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THE 

Glory of Our Youth 

AS PORTRAYED IN THE EVENTS AND MOVEMENTS THAT 

HAVE CHIEFLY DISTINGUISHED THE MARVELOUS 

ADVANCE OF THE AMERICAN NATION 

From Colony to World Power 



THE FASCINATING STORY 

Interesting as a romance, of the notable occurrences and decisive actions in the 

Political, Social, Religious, Economic, and Industrial Life of the 

People, from the Birth of the Republic 

to the current year 

WITH 

ENTERTAINING AND RELIABLE 

Character-sketches of the men and women whom the Nation has 

delighted to honor; all made doubly interesting by lively 

accounts of personal experiences, anecdotes, etc. 

BY 
FRAZAR KIRKLAND 

AND 

CHARLES W. CHASE, A. B. 



Richly illustrated with about four hundred reproductions 
of famous paintings, portraits, etc. 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE C. A. NICHOLS COMPANY 

SPRINGFIELD, MASS. 



vA' 



^ 



^^.<v 



Copyright 1909 by 
THE C. A. NICHOLS Co. 



,1. b. lyon company 

Electrottpers, Pbinters and Binders, 

albany, new york. 



©Gl. A 2 53240 




IT is superfluous to remind an American reader that the United 
States have become a great Nation, well nigh incomparably great 
in its virtues and achievements, — not insignificantly great, per- 
haps, in its vices and in what it has failed to accomplish. Scores of writers have 
depicted in dignified and stately narrative the growth of the Nation, from a weak and 
discordant condition that threatened to be fatal, to the stage of exalted power, bound- 
less resources and wealtli, and vast moral influence which it holds to-day. 

In the present work, however, the author has conceived of this national life as the 
counterpart or reflection of the life of an individual. In the Colonial period its 
infancy and childhood are seen, which gradually merge into a lusty and vigorous 
youth, chiefly through the unifying experiences of the Revolutionary war, and the 
broadening outlook that came with independent sovereignty and constantly enlarging 
national and international relations. By conscious and unconscious accretions of 
strength, physical vigor, and moral force the youth develops through a century of 
marvelous expansions until at its close full maturity of powers, definiteness of 
purpose, and a mighty determination to attain more lofty heights of achievement and 
influence mark the advent upon the world's stage of action of the adult Nation, — a 
World Power of lofty and imposing grandeur. And in the story of the Nation's 
progress from infancy to maturity we find " The Glory of Our Youth." 

Such a conception naturally admits of a method of treatment of the Nation's de- 
velopment very different from that of the ordinary historian. Wars and international 



PKEFACE. 



quarrels are considered rather as inci- 
dents in, than determining factors of, its 
growth. Their course, therefore, has not 
been followed closely or in detail; but 
significant events and movements that 
illustrate the patriotism, and the heroic 
purpose and action, of the people at differ- 
ent periods have been selected and de- 
scribed more fully than the space of the 
usual historic narration would permit. 
But hardly a year has passed since Inde- 
pendence was proclaimed when a certain 
individual occurrence or natural phe- 
nomenon lias not chiefly absorbed the 
thought and attention of all the people of 
the land. Such living questions of diiler- 
ent periods it has been the author's aim 
to select with judgment and make the 
subject of detailed treatment in the 
several chapters of this work. By this 
method of presenting the story of the 
Nation's development the reader may 
become more intimately familiar with the 
dominant hopes, fears, and aspirations of 
the people as the years rolled by than 
would otherwise be possible; while it 
admits of the description of personal ex- 
periences, interesting and peculiar situ- 
ations, and the introduction of anecdotes, 
which serve to enliven the narrative. 

No subject, for example, so engaged 
popular attention in 1789 as the novel 
function of inaugurating the first Presi- 
dent of the new Republic. The standard 
histories simply record the main features 
of the event, with comment especially 
directed toward its political significance. 
Here, however, by making the inaugura- 
tion the subject of a separate chapter, the 
autlior has been able to weave into the 
story interesting incidents, to describe in 
detail the movements, bearing, and dress 
of President Washington, the manner in 
which popular enthusiasm expressed itself, 
and many similar features in much the 
same way as the Press correspondents 
have recently sent into every home an 
account of all the incidents of interest 
connected with the inauguration of 
President Taft. Comparatively few people 
of the present day are aware that their 
forefathers in 1780 were thrown into an 



almost incredible state of superstitious 
fear and terror by what was long known 
and talked of as the " Wonderful Dark 
Day." By selecting that as the subject 
best illustrating popular interest at that 
time, it is possible to depict with a large 
measure of clearness the mental and re- 
ligious sentiment then prevalent. Look- 
ing back to the year 1857 one finds the 
whole country disturbed and all its people 
woefully distressed by conditions not ap- 
parently related, yet which our narrative 
will show were closely connected. The 
" Great Panic " of that year carried 
despair and ruin into thousands of homes 
all over the land; in the "Great Revival" 
movement of the same period one sees the 
stricken people, by scores of thousands, 
turning for succor to Him " who opens 
His hand " only " to satisfy the desire of 
every living thing." A chapter given to 
each of these subjects is replete with in- 
cidents and anecdotes that touch the heart 
and kindle the fires of sympathy in the 
breast of every reader. With the Great 
lievival movement of 1857 the author has 
associated a detailed and inspiriting ac- 
count of the wonderful work of Moody 
and Sankey twenty years later. At first 
blush one would fail to recognize any con- 
nection between the chance meeting of 
Alexander I. of Russia, in 1815, with the 
religious enthusiast and pietist, Mme. de 
Krudener, and the establishment of the 
Monroe Doctrine and the settlement of 
the Venezuela Boundary dispute. As the 
attitude of President Cleveland on the 
latter subject was the topic of dominant 
interest in this country and England in 
1895, it has naturally been chosen as the 
subject of our chapter to illustrate that 
period; and it has thus been possible to 
trace to its source, and in an interesting 
manner to make more intelligible, the 
development of the great American 
Doctrine which then, for the first time, 
was recognized by the foremost Powers 
of the world as an unwritten principle of 
International Law. No one matter of 
public concern, probably, has more 
thoroughly engrossed the thought and 
attention of the American people during 



PREFACE. 



the last decade than the Isthmian Canal. 
Making this the subject of one of our 
longer ehaxsters, the progress of the Canal 
scheme is detailed from the days when 
Philip II. of Spain, after prolonged in- 
vestigation by his naval officers and en- 
gineers, abandoned the project because it 
was evidently an impious act for man to 
attempt to join oceans which God had 
put asunder, down to the latest visit of 
President Taft to Panama. And lastly, 
not to cite other illustrations from the 
scores that are noted in our Table of 
Contents, it will be within thfe memory 
of most of our readers how the religious 
world was shocked when it was proposed 
to revise the grand old Bible, which had 
been considered perfect in every respect, 
and of too sacred a character to be 
touched by the irreverent hands of so- 
called textual critics and advanced 
Biblical scholars. A vast majority of 
Bible readers sympathized with the senti- 
ment of the curate quoted by Bishop 
Wordsworth, " that if the authorized 
version was good enough for St. Paul it 
was good enough for him." Selecting 
the Revision of the Bible as the subject 
for our chapter illustrating popular 
thought and interest about 1880, it is 
shown in a lucid and, it is believed, very 
entertaining and instructive manner how 
our prized King James Version has been 
evolved from a long succession of ante- 
cedent versions; and it is also made 
manifest that nothing of its essential 
truth has been disturbed or destroyed in 
the revision. 

These topics are named merely to 
illustrate as clearly as we may the idea 
that has been worked out in the prepara- 
tion of this book. With loving interest 
and thoughtful study the author has sur- 
veyed the period of the nation's history 
which in his thought constituted its 
" C41orious Youth," and has chosen such 
subjects for detailed treatment as seem to 
express most fully the mental and physical 
activities of the jjeople for nearly each 
year of the period covered; and which, he 
believes, in their totality furnish a more 
illuminating and vastly more fascinating 



survey of the young nation's progress 
toward maturity than can be secured by 
any other method of treatment. His 
purpose has been not merely to instruct, 
but to interest and entertain the reader ; 
" by judicious selection, rejection, and ar- 
rangement," as Macaulay has said, " to 
give to truth those attractions which have 
been usurped by fiction." 

Most frankly and happily it is admitted 
that the aim has been to present the 
various subjects treated in a populwr 
manner. But with the most determined 
insistence it is maintained that such a 
treatment need not, and has not been 
allowed to, in any degree involve a loss 
of dignity in the style of writing, nor 
of a keen sense of the difference between 
what appeals to a vicious and uneducated 
public sentiment and that which ministers 
to the highest ideals, loftiest aspirations, 
and purest life of an intelligent and 
right-minded people. The author has 
had in mind the hundreds of thousands of 
average homes throughout this great land ; 
and unless he has lamentably failed in his 
labors the work will be fomid intellectu- 
ally and morally enlightening and helpful, 
and, best of all, stimulating in an 
unusual degree of a desire to know more 
of the history and true greatness of this, 
our home-land. 

Nor has the .pen alone been brought 
into use to secure these ends. The senses 
are also appealed to and interested by re- 
productions of some of the best work of 
artist, engraver, and photographer. It 
will at once be recognized, however, that 
the aim has not been merely to attract the 
eye. Every picture is designed to truhj 
illustrate the text, not merely to adorn 
the page. For this reason a great num- 
ber of old and rare prints have been re- 
produced that the reader may more 
readily appreciate the actual conditions 
that existed in any community at the 
period described. This has involved the 
insertion in these pages of more than 
three hundred portraits of distinguished 
actors in the thrilling movements of the 
Nation's youth, scenes of notable events, 
and illustrations of customs, dress, modes 



8 



PREFACE. 



of travel, marvels of industrial and 
scientific development, etc. 

Because apparently isolated events or 
movements have been described, however, 
one should not imagine that such subjects 
have been selected at random nor in any 
hap-hazard way. There is a unity of 
purpose and a general thread of con- 
tinuity underlying the whole work; and 
the author feels great assurance that the 
unity of History has been quite as well 
conserved as in any of the more pre- 
tentious histories. But a great gain is 
made in the opportunity for interesting 



and attractive statement. Each chapter 
being complete in itself and devoted en- 
tirely to the delineation of a single sub- 
ject, the volume may be taken up at any 
time and opened by chance at any place, 
and one find an entertaining story or 
narrative, replete with informing and 
suggestive material ; all of which is made 
more truly attractive by anecdotes of the 
actors in the events described and others, 
by accounts of individual experiences, 
and by a most generous supply of 
portraits and pictures which eilectually 
illustrate and illuminate the narrative. 




In Colonial Days. 

Marvelous Achievements of Nineteenth Century.^ — Far Surpass Those of All Previous Cen- 
turies. — Washington Could Travel No Faster, Nor Despatch Messages More Quickly, Than 
CiEsar or Hammurabi. — Views of John Fiske. — " The Past Contains Within Itself All the 
Germs of the Future." — Mr. J. N. Larned's P>evie\v of Historical Development. — The United 
States in 1800.^ — New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Compared. — Washington in 1800. — Com- 
mercial and Social Life of Charleston. — Passion for Sport, Including the Rough-and- 
Tumble Fight. — Beginning of Cotton Culture and the Invention of the Cotton Gin. — Migra- 
tion to the Ohio Valley. — Local State Jealousies. — Contest Over Adoption of the Consti- 
tution. — Payment of Taxes an "Amiable Eccentricity." — Not a Dollar in the National 
Treasury. — Craze for Cheap Money and Depreciation of Currency. — Samuel Adams Pays 
.$2,000 for Hat and Suit of Clothes. — Injury to Cause of Popular Government Worked by 
Popular Discord.— Opinions of Fisher Ames, Hamilton, and Others. — " Your People, Sir. 
Your People is a Great Beast." — The Post Office Department. — First Mail Despatched on 
American Continent. — Methods of Travel, Inns, Etc. — The Early Stage Coaches and Famous 
Concord Stages. — Advent of Steam Railroad. — Home Life in the Colonies. — The Dining- 
room and the Kitchen. — The Light of Our Fathers. — The Clergv and Churches. — Intem- 
perance the National Curse. — Moral Status of the People. — Intellectual and Literary Con- 
ditions and Publications. — ^No Scientific Attainments. — Opinions of " Tom " Moore, Noah 
Webster, and Others. — Contrast Between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries... SI 



10 CONTENTS. 

II. 
Birth of the New Eepublic. — 1776. 
Declaration of American Indejjendence and National Sovereignty-, July Fourth, 1776. — TIr- 
Gauntlet of Defiance thrown at the Feet of the British Empire by Her Yoiuigest Colonies. 
— Vast Disparity, in Power and Resources, between the Contestants. — The whole World 
Looks on Astonished. — Seven Years' Bloody and Desolating War. — The American Cause Tri- 
umphant. — Grandest Modern Event. — America Resists Unjust Taxation. — Haughty Obsti- 
nacy of King George. — Burning Eloquence of Patrick Henry.- — His Summons, " We Must 
Fight." — Washington Endorses this Sentiment. — Determination of the People. — War Pre- 
ferred to Submission. — Momentous Action by Congress. — Separation from England Decreed. 
— Effect of the Act in America. — Its Reception in England. — Excitement of the King and 
Court. — Lord Chatham, America's Advocate. — His Passionate Change of Views. — Scorching 
Speech against the Colonies. — He is Struck Dead while Speaking. — Magnanimity of Burke 
and Fox. — Recognition from France Secured. — Her Timely Aid in the Struggle. — Victories 
over the British Armies. — England Gives Up the Contest. — World-wide Welcome to the 
New Nation 65 

III. 

First Americ.\n Nav.\l Victory. — 1779. 
John Paul .Tones, Commanding the Bon Homme Richard, Fights and Captures King George's 
Powerful Ship-of-war, the Serapis. in British Waters. — Crowds of Spectators Line the Eng- 
lish Coast. — The Most Sanguinary Battle Ever Fought between Single Ships. — Jones is 
Hailed as '" The Washington of the Seas." — World-wide Interest of this Combat. — Commo- 
dore Jones's Early Career. — Offers his Services to Congress. — Appointed a Naval Lieutenant. 
— Joins the Continental Fleet. — The First to Hoist its Ensign. — Style and ilotto of the 
Flag. — Sails from France on a Cruise. — Terror Created by His ^Movements. — Characteristic 
Anecdotes. — Two British Frigates in Sight. — Jones Ready for Bloody Work. — The Ships 
Muzzle to Muzzle. — Superiority of the Serapis. — A Most Deadly Contest. — Both Vessels on 
Fire. — .Jones Attacked by Another Foe. — One of His Vessels Treacherous. — Remarkable 
Scenes. — Britain's Flag Struck to America. — An Act without Precedent. — Sinking of the 
Victorious Vessel 72 

IV. 

The Wonderful Dark Day. — 1780. 

The Northern States wrapt in a Dense Black Atmosphere for Fifteen Hours. — The Day of 
Judgment Supposed to have Come. — Cessation of Labor. — Religious Devotions Resorted to. 
— The Herds Retire to their Stalls, the Fowls to their Roosts, and the Birds Sing Their 
Evening Songs at Noonday. — Science at Loss to Account for the Mysterious Phenomenon. — 
One of Nature's Marvels. — Redness of the Sun and Moon. — Approach of a Thick Vapor. — 
Loud Peals of Thunder. — Sudden and Strange Darkness. — Alarm of the Inhabitants. — End 
of the World Looked For. — Dismay of the Brute Creation. — An Intensely Deep Gloom. — 
Difficulty in Attending to Business.- — Lights Burning in the Houses. — Vast Extent of the 
Occurrence. — Condition of the Barometer. — Change in the Color of Objects. — Quick Motion 
of the Clouds. — Birds Suffocate and Die. — The Sun's Di.sc Seen in Some Places. — Oily 
Deposit on the Waters. — Impenetrable Darkness at Night. — Incidents and Anecdotes. — 
Ignorant TOiims and Conjectures. — An Unsolved Mystery 79 

V. 

Washington's Farewell to the Army. — 1783. 

Affecting Interviews and Parting Words between the Great Chieftain and His Comrades-in- 
Arms. — Solemn Farewell Audience with Congress. — In Its Presence He Voluntarily Divests 
Himself of His Supreme Authority, Returns His Victorious Sword, and Becomes a Private 
Citizen. — History of the Election of a Military Leader. — America's Destiny in His Hands. 
— Appointment of George Washington. — The Army at Cambridge, Mass. — He Immediately 
Takes Command. — Is Enthusiastically Greeted. — Leads Its Fortunes Seven Years. — Record 



CONTENTS. 11 

of His Generalship.— Ends tlie War in Triumpli. — Scheme to Make Him King.— Indig- 
nantly Rebukes the Proposal.— Last Review of His Troops.— His Strong Attachment for 
Them. — Intention to Leave Public Life. — Congress Informed of this Fact. — Embarkation 
from New York. — Homage Paid Him Everywhere. — Arrival at Annapolis. — Proceeds to the 
Halls of Congress. — Impressive Ceremonial There. — Rare Event in Human History 88 

VI. 

Appointment of the First Minister Plenipotentiary from the New Republic to 

THE English Court. — 1785. 

John Adams, America's Sturdiest Patriot, and the Foremost Enemy of British Tyranny, Fills 
this High Office. — Interview between Him and King George, His Late Sovereign. — Their 
Addresses, Temper, Personal Bearing, and Humorous Conversation. — ^The Two Men Rightly 
Matched against Each Other. — Old Animosities Unhealed. — ilutual Charges of False Deal- 
ing. — Settlement Demanded by the United States. — What Adams's Mission Involved. — Dis- 
memberment of the British Realm. — Loss of the Fairest Possession. — Bitter Pill for the 
King. — His Obstinacy Forced to Yield. — Humiliation of the Proud Monarch. — All Europe 
Watches the Event. — Mr. Adams Presented at Court. — ^Patriot and King Face to Face.— 
Official Address by the Minister. — Reply of King George. — His Visible Agitation. — Adams's 
Presence of Mind. — Pays His Homage to the Queen. — Her Majesty's Response. — Civilities 
by the Royal Family. — Results of this Embassy. — Pitiable Position of George the Third.— 
Fatal Error of Great Britain 95 

VII. 
First Organized Rebellion in the United States. — 1786. 
Daniel Shays, at the Head of an Armed and Desperate Force, Boldly Defies the State and Fed- 
eral Laws in Massachusetts. — " Taxation and Tyranny " the Alleged Grievances. — Alarming 
Disaffection throughout all New England. — Bad Leaders and Furious Mobs. — Rout of the 
Insurgents, by General Lincoln, in the Dead of Winter. — Patriotic Old Massachusetts in a 
Ferment. — Causes of Public Discontent. — Total Exhaustion of Credit. — Prostration of Trade. 
—Ruinous Debts, Heavy Taxation. — Weakness of the Government. — An Excited Populace. 
— Turbulence and Lawlessness. — All Authority Spurned. — A Bloody Conflict Invited. — 
Courts of Justice Broken Up. — Indignation of Washington. — Heroism on the Bench. — The 
National Forces Augmented. — Fears of a General Civil War. — Unscrupulousness of Shays. 
— Intention to Seize the Capitol. — Governor Bbwdoin's Defenses. — General Lincoln in Com- 
mand. — Active Movement of His Troops. — A Terrible Snow Storm. — Hardships of Shays's 
Army. — Federal Bayonets Triumphant 101 

vni. 

Formation and Adoption of the Federal Constitution. — 1787. 
The United States no Longer a People without a Government. — Establishment of the Repub- 
lic on a Permanent Foundation of Unity, Organic Law, and National Polity. — Dignity, 
Learning, and Eloquence of the Delegates. — Sublime Scene on Signing the Instrument. — 
Extraordinary Character of the Whole Transaction. — State of Things After the War. — 
Financial Embarrassment. — Despondency of the People. — Grave Crisis in Public Affairs. — 
A Grand Movement Initiated. — Plan of Government to be Framed. — All the States in Con- 
vention. — Washington Chosen to Preside. — Statesmen and Sages in Council. — The Old Com- 
pact Abrogated. — New Basis of Union Proposed. — Various Schemes Discussed. — .Jealousy of 
the Smaller States. — Angry Debates, Sectional Threats. — Bad Prospects of the Convention. — 
Its Dissolution Imminent. — Franklin's Impressive Appeal. — Compromise and Conciliation. — 
Final System Agreed Upon. — Patriotism Rules all Hearts. — Ratification by the Stat/cs. — 
National Joy at the Decision lOS 

IX. 
First Election and Inauguration of a President of the United States. — 1789. 
Washington, " First in War, First in Peace, and First in the Hearts of His Countrymen," tlie 
Nation's Spontaneous, Unanimous Choice. — His Triumphal Progress from Home, and Sol- 



12 CONTENTS. 

enin Imluction into Office. — .Jubilee tlirougliout the Republic, over the August Event. — 
Auspicious Commencement of the National Executive Government. — Requirements of the 
Constitution. — A President to be Chosen. — Four Years tlie Term of Service. — All Eyes 
Fi.\ed Upon Washington. — His Reluctance to Accept. — Reasons Given for this Course. — 
Urgent Appeals to Him. — The Result of the Election. — One Voice and One Mind. — He 
Bows to the People's Will. — Joy Produced by His Decision. — Departs at Once from Mount 
Vernon. — Farewell Visits to His Mother. — Inauguration Appointed for March Fourth. — 
Postponement to A])ril Thirtieth. — Order of Ceremonies. — Xew Spectacle in the Western 
World. — Distinguished Celebrities Present. — Washington's Elegant Appearance. — Dignity 
when Taking the Oath. — Reverentially Kisses the Bible. — Curious Customs Initiated.. 11.5 



X. 

Whitney's Extraohuixary Cotton Gin Invention. — 1793. 

Amazing Impetus Given to tlie Culture, Uses, and Consumption of Cotton. — Revolution in the 
Industrial Prospects and Political Power of the South. — How Cotton Became " King." — Its 
Relation to the Great Themes and Events in American History. — Ingratitude to Whitney. — 
His Brilliant Change of Fortune in Anotlier Spliere. — Whitney's Obscure Circumstances. — 
His Early Mechanical Genius. — Determined to Get an Education. — Goes to the South as a 
Teacher. — Change of Pursuits. — Befriended by General Greene's Widow. — Amateur Invent- 
ive Efforts. — Low State of Southern Industry. — Objection to Cotton-Raising.- — Mrs. 
Greene's Apt Suggestion. — Whitney's Characteristic Resolve. — Secret and Persevering Toil. 
— Exciting Rumors as to His Purpose. — Gi-eat Expectations Entertained. — Triumphant Suc- 
cess. — Entliusiasm of the Cotton-Growers. — His Machine Stolen from Him. — Infringements 
upon His Patent. — Law-Suits, but no Redress for Him. — His Patlietic Letter to Fulton. — • 
He Invents a Valuable Firearm. — Soutliern Strides in Wealth 122 



XL 

FouNuiNi; ANU Est.^blishment of the National Capital. — 1799. 
Bitter Sectional Contest in Deciiling the Location. — First " Compromise " in Congress between 
the Xorth and the South. — Final Removal of the Government and its Archives to Washing- 
ton. — Official Observance of the Event. — Magnificent Site and Plan of the City. — Splendor 
of its Public Buildings. — Congress First Sits in Philadelphia. — Need of a Permanent Capi- 
tal. — National Dignity Involved. — Violent Agitation of the Subject. — Philadelphia and New 
York Proposed. — They are Objected to by the South. — Northern Disunion Threats. — 
Schemes of Conciliation. — How the Question was Settled. — Sweetening Two Bitter Pills. — 
.Jefferson's Graphic Account. — General Washington's Preference. — His Site on the Potomac 
Adopted. — Some Ratlier Personal Anecdotes. — Work of Laying Out the City. — Its Original 
Aspect and Condition. — Early Trials of the President's Wife.- — Construction of the Capitol. 
— Its Corner-stone Laid by Washington. — Congress in its New Halls. — -Growth of the 
Metropolis. — The New Corner-Stone of 1851 129 



XII. 
Death of George Wa.shington. — 1799. 
His Sudden and Brief Illness, Last Hours, and Dying Words. — Fortitude and Serenity through 
all His Sufferings. — He Calmly .Announces His Approaching Dissolution Without a Mur- 
mur. — The Whole World Does Honor, by Eulogy and Lamentations, to His Exalted Worth 
and Immortal Fame. — He Anticipated an Early Death. — His Invariably Good Health. — 
Exposure in a Snow-Storm. — Takes a Fatal Cold. — Last Letter Written by His Hand. — 
Reads the Papers in the Evening. — Characteristic Reply to His Wife. — ^Passes a Restless 
Night. — Alarming Condition the Next Day. — Medical Treatment of no Avail. — Calls for His 
Two Wills, Burns One. — Affecting Scene at His Bedside. — ^Last Words, " 'Tis Well!"^ 
Only One Day's Sickness. — Acute Laryngitis His Disease. — Burial in the Old Family Vault. 
— Tidings of His Death. — Tributes from Peoples and Kings. — A Man Without a Parallel. — 
Last Page in His .Tournal. — Re-entombment in 1837. — Appearance of His Remains. . . . 136 



CONTENTS. 13 

xni. 

Fatal Duel Between Mr. Burr and General Alexander Hamilton. — 1804. 

Fall of Hamilton at First Fire." — His Death in Thirty Hours. — Profound Sensation and Solemn 
Obsequies in all Parts of the Land. — Mourned as One of the Founders of the Republic. — 
Indictment of the Assassin for the Crime of Murder. — Hamilton's Brilliant Public Life. — 
Washington's Riglit-liand SLin. — Champion of the Federalists. — Burr's Career in the Revo- 
lution. — His Notorious Debauchery. — Finally Dismissed by Washington. — Becomes Vice- 
President in 1800. — Deadly Personal Hatreds. — Criticisms on Burr by His Opponents. — 
Challenge Sent to Hamilton. — Pacific Explanations Spurned. — Forced to ileet Burr. — Makes 
His Will in Anticipation. — Sings at a Banquet the Day Before. — Arrival of the Fatal Hour. 
— Hamilton's Mortal Wound. — What He Said of the Event. — Conversation before Dying. — 
Partakes of the Communion. — His Testimony against Dueling. — Heartless Conduct of 
Burr. — A Fugitive and an Outlaw 141 

XIV. 

Fulton's Triumphant Application of Steam to Navigation. — 1807. 
First Steam-boat Voyage on American Waters under His Direction. — Astonishment Produced 
by the Exhibition. — Great Era in National Development. — The World at Large Indebted to 
American Ingenuity and Enterprise for this Mighty Revolutionary Agent in Human Prog- 
ress and Power. — The Wliole Scale of Civilization Enlarged. — Fulton's Early Mechanisms. 
— His Inventive Projects Abroad. — Steam Propulsion tlie End Sought. — Various Experi- 
ments and Trials. — Livingston's Valued Co-operation. — Studying the Principle Involved. — 
Its Discovery at Last. — Legislative Encouragement Asked. — Public Ridicule of the Scheme. 
— Construction of a Steam-boat. — The " Queer-Looking Craft." — Incidents at the Launch. — 
Undaunted Confidence of Fulton. — Sailing of the " New-Fangled Craft." — Demonstrations 
Along the Route. — Complete Success of the Trip. — First Passage Money. — That Bottle of 
Wine. — Opposition Lines, and Racing. — First Steam-boat at the West. — Amazing Subse- 
quent Increase. — Fulton's Checkered Fortunes 151 

XV. 

Capture of the British Fkig.'vte Guf.rrieri: by the United States Frigate Consti- 
tution. — 1812. 

Captain Dacres's Insolent Challenge to the American Navy. — Captain Hull's Eager Accept- 
ance. — His Unrivaled Tactics and Maneuvers. — A Short, Terrific, Decisive Contest. — Yankee 
Valor on the Ocean a Fixed Fact, Sternly Respected. — The Constitution Becomes the Favor- 
ite Ship of the Nation and is Popularly Called " Old Ironsides." — Cruise of the Constitution. 
— Hull, the "Sea King." in Command. — A Sail! The Enemy's Squadron! — Chased Three 
Days by Them. — Rowing and Warping in a Calm. — Most Wonderful Escape on Record. — 
Another Frigate in Sight, the Guerriere. — Her Signals of Defiance. — Yankee Eagerness for 
Action. — The Two Frigates Afoul. — Yard- Arm to Yard-Arm Encounter. — Fire of the Con- 
stitution Reserved. — Final and Deadly Broadsides. — Fearless Conduct of Her Crew. — British 
Colors Hauled Down. — Sinking of the Shattered Wreck. — Armament and Power of the 
Ships. — An Almost Equal Match. — Anecdotes of the Two Commanders. — Honors to the 
Brave Victors. — Future Annals of the Constitution. — Her Varied and Noble Career. . . 157 

XVI. 

General J.\ckson's Terrible Kout .\nd Slaughter of the British Army, at New 

Orleans.— 181.5. 

His Consummate Generalship in the Order and Conduct of this Campaign. — The War with 
England Terminated by a Sudden and Splendid Victory to the American Arms. — Jackson is 
Hailed as One of the Greatest of Modern Warriors, and as the Deliverer and Second Savior 
of His Country. — National Military Prestige Gained by this Decisive Battle. — British Inva- 
sion of Louisiana. — Preparations to Resist Them. — Jackson Hastens to New Orleans. — His 
Presence Inspires Confidence. — Martial L.aw Proclaimed. — Progress of the British Forces. — 
They Rendezvous at Ship Island. — Pirates and Indians for Allies. — Capture of the United 



14 CONTENTS. 

States Flotilla. — Arrival of Veterans from England. — Desperate Attempts at Storming. — 
Both Armies Face Each Other. — The Day of Action, January Eighth. — General PaUenham 
Leads the Charge. — His ilotto, " Booty and Beauty." — Fire and Death Open Upon Them. — 
Tliey Are ilowii Dawn Like Grass. — Pakenliam Falls at the Onset. — Panic and Precipitate 
Retreat. — America's Motto, " Victory or Death." — T!ie Result at Home and Abroad. — 
Startling and Impressive Effect 166 

XVII. 

The Ever-Memor.\ble September Gale. — 1S15. 
Its Violence and Destructiveness ■without a Parallel Since the Settlement of the Country. — 
Terror Excited by its Sudden and Tumultuous Force. — LTnprecedented Phenomena of Tem- 
pest, Deluge, and Flood. — One Hour of Indescribable Havoc on the Land and Sea. — Premon- 
itory Indications. — Heavy North-east Rains. — .Sudden and Violent Changes of Wind. — Its 
Rapidity and Force Indescribable. — Demolition of Hundreds of Buildings. — Orchards and 
Forests Instantly Uprooted. — Raging and Foaming of the Sea. — Its Spray Drives like a 
Snow-Storm over the Land. — Tremendous Rise in the Tides. — Irresistible Impetuosity of the 
Flood. — Several Feet of Water in the Streets. — Innumerable Fragments Fill the Air. — Flight 
for Safety to the Fields. — The whole Coast Swarms with Wrecks. — Perils, Escapes, Fatali- 
ties. — Peculiar Meteorological Facts. — Bright Skies in the Midst of the Tempest. — Suffo- 
cating Current of Hot Air. — Sea Fowls in the Depths of the Interior. — Effect upon Lands, 
Crops, and Wells. — All New England Desolated. — Comparison with Other Gales 173 

XVIII. 

Visit of Lafayette to America, as the Guest of the Eepublic. — 1824. 
His Tour of Five Thousand Miles through the Twenty-four States. — A National Ovation on 
the Grandest Scale. — Cities, States, Legislatures and Governors. Vie in Their Demonstrations 
of Respect. — The Venerable Patriot Enters the Tomb and Stands beside the Remains of his 
Great Departed Friend, Washington. — Noble Qualities of the ilarquis. — A Favorite of 
Louis XVI. — Hears of tlie Battle of Bunker Hill. — Pleads the Cause of the Americans. — • 
Resolves to Join their Army. — Freely Consecrates his Vast Wealth. — Equips a Vessel and 
Embarks. — Introduced to General Washington. — Admiration of Him by the Chieftain. — One 
of Washington's Military Family. — A Major-General in His Nineteenth Year. — Heroic Fi- 
delity During the War. — Subsequent Vicissitudes in France. — America's Heart-felt Sym- 
pathy. — He Leaves Havre for New York. — Enthusiasm Excited by his Presence. — Incidents, 
Interviews. Fetes. — Greetings with Old Comrades. — Memories, Joys, and Tears. — Departs in 
the United States Ship Brandywine.— His Death in 1834. — National Grief 181 

XIX. 

Fiftieth A^■xlVERSARY and Celebration of the Independence of the Republic. — 1826. 

Sudden and Simultaneous Death of Ex-Presidents .lohn Adams and Thomas .Jefferson, its Two 
Most Illustrious Founders. — Tlie Day of Resounding Joy and .Jubilee Clianged to One of 
Profound National Sorrow. — No Historical Parallel to Such a Remarkable Coincidence. — 
World-Renowned Career of these Statesmen. — Extraordinary Preparations for the Day. — 
Adams and Jefferson then Alive. — Sires and Patriarchs of the Nation. — Their Names House- 
hold Words. — Invited to Share in the Festivities. — Tliey Hail the Glorious Morn. — Great 
Rejoicings; Death's Summons. — Jefferson's Distinguishing Honor.- — Adams's Patriotic Lus- 
ter. — Their Imperishable Deeds. — Calm Yet High Enthusiasm. — Hostile Leaders in After- 
Life. — Racy and Piquant Anecdote. — Crisis Point in Adams's J^ortunes. — His Last Toast 
for His Country, — " Indejiendence Forever." — Two Sages in Old Age. — Serenity, Wisdom, 
Dignity. — Former Friendship Revived. — Letters of Mutual Attachment. — European Admir- 
ation Excited. — Reverence to Their Colossal Fame 191 

XX. 

The " Gre.\t Debate " Between Webster and Hayne, in Conoress. — 1830. 
Vital Constitutional Issues Discussed. — Unsurpassed Power and Splendor of Senatorial Elo- 
quence. — Webster's Speech Acknowledged to be the Grandest Forensic Achievement in the 



CONTENTS. 15 

Whole Range of ]\Iodern Parliamentary Efforts. — Golden Age of American Oratory. — Un- 
precedented Interest and Excitement Produced in the Public Mind. — No American Debate 
Comparable with This. — Known as " The Battle of the Giants." — Inflamed Feeling at the 
South. — Hayne's Brilliant Championship. — His Speech Against the North. — Profound Im- 
pression Created. — Its Dash, Assurance, Severity. — Bitter and Sweeping Charges. — His Op- 
ponents Wonder-Struck. — Webster has the Floor to Reply. — An Ever-Memorable Day. — 
Intense Anxiety to Hear Him. — Magnificent Personal Appearance. — His Exordium; All 
Hearts Enchained. — Immense Intellectual Range. — Copious and Crushing Logic. — Accumu- 
lative Grandeur of Thought. — Thrilling Apostrophe to the Union. — The Serious, Comic, 
Pathetic, etc. — Hayne's Argument Demolished. — Reception Accorded the Speech. — Rival 
Orators ; Pleasant Courtesies 197 

XXI. 

Struggle fob the Eight of Petition in Congress. — 1836. 
John Quincy Adams, the " Old Man Eloquent," Carries on a Contest of Eleven Days, Single- 
Handed, in its Defense in the House of Representatives. — Passage of the " Gag Rule." — Ex- 
pulsion and Assassination Threatened. — His Unquailing Courage. — A Spectacle Unwitnesseil 
'hefore in the Halls of Legislation. — Triumph of His Master Mind. — The Right of Petition a 
Constitutional One. — Indiscriminate and Unrestricted. — Anti-Slavery Petitions. Mr. Adams 
Their Champion. — An Unpopular Position. — He Defies Every Menace. — His Bold and In- 
trepid Conduct. — The North and South at Variance. — Monster Petitions Pour In. — A Me- 
morial from Slaves. — Wild Tumult in the House. — Cries of " Expel the Old Scoundrel ! " — 
Proposal to Censure and Disgrace Him. — Mr. Adams Unmoved Amidst the Tempest. — Elo- 
quence and Indomltaibleness. — A Petition to Dissolve the Union. — Increased Exasperation. 
— Violent and Denunciatory Debate. — Sublime Bearing of ilr. Adams. — Vindicated and 
Victorious at Last. — What He Lived to See. — Honor from His Opponents 200 

xxn. 

Breaking Out of the Temperance Eeformation. — 1840. 
Origin, Rapid Spread, Influence, and Wonderful History of the Movement. — Enthusiasm At- 
tending the " Washington " Era. — Its Pioneers Rise from the Gutter to the Rostrum, and 
Sway Multitudes by Their Eloquence. — Father Mathew's Visit. — His 600,000 Converts. — Ca- 
reer of Hawkins, Mitchell, Gough, Dow, and Others. — First Temperance Society in the 
United States. — Singular Terms of Membership. — Social Customs in Former Times. — Unre- 
strained Use of Spirits. — Growing Desire for Reform. — Influential Men Enlisted. — Meetings, 
Societies, Agitation. — A Congressional Organization. — Origin of " Tee-Totalism." — Deacon 
Giles's Distillery. — " My Mother's Gold Ring." — Rise of " Wa.shingtonianism." — Six Re- 
formed Drunkards. — Cold Water Armies, Processions, etc. — Music. Banners, and Badges. — 
The Country All Ablaze. — An "Apostle of Temperance." — Administering the Pledge. — Con- 
flict Concerning Measures. — Anecdotes of Washington. — General Taylor's Whiskey Jug. — 
Farragut's Substitute for Grog 217 

XXIII. 

Invention op that Wondrous Piece of Mechanism, the Sewing Machine. — 1846. 

Romantic Genius and Perseverance Displayed in Its Production. — Toils of the Inventor in His 
Garret. — World-Wide Introduction of the Device. — Upwards of One Thousand Patents 
Taken Out in the United States. — The Industrial Interests of the Country Affected to the 
Amount of $.500,000,000 Annually. — The Humble Inventor Becomes a Millionaire. — ^The 
Main Principle Involved. — Comparison With Hand Sewing. — How it was Suggested. — Lis- 
tening to Some Advantage. — History of Mr. Howe's Efforts. — Ingenuity, Struggles, Triumphs. 
— Value of a Friend in Need. — A Machine at Last. — Its Parts, Capabilities, etc. — Reception 
by the Public. — Doubt Succeeded by Admiration. — Great Popularity and Demand. — Weari- 
some Litigation With Rivals. — Interesting Question of Priority. — Decided in Howe's Favor. 
— He Rises to Affluence. — Improvements by Others. — Unique and Useful Devices. — Number 
of Machines Produced. — Time and Labor Saved. — Effect Upon Prices. — New Avenues of 
Labor Opened 226 



16 CONTENTS. 

XXIV. 

Discovery of the Inhalation of Ether as a Preventive of Pain. — 1846. 

Performance of Surgical Operations Involving tlie Intensest Torture, During the Ha])py Un- 
consciousness of tlie Patient. — Account of the First Capital Demonstration hefore a Crowded 
and Breathless Assembly. — Its Signal Success. — Thrill of Enthusiastic Joy. — Most Benefi- 
cent Boon Ever Conferred by Science upon the Human Race. — Instinctive Dread of Pain. — - 
Fruitless Search Hitherto for a Preventive. — Terror of the Probe and Knife. — Heroes Quail 
before Them. — Case of the Bluff Old Admiral. — Discovery of the Long-Sought Secret. — Sul- 
pliurio Ether the Prize. — Bliss During Amputation. — Honor Due to America. — A Whole 
World Elated. — Jledical Men Exultant. — Curious Religious Objections. — Test-Case in Sur- 
gery. — Startling and Romantic Interest. — Value in Public Hospitals. — War's Sufferings 
Ameliorated. — Various Effects While Inhaling. — Amusing and Extraordinary Cases. — 
"Thocht tlie Deil Had a Grip o' Her!"— Odd Talk of an Innocent Damsel.— Old Folks 
Wanting to Dance. — Awards to the Discoverers 234 

XXV. 

Discovery of Gold at Sutter's Mill, California. — 1848. 

Widely-Extended and Inexhaustible Deposits of the Precious Metal. — The News Spreads Like 
Wild-Fire to the Four Quarters of the Globe. — Overwhelming Tide of Emigration from all 
Countries. — Nucleus of a Great Empire on the Pacific. — California Becomes the El Dorado 
of the World and the Golden Commonwealth of the American Union. — First Practical Dis- 
covery of Gold. — On John A. Sutter's Land. — Found by J. W. Marshall. — Simple Accident 
That Led to It. — Marshall's Wild Excitement. — Shows Sutter the Golden Grains. — A Dra- 
matic Interview. — The Discovery Kept Secret. — How It was Disclosed. — A Real Wonder of 
the Age. — Trials of the Early Emigrants. — Their Bones Whiten the Soil. — All Professions 
at the Mines. — Impetus Given to Commerce. — Life Among the Diggers. — Disordered State 
of Society. — Crimes, Outrages, Conflagrations. — Scarcity: Fabulous Prices. — ilining by 
Machinery.— Order and Stability Reached.— Population in IS.iT, 600,000.— Gold in Ten 
Years, .$(500,000,000 242 



XXVI. 

Victorious 'Race of the Yacht "Ajierica," in the Great International 

Regatta. — 1851. 
She Distances, by Nearly Eight Miles, the Whole Fleet of Swift and Splendid Competitors, 
and Wins " the Cup of all Nations." — Grandest and Most Exciting Spectacle of the Kind 
Ever ICnown. — Queen Victoria Witnesses the Match. — Universal Astonishment at the Result. 
— Admiration Excited by the "America's" Beautiful Model and Ingenious Rig. — Scenes at 
the " World's Exhibition " at London. — Grand Finale Yet to Come Off. — Championship of 
the Sea. — England Sensitive on this Point. — Her Motto, "Rule Britannia!" — George Steers 
Builds the America. — Commodore Stevens Takes Her to England. — His Challenge to all 
Countries. — An International Prize Race. — Eighteen Yachts Entered. — The Scene on Wave 
and Shore. — All Sails Set: The Signal. — Every Eye on "the Yankee." — Her Leisurely Move- 
ments. — Allows Herself to be Distanced. — Her Quality Soon Shown. — No "Bellying" of 
Canvas. — Amazing Increase of Speed. — All Rivals Passed, One by One. — They Return in 
Despair. — Great Odds for the America. — Is Visited by Queen Victoria 2.50 

XXVII. 
N.U'AL Expedition to Jap.vn, under Commodore M. C. Perry. — 1852. 
Negotiations to be Opened for Unsealing the Ports of that Empire to America. — Letter of 
Friend.ship from the President of the LInited States to the Emperor. — Distinguished Favor 
Shown the Representatives of the Great Republic— Ceremonies, Entertainments, and Diplo- 
matic Conferences. — Treaty of Peace, Amity, and Commercial Intercourse Concluded. — 
Former .Japanese Isolation Policy. — Exclusive Privileges to the Dutch. — Effects of this Re- 
striction. — European Efforts to Change It. — Mission of Commodore Biddle. — Seeks the 



CONTENTS. 17 

Release of United States Sailors. — Ordered to Depart Forthwith. — Firm Conduct of Captain 
Glynn. — Contempt for .Japanese Etiquette. — Champagne as a ilediator. — Commodore Perry's 
Fine Fleet. — The Letter in a Golden Bo.x. — Its Presentation to the Emperor. — Commissioners 
Meet Commodore Perry. — Their Attire, Manners, Etc. — The Conference in Session. — Friend- 
liness of the Japanese. — Civilities and Festivals. — Reception on the Flag-Ship. — Substance 
of the Treaty. — A Talk with the Emperor. — More Privileges Extended 2.30 

XXVIII. 

Terrible Crisis in the Business and Fin.^ncial World. — 1837. 

Known as " the Great Panic." — A Sudden, Universal Crash, in the Height of Prosperity. — 
Caused by Wild Speculations and Enormous Debt. — Suspension of Banks all Over the Coun- 
try.— Failure of the Oldest and Wealthiest Houses. — Fortunes Swept Away in a Day. — Pros- 
tration of Every Branch of Industry. — Prolonged Embarrassment, Distrust, and Suffering. — 
The Panic of 1837 in Comparison. — Extravagance and High Prices. — Chimerical Railroad 
Schemes. — Mania for Land Investments. — Reckless Stock Gambling. — Western Paper Cities. 
— Fabulous Prices for " Lots." — Money Absorbed in this Way.— Bursting of the Bubble.— 
The First Great Blow. — A Bomb in Money Circles. — W'ide-Spread Shock and Terror. — 
Fierce Crowds at the Banks. — A Run Upon Them for Specie. — They " Go to the Wall." — 
Savings Bank Excitement. — Rare Doings at the Counters. — ^V^'it, Mirth, Despair, and Ruin. 
— Forty Thousand Persons in Wall Street. — Factories, Foundries, etc.. Stopped. — Business 
Credit Destroyed. — Root of the Whole Difficulty 267 

XXIX. 

The " Great Awakening " in the Eeligious World, and the Popular Movement (in 
1875-76) under Messrs. Moody and Sankey. — 18.57. 

Like a Mighty Rushing Wind, it Sweeps from the Atlantic to the Pacific. — Crowded Prayer- 
Meetings Held Daily in Every City and Town, from the Granite Hills of the North to the 
Rolling Prairies of the West and the Golden Slopes of California. — Large Accessions, from 
all Classes, to the Churches of Every Name and Denomination. — The "American Pentecost." 
— Early American Revivals. — Dr. Franklin and Mr. Whitefield. — The Revival of 1857 Spon- 
taneoxis. — No Leaders or Organizers. — Its Immediate Cause. — Universal Ruin of Commerce. 
— Anxiety for Higher Interests. — All Days of the Week Alike. — Business Men in the Work. 
— Telegraphing Religious Tidings. — New York a Center of Influence. — Fulton Street Prayer- 
Meeting. — Scenes in Burton's Theater. — New Themes and Actors. — Countless Requests for 
Prayers. — A Wonderful Book. — Striking Moral Results. — ilen of Violence Reformed. — 
Crime and Suicide Prevented. — Infidels, Gamblers, Pugilists. — Jessie Fremont's Gold Ring. 
— "Awful " Gardner's Case 276 

XXX. 

Political Deb.\te Between Abraiiasi Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas in Illinois. 

— 1858. 

Cause of this Remarkable Oratorical Contest. — Intense Interest in All Parts of the Land. — 
The Heart of every American Citizen Enlisted in the Momentous Issue Involved. — Eminent 
Character of the Combatants. — Their Extraordinary Ability and Eloquence Universally Ac- 
knowledged. — The Discussions Attended by Friends and Foes. — Victory, Defeat, Life and 
Death. — Condition of the New Territories. — Form of Constitution to be Decided. — Domestic 
Institutions: Slavery. — Mr. Douglas Advocates "Popular Sovereignty." — "Prohibition" 
Urged by Mr. Lincoln. — National Importance nf the Question. — The Public Mind Divided. — 
Joint Debates Proposed. — Agreement between the two Leaders. — Personal Appearance and 
Style. — Plans, Places, Scenes. — Theories and Arguments Advanced. — Skill and Adroitness of 
the Disputants. — Immense Concourses. — Result Impartially Stated. — Mr. Douglas Re-elected 
Senator. — Mr. Lincoln Nominated for President. — His Election to that Office. — Douglas' 
Magnanimity. — The Olive Branch. — Shoulder to Shoulder as Unionists. — Sudden Decease of 
the Great Senator 28!) 



18 CONTENTS. 

XXXI. 

Extraordinary Combat Between the Iron-Clads Merrimac and Monitor, in 

Hampton Roads.— 1862. 

Suililen Appearance of tlie Merrimac Among the Federal Frigates. — Their Swift and Terrible 
Destruction by Her Steel Prow. — Unexpected Arrival of the " Little Monitor " at the Scene 
of Action. — She Engages and Disables the Monster Craft in a Four Hours Fight. — Total 
Revolution in Xaval Warfare the World Over by this Remarkable Contest. — How the Mer- 
rimac Changed Hands. — Burned and Sunk at Norfolk, Va. — Her Hull Raised by the Confed- 
erates. — She is Iron Roofed and Plated. — Proof Against Shot and Shell. — A Powerful Steel 
Beak in Her Prow. — Most Formidable Vessel .4lloat. — In Command of Commodore Buchanan. 
— Departs from Norfolk, March Eightli. — Pierce.s and Sinks the Cumberland. — Next Attacks 
tlie Congress. — The Noble Frigate Destroyed. — Fight Begun with the Minnesota. — Suspended 
at Nightfall. — Trip of the Monitor from New York. — Her New and Singular Build. — Lieu- 
tenant Worden Hears of the Battles.— Resolves to Grapple with tlie Monster. — The Two 
Together Next Day. — A Scene Never to be Forgotten. — Worden Turns the Tide of Fortune. 
— Repulse and Retreat of the Merrimac 290 

XXXII. 

Proclamation of Emancipation, as a War Measure, by President Lincoln. — 1863. 

More than Three Millions, in Bondage at the South, Declared Forever Free. — Most Important 
American State Paper Siijce July Fourth, 177fi. — Pronounced, by the President, "the Great 
Event of the Nineteenth Century." — Tlie Whole System of Slavery Finally Swept from the 
Republic, by Victories in the Field and by Constitutional Amendments. — Mr. Lincoln's 
Views on Slavery. — Opposed to all Unconstitutional Acts. — His Orders to Union Generals. — 
Prohibits the Arming of Negroes. — .\Iarming Progress of Events. — The Great Exigency at 
Last. — Slavery i>crsus the Union. — Solemn and Urgent Alternative. — Emancipation Under 
the War-Power. — Preparation of the Great Document. — Its Submission to the Cabinet. — 
Opinions and Discussions. — Singular Reason for Delay. — Mr. Lincoln's Vow to God. — Wait- 
ing for a Union Triumph. — Decided by the Battle of Antietam. — Final Adoption of the 
Measure. — Mr. Carjienter's Admiraible Narrative. — Public Reception of the Proclamation. — 
Promulgation at the South. — Scenes of Joy Among the Freedmen. — Enfranchisement Added 
to Freedom 305 

XXXIII. 

TiiHEE Days' B.M'tle Between the Concentrated Armies of Generals Meade and 

Lee, at Gettysburg, Pa. — 1863. 

Overwhelming Invasion of Pennsylvania by the Confederate Forces. — The Union Army Drives 
Them with Great Slaugliter Across the Potomac. — Unsuccessful Attempt to Transfer the 
Seat of War from Virginia to Northern Soil. — One of the Most Decisive and Important 
Federal Victories in the Great American Civil Conflict. — Lee's Army Impatient to go North. 
— Order of March at Last.^Consternation in the Border States. — Call for One Hundreil 
Thousand More Men. — Advance of Meade's Array. — Face to Face With the Foe. — Engage- 
ment between the Vanguards. — Terrific Artillery Contests. — ^Movements and Counter Move- 
ments. — Severe Reverses on Both Sides. — Carnage at Cemetery Hill. — Longstreet's Furious 
Onset. — Most Destructive Cannonade. — Gettysburg a Vast Hospital. — Crawford's Grand 
Charge. — Standing by the Batteries! — Hand-to-Hand Conflict. — Following the Battle-Flag. 
— Deadly and Impetuous Fighting. — Forty-one Confederate Standards Taken. — Unliounded 
Joy of the Victors. — President Lincoln's Announcement ;il."> 

XXXIV. 
Grand March of the Fnion Army, under General Siierm.\n, Through the Heart 

OF THE South. — 1864. 
Generals and Armies Baffled, and States and Cities Conquered, Without a Serious Disaster to 
the Victors. — Display of Military Geniiis Unsurpassed in Any Age or Country. — The 
Southern Confederacy Virtually Crushed Within the Coils of this Wide-Sweeping, Bold, and 
Resistless Movement. — The Great Closing Act in the Campaign. — Sherman's Qualities as a 
Commander. — His Great Military Success. — His Own Story. — A Brilliant Campaign PLanned. 



CONTENTS. 19 

— Brave and Confident Troops. — Atlanta, Ga., the First Great Prize.— Destroys tliat City: 
Starts for the Coast. — Kilpatrick Leads the Cavalry. — Thomas Defends the Border States. — 
Successful Feints Made by Sherman. — Subsists His Men on the Enemy's Country. — Im- 
mense Sweep of the Onward Columns. — Savannah's Doom Sealed. — Fall of Fort McAllister. 
— Christmas Gift to the President. — Advance Into South Carolina. — The Stars and Stripes 
in Her Capital. — All Opposition Powerless. — North Carolina's Turn Next. — Swamps, Hills, 
Quagmires, Storms, Floods. — Battles Fought: Onward to Raleigh. — Johnston's Whole Army 
Bagged. — Sherman Described Personally 325 

XXXV. 

Fall of Richmond, V.\., thi-; Confederate Capital. — 1865. 
The Entrenched City Closely Encompassed for Months by General Grant's Brave Legions and 
Walls of Steel. — Flight of .Jefferson Davis, and Surrender of General Lee's Army. — Over- 
throw of the Four Years' Gigantic Rebellion. — The iEgis and Starry Ensigns of the Republic 
Everywhere Dominant. — Transports of .Joy Fill the Land. — A Nation's Laurels Crown the 
Head of the Conqueror of Peace. — Memorable Day in Human Affairs. — ilomentous Issues 
Involved. — Heavy Cost of this Triumpli. — Without It, a Lost Republic. — Unequaled Valor 
Displayed. — Sherman's Grand Conceptions. — Sheridan's Splendid Generalship. — Onward 
March of Events. — Strategy, Battles, Victories. — I^e's Lines Fatally Broken. — Approach of 
the Final Crisis. — Riclimond Evacuated by Night. — Retreat of Lee: Vigorous Pursuit. — 
His Hopeless Resistance to Grant. — Their Correspondence and Interview. — The Two Great 
Generals Face to Face. — What Was Said and Done. — Announcing the Result. — Parting of 
Lee with His Soldiers. — President Lincoln's Visit to Richmond.— Raising the United States 
Flag at Fort Sumter. — Davis a Prisoner in Fortress Monroe 33-1 

XXXVI. 

Assassination of President Lincoln, at Ford's The.4ter, Washington, by J. Wilkes 

Booth.— 1865. 

Conspiracy to Murder, Simultaneously, all the Chief Officers of the Government. — The Most 
Exalted and Beloved of Jlortal Rulers Falls a Victim. — A Universal Wail of Anguish and 
Lamentation Poured Forth from the National Heart. — Darkest Page in the History of the 
Country. — Funeral Cortege Through Fifteen States. — Tragical Fate of the Conspirators. — 
Object of this ilost Infamous of Crimes. — Singular Time of Its Perpetration. — Virtual End 
of the Great Civil War. — Dawn of Peace: Universal Joy. — President Lincoln's Happy Frame 
of Mind. — How He Passed His Last Day. — Conversations on the Evening of April Four- 
teenth. — Makes an Engagement for the Morrow. — Last Time He Signed His Name. — Re- 
luctantly Goes to the Theater. — Arrives Late: Immense Audience. — Plans and ^Movements of 
the Assassin. — The Fatal Shot: a Tragedy of Horrors. — Removal of the President to a Pri- 
vate House. — Speechless and Unconscious to the End. — Death-Bed Scenes and Incidents. — 
The Nation Stunned at the ApjiaHing News. — Its Reception at the South, and by General 
Lee. — A Continent in Tears and Mourning. — ilost Imposing Obsequies Ever Known. — 
Booth's Swift and Bloody End. — Trial of His Male and Female Accomplices 344 

XXXVII. 

National Peace Jubilee and Musical Festival for Five Days, in Boston, in Honor 
OF THE Restoration of the Union op the St.\tes. — 1869. 

Ten Thousand Singers, an Orchestra of One Thousand Instruments, and Tens of Thousands of 
Spectators, in the Coliseum, an Immense Building Erected for the Occasion. — Attendance of 
President Grant. — Sublime and Inspiring Harmonies. — Most Majestic Musical Demonstra- 
tion of Modern Times. — Origin of the Jubilee. — P. S. Gilmore: His Zeal and Enthusiasm. — 
All Discouragements Overcome. — Magnificent Programme. — Splendor of the Coliseum. — It 
Covers Nearly Four Acres. — Inauguration Ceremonies. — View of the Audience. — Scene of 
Surpassing Enchantment. — Beauty of the Decorations. — Overtures, Choruses, Anthems, Etc. 
— Parepa-Rosa. Phillips, Ole Bull. — Their Professional Triumphs. — Zerrahn, Tourjee. Eich- 
berg. — Tlie Famous "Anvil " Chorus. — Chiming the City Bells. — Novel Commingling of 
Artillery with Music. — Tremendous Ovation to Grant. — Half a Million People in the City. — 
Testimonial to Mr. Gilmore. — Last Day: Concert by 10,000 Children. — Triumphant Success 
of the Jubilee ,S.56 



20 CONTENTS. 

XXXVIII. 

COXSECRATION OF THE FiRST CARDINAL IX THE FxiTED STATES. 1875. 

The Venerable Archbishop McC'loskey, of New York, Si-leeted by tlie Roman Pontiff, for lliis 
Great OHUe. — He becomes a Prince in the Cliurcli. — Tlie Highest Ecclesiastical Appointment 
in the Catholic Hierarchy. — Reasons given for this Step. — Solemn Investiture, in the Cathe- 
dral, by Clerical Dignitaries from All Parts of the Country. — An Uuiiaralleled Scene. — Illus- 
trious Xature of this Office. — Special Knvoy sent from Rome. — Announcing the Event to the 
Archbisliop. — Time of Public Recognition Assigned. — A ^Mighty Stream of Humanity. — 
Decorations of the Church. — Procession of Priests. — Incensing the Altars. — Sacred Vessels 
and Vestments. — Insignia Peculiar to this Rank. — The Scarlet Cap. — Profoundly Impressive 
Service. — Unprecedented on this Continent. — Imposing the Berretta. — Intoning and Chanting. 
— Official Letter from the Pope. — Use of the Latin Language. — Inspiring Strains of Music. 
— Incidents atten<ling the Ceremonial. — Pontifical Benediction by the Cardinal. — Retirement 
of the Celebrants. — Dispersion of the Vast Throng 365 

XXXIX. 

The Tweed Eing.— 1876. 
The Character of New York City Government When Tweed Began Public Life. — State Inter- 
ference. — Tweed's Entry Into Politics. — Sent to Congress in ISnS. — " Tweedie Never Goes 
Back on Tweedie." — Becomes Grand Sacliem of Tammany Hall. — The New " Wigwam." — 
The Democratic National Convention Held in It, July 4, 1868. — Tammany Forces Seymour 
on Party, ami Supports Hoffman for Governor. — Oaths Administered on " Ollendorff's 
French Metliod," No Bible Being at Hand. — Constitution of Tweed Ring in 1868. — The 
"Big Four," "Oal«'y" Hall, Sweeny, Cnnnolly, and Tweed. — Tweed Already Very Rich. — • 
Marriage of Daughter and Costly Piesents From Politicians. — The Americus Club and 
Its Tiger. — Latter Becomes Emblem of Tammany. — The New City Charter, " Tweed's 
Charter." — Places All Power in City in Hands of Ring Legally. — Charter Cost Tweed 
$1,500,000. — " The Y'oung Democracy." — Exposures by New York Times. — " What Are You 
Going to Do About It?" — Tweed's Hold Upon the Poor. — Ring Overthrown in the Elec- 
tion of 1871. — Statement of Enormous Thefts. — Untold Millions. — Tweed's Various Trials. 
— Exciting Escape to Spain and Recapture. — Confesses Judgment for .$6.000,000. — Unable 
to Pay or Secure .$3.000.000 Bail, He Goes to Jail.— Dies in Ludlow Street Jail April 12, 
1878. — Deserted By All His Henchmen and Former Friends. — Other Ring Members Escape to 
Europe. — Effect Upon Tammanj' Hall. — Similar Corruption in Other Cities 371 

XL. 

New Forms of Religious Activities. — The Society for Ciiristiax Endeavor. — 1881. 

Recent Organizations of Young People Into Immense Societies. — Jleaning of Such Movement's. 
— Dr. Hale and the Lend-a-Hand Clubs. — Mottoes of the Clubs. — Jlrs. Bottome and the 
King's Daughters. — An Outgrowth of the Lend-a-Hand Movement. — Rapid Growth of Order. 
— Changed to " International Order of the King's Daugliters and Sons." — Rev. F. E. Clark 
as a Pastor. — Origin of Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor. — Its First Meet- 
ing.— Dr. Clark's Statement of Results. — October, 1884, More Than 150 Societies With 
Upwards of Eight Thousand Members. — Incorporation of United Society of Christian En- 
deavor, 1SS5. — Mighty Force Toward Christian Unity. — Organizations not Denominational 
but Interdenominational. — Third World's Convention at Geneva, Switzerland, in 1906. — 
Sixty-four Thousand Societies Reported : Close to Four Jfillion 'Members. — Withdrawal of 
Methodists and Baptists in 1801. — The Epworth League Strictly Denominational and Under 
Control of Church. — Organization of Baptist Young People's Unioii the Same Year. — Edu- 
cational Features of Later Societies. — The Brotherhood of St. Andrew, Organized October, 
1886. — " Object '" and " Rules " .of the Society.— The Rule of Prayer and Rule of Service. 
— Contrast of Working of These Societies With That of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciations. — A Mighty Power For the Uplifting of All Peoples 383 

XLI. 
The Feder.^tiox' of Labor. — Labor Oroanizationr. — 1881. 

Ideal Relation of Capital and Labor. — Actual Conditions. — Labor of Earliest Historical 
Times. — Origin of Slavery. — Condition^ in Greece and Rome. — Change from Slavery to 



CONTENTS. 21 

Sei-fflom. — Graduiil Aeqiiisition of Rights of Freemen by Serfs. — Influenee of Wyclif and 
His Itinerant Preachers. — Conditions in Enghmd in Eighteentli Century. — Unions of 
Laboring Men Organized. — Early Labor Situation in United States. — First Organizations 
and Tlieir Wealiness. — Individual Versus Collective Bargaining. — The Weakness of the 
Labor Unit. — John Mitchell's Description of the Trade Union and Its Purposes. — Flexibility 
of Union Organizations. — The Knights of Labor. — "That is the Most Perfect Government 
in Which Injury to One is the Concern of All." — The Federation of Organized Trades and 
Labor Unions of the United States and Canada. — Importance of Federative Principle. — 
General Position of LTnions as to Strikes and Boycotts. — Evil Results to All Unions of 
Political Alliances. — Present Status of Federation of Labor: 1.500,000 Paying Members. — 
Organization of Employers' L'nions. — ■' Tlie Citizens Industrial Association of America." — 
Statement of Its Principles. — Reactionary Position of Its Leaders. — " Labor Has No 
Rights Capital is Bound to Respect." — The Twentieth Century Spirit Will Not Tolerate 
Reactionary Measures. — The Rights of All, Labor, Capital, and the Public, Must be Con- 
sidered. — " No Man Liveth to Himself Alone." — End to be Aimed at is Peace 391 

XLII. 
The Eevisiox op the Bible. — 1885. 
The Bible of the Apostles. — Tlie Jewish Scriptiiros. — A Library of Law. Prophecy. Philosophy, 
and Poetry. — Rise and Importance of the Synagogues. — ^Jlanner in Wliich the Scriptures 
Were Kept. — The Rolls. — Papyrus and Methods of Writing. — The Septuagint. — Libraries 
of the Early Christian Churclies. — Tliree Great Sources of Our Bible. — Remarkable Work 
of Dr. Tiscliendorf. — The Old Latin Bible. — St. Jerome's Revision. — The Accepted Vulgate. 
— Caedmon's Paraphrases and Bede's Tran.slations. — King Alfred's Dooms — Translation 
from Sa.xon to Modern English. — Effects of the Norman Invasion of England. — Inlluence 
of Bible on the Rise of Intellectual and Civil Liberty. — The Black Death. — Wyclif's 
Translation of the Bible. — Purvey's Revision. — The Invention of Printing. — First Printed 
Book, the Mazarin Bible. — Luther and His Translation of the Bible. — Intellectual and Re- 
ligious Conditions in the Church at Close of Fifteenth Century. — Tyndale and His Trans- 
lation of Bible. — First Division into Chapters. — Final Revision in 1.5.34. — Coverdale's, 
Matthew's, and Taverner's Bibles. — The " Great Bilde." — Influence of Bible npon English 
People and Language. — Green's Estimate. — Tlie Geneva, or " Breeches," Bible. — First Di- 
vision of Chapters into Verses, and First L^se of ilodern Type. — The Bishop's Bible. — Ac- 
cession of King James and His Character. — The King .lames, or Authorized, Version of 
Iflll. — The CJeneva a Strong Competitor. — Reasons for another Revision. — Wonderful 
Increase of Texts and Documents Unknown to Revisers of 1611. — Character of Revision 
Committee and Methods of Work. — Three Million Copies Revised New Testament Sold in 
One Year. — Work of American Revision Committee. — The American Revised Bible of 190]. 
— Many Notable Opinions Regarding the Bible. — " In this Book is Contained All the 
Wisdom of the World." 401 

XLIII. 
The Hayjiarket Eiot. — Anarcht. — 1886. 
Political and Social Conditions at Close of Eiglitcenth Century. — Effect of Advances Along 
Commercial and Industrial Lines. — Difficulty of Realizing Economical and Social Burdens 
of Eighteenth Century Workingmen. — Accounts of Travelers and Historians and Novelists. 
— The Origin of Socialism and Anarchy. — St. Simon, Fourier, Proudhon. — Proudhon's 
"What :s Property?" "Property is Theft." — Accounts of the Two Great Anarchist Leaders. 
Bakunin and Ivropotkin. — Rise of Russian Anarchists. — Repressive Laws Following Murder 
of Alexander 11. — The Leaders Driven From Europs to United States. — Connection Be- 
tween Assassination of Czar and Haymarket Riot a Close One. — Condition in Chicago. — 
Great Strike at ^IcCormick Harvester Works. — Interference and Incendiary Utterances of 
Anarchist Agitators. — Calls to Arms. — The Riot at McCormick's Works, 'May .3. — Call for 
Haymarket Meeting. — "Workingmen. Arm Yourselves, and Appear in Full Force." — Tli.^ 
Throwing of the Bomb. — Whole Company of Police Prostrated. — Eiglit Mortally Wounded. 
— Intense Excitement All Over Country. — Trial of Accused Anarchists. — Seven Sentenced 
to Death, One Imprisonment for Life. — Sensational Suicide of Lingg. — Sentences of Fielden 



22 CONTENTS. 

and Schwab Commuted to Life Imprisonment. — Spies, Parsons, Fislier, and Engel, Hung 
November 11, 1SS7. — Cliange iu Public Opinion. — Action of Governor Altgeld. — Judge 
Gary's Position 445 

XLIV. 

The Great Bi,izz,\rd. — 1888. 
Supreme Satisfaction of People of Xew York. — Its Apparent Safety From Dangers From 
Storm or Flood. — Apparent Purpose of the Infinite Power to .Show How Insignificant We 
Really Are. — Beginning of Great Storm, Sunday Evening, March 11, 1888. — Origin and 
Progress of Storm From West to Coast.^ — -Conditions Early Monday Morning. — All Systems 
of Transi)ortation Tied Up. — People Rescued From Elevated Trains by Ladders. — Before 
Ten O'Cloclv Broadway a Succession of Hills. Vrtlleys, and Ravines. — Drifts Across Street 
Si.K to Ten Feet Deep. — Side Streets Filled Witli Abandoned Teams AViout Which Snow 
Piled up Fifteen to Twenty Feet. — Calmien Cliarge Fifty Dollars for Fare iladison Square 
to Wall Street. — Trade Comlitions. — ilany " Spring 0])enings " Advertised for This Monday 
Morning. — At Altman's Tlirongli Forenoon One Woman Bouglit Two S])Ools of Thread. — 
All Business Suspended at Noon. — No Steam Trains Able to Enter or Leave City. — Horror'^ 
of Monday Niglit. — Storm Increasing, Wind Rising, Mercury Falling. — Total Darkness and 
Blinding Storm Obliterated all Landmarks. — Suli'erings of Lady Stenographer; Seven Hours 
Getting Home, a Distance of Two Miles. — Terribl" Experience of Roscoe Conkling. — Lost 
in Union Square. — Snow Storm Ceases Tuesday ilorning. But Not tlie Wind. — 12..500,000 
Loads of Snow to Be Removed. — Over Six Hundred Funi'rals Wednesday. — City Closi- 
to Starvation. — Humorous Messages of Sym]>athy from Dakota. — '■ Keep Off tlie Grass." — 
Extent of Storm. — Worst Recorded in History of Country. — Twenty Lives Lost and $15,- 
000,000 to $20,000,000 of Property Destroyed in Manhattan Alone 457 

XLV. 
The New Navy.— 1893-1909. 
Conditions Preceding Spanish War. — President Cleveland's Attitude Regarding Cuban Affairs. 
— President McKinley's. — Republican Platform of 1896. — Senator Proctor's Description of 
Conditions in Cuba. — Destruction of the Maine. — Resolutions of Congress Declaring War. — 
History of American Navy. — Sentiment of Colonial Leaders. — .Tohn Paul .Jones. — Total 
Strength of Revolutionary Navy. — ^First Secretary of Navy. — Character of Vessels Built 
After War. — First Application of Steam and of the Propeller. — The Demologos. — The 
Monitor and Merrimae. — Condition of Navy After Civil War. — Birth of New Navy. — The 
White Squadron. — Tlie Battlesliip Era. — The Oreqon. — The Battle of Manila. — Departure 
of Admiral Sampson's Fleet to Blockade Cuba. — Cervera's Squadron and the Santiago 
Blockade. — The Blowing Up of the Merrimae. — Destruction of Cervera's Fleet. — Fall of 
Santiago and Close of War. — Schley and the Famous Loop. — Improvement in Navy Fol- 
lowing Close of Spanish War. — Comparison of Navy of 1893 and 1008. — ^Naval Appropria- 
tions of Leading World Powers. — Cruise of the Battleships. — Itinerary of Trip. — Reception 
of Fleet and Review in Hampton Roads, February 22, 1000 467 

XLVI. 

The Venezttela Eot'NnARY Dispute. — ]\roNROE Doctrixe. — ISO.'i. 
Alexander I. of Russia and Mme. de Krudener. — The Emperor's Religions Enthusiasm. — 
His Part and Purpose in Forming the Holy Alliance. — Text of That Remarkable Document. 
— The Holy Alliance Becomes Association of Despots For Overthrow of Liberty. — Spanish 
Colonies in Western Hemisphere Declare Independence. — Purjiose of Holy Alliance to Re- 
store Power to Spain. — Canning's Proposals. — Views of .Tohn Quincy Adams. Secretary of 
State. — ^Declares Against Acting "As a Cock-boat in Wake of British ilan-of-War." — 
"Make an American Cause and Adhere Inflexibly to That." — Statement of His Doctrine 
as Announced by President Monroe in 182.3. — Reception of ^Message by British Press. — 
Canning's Duplicity Proved. — ^Doubtful Position of the United States Government as to 
Doctrine for Seventy Years. — " To Be Asserted When, and to What Extent, Individual Con- 
ditions Demand," — Polk's Attitude as Congressman and Later as President. — Applica- 
tion to French Occupation of Mexico. — Interpretations and Indorsements in Many Party 



CONTENTS. 23 

Platforms. — History of Differences between Great Britain and Venezuela. — Intervention of 
the United States. — Olney versus Salisbury. — Latter's Contempt for Monroe Doctrine. — ■ 
President Cleveland's Vigorous Message. — Appointment of American Commission to De- 
termine True Boundary Line. — Great Britain Assents to Arbitration. — Distinguished 
Arbitrators. — Character of Award and Results. — Final Determination of Status of Monroe 
Doctrine 502 

XLVII. 
The Annexation of Hawaii. — 1898. 
Sandwich Islands Unknown When American Independence Declared. — Discovery by Captain 
Cook, 1778. — His E.xperience With Natives. — Descriptions of Islands. — Highest Volcanoes 
In World. — Xotable Eruptions. — Princess Kapiolani Defies Pele, Goddess of Volcanoes. — 
Three Periods of Hawaiian History. — Origin of Xative People. — Physical Characteristics. 
— Their Religion and Superstition. — The Tabu.^Pastimes of People. — Xative Poetry.^ 
Vancouver's Influence. — Introduction of Rum. — Kamehameha I. — Conquers Other Chiefs. 
— Established Central Government. — Overthrow of Idolatry 'by People. — Arrival of Mis- 
sionaries. — Intense Interest of People in Education. — Continuous Interference of Foreign 
Powers. — The " New Kaahumanu." — Formation of Written Language. — First Constitu- 
tion. — Independence Recognized by United States, France, and England. — Comparison of 
Census Statistics. — Steady Growth of American Party. — Statement of Liliuokalani. — 
Early Movements Toward Annexation. — Hostility of English. — First Treaty Witli LTnited 
States. — Kalakaua. — Crisis on Accession of Liliuokalani. — Establishment of Provisional 
Government. — Negotiations with Government of United States. — The Joint Resolution of 
Congress. — Final Cession to LTnited States 52.5 

XLVIII. 

The Hague Conferences.— 1899-1907. 
Early Arbitration Agreements. — The Jay Treaty. — The Burr-Hamilton Duel. — The Geneva 
Arbitration. — The Czar's First Letter to Sovereign States. — Public Opinion Regarding It. — 
Second Letter and Programme for Conference. — Description of Holland and The Hague. — 
Grotius and His Work. — The House in the Wood. — Splendid Courtesy of Queen Wilhelmina 
and The Netherlanders. — First Meeting of First Conference. — Twenty-six Nations. Twelve 
Hundred Jlillion People Represented. — Cliaracter of Delegates and Languages Spoken. — ■ 
Delegates from the United States. — Routine Work of Delegates. — Social Functions. — 
Details of Results Achieved. — Effective Addresses of Leading Delegates. — Permanent Court 
of Arbitration. — Notable Arbitration Between Chile and Argentina. — The Statue of the 
Christ. — Second Conference Demanded by Interparliamentary Union. — President Roosevelt's 
Action. — Final Call of Czar of Russia for Conference to Meet .June 15, 1007. — Delegates 
from United States. — Conditions Attending the Meeting. — Organization and Distribution 
of Work. — Notable Addresses. — Stubborn Fight to Perfect Permanent Court. — Magnificent 
Work of Mr. Choate.^All Provisions Made for Court, hut no Judges. — Bitter Opposition 
of Smaller Nations. — "The World Desires Peace." — The International Prize Court. — 
Achievements of Second Conference. — Opinion of Elihu Root, then Secretary of State. — 
Real Significance of the Conferences 5.57 

XLIX. 

The Destruction of Galveston. — 1900. 
Sublime Faith and Heroism of Stricken Peoples. — Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, San Fran- 
cisco. — Peculiar Location of Galveston. — Importance as Sea Port. — Converging Point of 
Fifty-three Steamship Lines. — The " Oleander City." — The Terrible Hurricane of September 
8, 1900. — Winds Began to Rise Early in Forenoon. — Constantly Changing Direction They 
Covered Every Point of Compass. — Rapidly Increasing Velocity.—" Every Building on 
Island Trembled, Many Rocking Like Boats." — Velocity of Wind One Hundred and Ten 
Miles an Hour in Evening. — Whole City Prepares for Death. — At Convent tlie Sacrament 
Administered to All. — At Orphan Asylums Nims Tied Little Charges in Bunches, Each 
Sister Fastening Runcli to Herself. — All Perished Together. — Great Rafts of Wreckage 
Hurled in Every Direction by Wind and Waves. — Veritable Battering Rams. — After Nine 



24 CONTEXTS. 

P. M., IJegan to Subside. — Pastor and Family and Three Quarters of Entire Congregation 
Drowned. — Within a Week Six Thousand Bodies Recovered. — Probably Anotlier Thousand 
Washed Out to Sea. — Wonderful Recuperative Powers of People. — Committee of Safety. — 
The Deep-water Commission.— Xew City Charter. — ilammoth Sea Wall. — Total Surface 
Level of City Raised from Five to Eighteen Feet. — The Xew Government By Commission; 
'• The Galveston Plan." — Result of Its Work in Rebuilding and Redeeming Galveston. — 
Adopted in Jlany Other Cities 585 

L. 

The Pan.\ma C.\nal. — 1903. 
Early Search for Strait Connecting Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. — Efforts of Cortez, Saavedra. 
and Others. — Interest of Charles V. and Philip II. — Latter Decides, "Contrary to Divine 
Will to Unite Two Oceans Which the Creator of World Had Separated." — English Become 
Interested in Nicaragua in Seventeenth Century. — Visit of Humboldt to United States and 
Central America. — Outlines Nine Routes for Waterway from Atlantic to Pacific. — Views 
of Goethe. — Remarkable Predictions as to Development of United States; Also as to Canals. 
— The Treaty of lS4li with New Granada (Colombia). — The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. — 
French Interference Under Napoleon III. — American Position Asserted by President Grant 
In 1SG9. — "Only American Canal, under Control of Americans Should be Built Between 
Atlantic and Pacitie Oceans." — DeLesseps and the French Concession. — A])]iointment of Com- 
mission to Investigate Merits of All Leading Routes. — Commission Reports in Favor of 
Nicaragua. — Debate in Congress and Spooner Amendment. — Clayton-Bulwer Treaty Abro- 
gated by Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, IHOI. — The Remarkable Panama Revolution. — M. Bunau- 
Varilla. — Treaty with Panama Republic. — President Roosevelt's Attitvide. — His Letter to 
Dr. Shaw.^Transfer of All Riglits and Property of French Canal Company for .$40,000,000. 
— Canal Commission Appointed. — Repeated Changes in It. — Whole Work Finally Placed in 
Hands of Board of Army Engineers. — Great Improvement in Its Prosecution. — Statistics 
as to Present Conditions. — Original Estimates and Probably Final Cost of the Canal. . 594 

LI. 

The Treaty of Portsmouth. — 1905. 
The Interests of Russia and .Japan in ilancliuria. — Position and Importance of the Province. 
— Position of Korea. — Tlie Building of tlie Siberian Railroad. — Japan's Vital Need of Man- 
churian and Korean Markets and Products. — The Chinese-.Japanese War of 1894-5.- — .Japan 
Robbed of the Fruits of Victory by European Powers. — Russia's Agreement of 1902 to 
Evacuate Manchuria. — Not Only Fails to Evacuate but Strengthens Forces. — Russia's 
Interests on the Yalu. — Dignified but Forcible Protest of .Japan in 1903. — Russia's Dilatory 
Tactics. — Diplomatic Relations Severed February 5, 1904. — The Battle of Chemulpo Bay 
and Port Arthur. — L'nprecedented Successes of Japan on Sea and Land for Fifteen Months. 
— Final Battles of JIukden and Korean Straits. — Movements T^ooking Toward Peace. — 
The Influence of the Hague Conference. — President Roosevelt's Identical Notes to Czar and 
Mikado of .June 7, IPOo. — ^Conference Agreed Upon. — Ambassadors Named by Botli Powers. 
— Reception of Ambassadors on the Mayfloiver. — President Roosevelt's Tact, and Amicable 
Toast. — Reasons for Choosing Portsmoutli as the Treaty City. — First Meeting of Envoys 
August 9, 1905. — Account of Deliberations. — ^Dark Days. — Final Agreement. — Result of 
Compromises. — Treaty Signed September 5. — Interesting Interchange of Courtesies Be- 
tween Envoys. — Notable Te Deiim Service in Episcopal Church at Portsmouth. — Reception 
of News Throughout United States. — Cannons Roar, Bells Ring, Bonfires Everywhere. — 
Hostile Reception by .Japanese People. — Results Acliieved. — Happy and Proud Position of 
President Roosevelt ''12 

LIT. 

E.\RTHQUAKE AXD FiRE -\T SaN FrANCISCO. — 1906. 

The Long Chain of San Franciscan Missions in California. — The IMission Dolores on the Site 

of San Francisco. — Took Present Name in 1R47. with Population of 450. — Discovery of Gold 

on Sutter Ranch, — The Early Vigilance Leagues. — Character of Early City. — "A Free and 

Easy City, Bohemian to the Core." — Early " Baptisms of Fire." — Peculiar Location of City. 



CONTENTS. 25 

— Market Street and Van Ness Avenue. — The Fateful ISth of April, 190G. — Small Loss uf 
Life and Property from Earthquake. — The Starting of the Fire and Causes. — No Water, 
The City at the Mercy of tlie t<'lames. — Dynamit<? the Only Weapon with Whicli to Fight 
the Fire. — " Shoot at Sight Anyone Cauglit Pilfering or Looting." — Sorrowful Fliglit of 
Refugees to Suburban Towns, or The Presidio and Golden C4ate Park. — Wonderful Fortitude 
of Sufferers. — Progress of the Fire on the 19th. — Final Stand of Fire Fighters at Van Ness 
Avenue. — Sudden Change of Wind Saves tlie Rest of the City. — Three Quarters of a Mile 
of Mansions Blown L'p. — Region Destroyed Covered About Four Square Miles. — 498 City 
Blocks. — Month Following Fire Jlost Orderly City Had Ever Known. — The Bread Lines. — 
. "Neither JIarkets nor Jloney with Wliich to Buy." — C41oriou3 Outburst of Sympathy 
Throughout the Country.— ilore than .$20,000,000 Contributed in Thirty Days.— Hon. ,T. D. 
Phelan's Review of the Situation. — Character of New Buildings. — Systematic Plans for 
Rebuilding. — The Burnham Plans. — Labor Troubles and Municipal Rottenness. — The Case 
of Mayor Schmitz. — Widespread Symjiathy with tlie Stricken People 626 

LIII. 

The Story of Electricity. 
Amber and the Lodestone. — Views of Ancient Philosophers and of the Church Fathers. — 
The Chinese " Soutli-Pointing Car." — Rise of Experimental Philosophy. — Dr. Gilbert the 
Pioneer Experimenter. — Formation of the British Royal Society. — The " Roarings and 
Crackings " wlien Electricity was Produced. — Earliest Comparison with Thunder and 
Lightning. — Franklin's Experiments. — His " Electrified Bumpers." — His Demonstration 
that Liglitning of the Storm Same as He Produced. — Lightning Rods. — Invention of Leyden 
Jar. — Line of Monks, Nine Hundred Feet Long, Electrified. — Experiments of Galvani and 
Volta. — Humphrey Davy and the Arc Liglit. — Oersted's Great Discovery. — Faraday 
Determines Relation of Electricity anil Magnetism. — .Joseph Henry's Distinguished Career 
and Discoveries. — !Morse and the Electric Telegraph. — Strange and Sad Vicissitudes of 
Inventor. — First Telegraph Laid. Baltimore to Washington, Opened ^lay 24. 1S44. — First 
Message, " \\'hat God Hath Wrought."— Cyrus Field and the Atlantic Cable. — Repeated 
Failures. — First Perfect Connection Established July 27, 186B. — Statistics as to Cable 
Service. — Bell and the Telephone. — Remarkable Characteristics of Invention. — The 
Microphone. — Every Other Family in the United States Has Telephone. — Development of 
Dynamos and Motors. — Remarkable Transmission of Currents for Power and Light. — The 
Electric Light. — Incandescent and Arc Lights Described. — Arc Light 3,000,000 Candle 
Power. — Uses of Selenium. — ^\^arious Applications of Electricity in Railroad Service.^ 
Dr. Holmes's " Broomstick Train." — Hertz and the Hertzian Waves.— Ether. — Marconi's 
W'ireless Telegraph and Its Principles. — Remarkable Invention of Orling and Armstrong. — • 
The Wireless Telegraph and the Republic Collision. — What Next, Telepathy? 636 

LIV. 

Intersatio\al Courtesies. 
Founder's Day at Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg.— Address of W. T. Stead. — " Outlook for 
Peace." — "You Have Only to Hang Twelve Newspaper Editors." — Infliience of More 
Intimate Relations Between Peoples. — "Little Things that Make for Peace." — The Life and 
Death of George Peabody a Link Between the English and American Peoples. — Editorial 
Utterances. — The Geneva Arbitration. — The French Gift of Bartholdi Statue. — Description 
of Statue. — Educational Reciprocity. — Work of I'Alliance FranQaiae. — Exchange of 
Lecturers by Harvard and The Sorbonne. — Lectures of Charles F. Beach at University of 
Paris Law School. — Work Extended to Other French tTniversities. — German Emperor and 
American Ambassador Discuss Exchange of Professors Between Universities. — Emperor 
Invited President Nicholas ilurray Butler to Discuss Subject at Informal Dinner. — " The 
Theodore Roosevelt Professorship " at L^niversity of Berlin. — Gift of .Tames M. Speyer to 
Columbia to Found Similar Chair. — English and American Universities. — Opinion and 
Efforts of Baron Kentarn, of Japan, Along Same Lines. — Cecil Rhodes and His Ambitions. 
"A Good Understanding Between England, Germany, and United States. Will Secure Peace 
of the World; and Educational Relations Form the Strongest Tie." — The Rhodes Scholar- 
ships. — Bryce ' and " The American Commonwealth." — Hannis Taylor and " The English 
Constitution." — " God Hath Created of One Blood All Nations of Men." 678 



26 CONTENTS. 

LV. 

Education in Colonies and States. 
Education at the Time of the Great Reformation. — The Renaissance. — Wyolif's Position. 
Luther's Appeal to the German ilagistrates. — " The True Wealtli of a City is to Have Many 
Learned, Serious, Worthy, Well-educated Citizens." — Common Schools in Germany and Low 
Countries in Sixteenth Century. — Contact of Pilgrim Fatliers witli Dutch System While at 
Leyden. — First School Established in Colonies of America. — Support of Dutch West India 
Company. — The Boston Latin School. — Massachusetts Law of 1047. — " The Great Charter 
of Free Education in the Commonwealth." — Early Schools for Boys Alone; Girls Had No 
Share in School Privileges. — Graduates of English Universities in Colonies. — John Harvard 
and the Founding of Harvard College. — Xo Knowledge of Harvard's Life. — ,$500 Offered for 
Five Lines of Authentic Information. — Present Status of University, and Its New President. 
— Foundation of William and Mary. — Eliliu Yale and Yale College. — Tennent's " Log 
College " and Princeton. — Lottery to Raise Money for King's College. — Present Status of 
Columbia University. — The " Dartmouth College Case." — Number and Resources of 
"Colleges, Universities, and Technical Schools" in the United States. — Rise of Academies 
and Notable Preparatory Schools. — Education of Women. — Growth of the High School 
System. — Horace Mann and tlie Massachusetts State Board of Education. — Establishment 
of Normal Schools. — The National Educational Association.^ — Origin and Development of 
State Universities. — Post-Graduate Work. — ^^'omen's Colleges ; Vassar, Mt. Holyoke, Welles- 
ley, Smith, Bryn Mawr. — The Chautauqua and Summer Schools 691 

LVI. 

An Era of Prinpei.y Gifts. 
Contrast Between Early Gifts and Those of To-day. — Different Sources of Wealth. — Total of 
Gifts Above .$.5,000 for 1003-1007 Inclusive Upwards of $1.000,000,000. — Animating Impulse 
in Such Gifts. — " There is Something Pathetic About a Great Gift." — Stephen Girard and 
His Benefactions. — His Estate Valued at $9.000,000. — Girard College and Its Peculiar 
Restrictions as to Ministerial Visitors. — Notable Gift of John Lowell. — The Lowell Institute 
and Its Work. — The Lyceum Lectures in New England. — Estimate of Value of Lowell's 
Beneficence by Hon. Edward Everett. — George Peabody and His Royal Liberality. — Letter 
of Tlianks from Queen Victoria. — Tlie .J. F. Slater and Daniel C. Hand Bequests for the 
Freeilnien. — Beneficent Action of Miss Anna T. Jeanes. — The Enoch Pratt Library. — Johns 
Hopkins; His University and Hnspital. — Influence of Death of Son on Leland Stanford and 
Wife. — "The Children of California SIuill Be Our Children." — The Leland Stanford .Tunior 
University. — " The Lolita Armour Institute of Bloodless Surgery." — The Newberry and 
Crerar Libraries in Chicago. — Peter Cooper and Cooper U^nion. — John Jacob Astor's 
Gift to City. — James Lenox and His Library. — "The Finest Collection of Books and Art in 
New World." — J. Pierpont Morgan's Many Liberal Benefactions. — Samuel J. Tilden's 
Notable Gift to New York. — The Tilden Library Foundation. — .Joseph Pulitzer Gives 
$2,000,000 to Establish His School of .Tournalism.— Peculiar Gift of Mrs. Russell Sage.— 
The True Measure of the Value of Gifts. — Carnegie and His "Many Notable Gifts. — 
Rockefeller's Beneficence: Tlie University of Chicago, and General Education Board. — 
Influence of Robert C. Winthrop on Direction of George Peabody's Great Benefactions. — 
ludiretlly, also, of Those That Have Followed. — Opinions of President Daniel Coit Gil- 
man 731 

Lvn. 

The Conquest of the North Pole — 1909. 
Polar E.xploration Pro.secuted for nearly Four Centuries. — Its History Divided Naturally 
into Three Periods. — Characteristics of Each. — Importance of Ancient and Mediaeval Com- 
merce between Europe and the Orient. — Early Trade Routes. — The '• Wealth of tlie 
Indies." — Effect of the Mohammedan Conquests. — Europe Shut in upon Herself. — Birth of 
Polar E.\ploratiou in Commercial Distress tliat Followed. — Significance of Voyages of 
Columbus and Magellan. — Beginning of the Search for a Northwest or Northeast Passage 
to Cathay. — History of Early English and Dutch Ventures. — Well Determined Routes 
for Exploration at Beginning of Nineteenth Century. — Most noted Expeditions of the 



COiSiTEiN'TS. 27 

last Century. — Sir William Parry's Four Ventures. — Sir John Franklin's Notable 
Achievements and Melancholy F'ate. — Great Number of Relief Expeditions. — Discovery 
of the Northwest Passage. — Amundsen and the Ojoa. — Exploits of tlie Three Noted 
American Explorers, — Kane, Hayes, and Hall. — Terrible Experience of the Crew of the 
Polaris. — De Long and the Jeaiiiictte Expedition. — Nordenskiold Makes the Northeast 
Passage. — Nansen's Famous Drifting Expedition in the Frain. — Notable Expedition of 
the Duke of the Abruzzi. — Attempts to reach the Pole by Balloon and Air Ship. — An- 
nouncement of Cook and Peary that They had Reached the Pole. — Previous Experience 
of Each. — The Voyage of the John R. Bradley. — Dr. Cook's Dash for the Pole. — His Return 
and Reception. — The Roosevelt and Commander Peary's Remarkable Achievements. — 
Some Considerations Regarding the Controversy Over the Claims of the two Explorers. 
— Both Successful, though Dr. Cook first at the Pole. — Only Alternative. — Chronology of 
Arctic Exploration 767 

LVIII. 

The United St.\tes a World Power — 1909. 
Influence of Cacch-words and Phrases on Sentiment of People. — Old Ideas of World Powers. — 
What Constitutes the World Power of To-day. — The " Powers " of the Nineteenth Century. 
— The Concert of the Powers. — "' Spheres of Influence." — Europe No Longer the World. — 
The Recognized World Powers ; England, France, Germany, Russia, and the United States. — 
Riches of China. — Outbreak of European Nations in 1897. — Murder of French and German 
Missionaries. — " The Battle for Concessions." — Attitude of Administration Leaders Toward 
Spanish War. — Despatch to Commodore Dewey at Hong Kong. — " Ofl'cnsive Operations in the 
Philippine Islands." — The Annexation of Hawaii. — Underlying Purpose of Many Congress- 
men. — •" Point of Vantage for Acquiring Dominion in Far East." — Causes of War. — 
Political and Commercial and Not Merely Humanitarian. — Terras of the Protocol 
Concluding Peace. — The American Commissioners to Paris. — Proceedings of the Joint 
Commission at Paris to Agree upon Treaty of Peace. — "The Cession Must Be of Whole 
Archipelago or None." — Change in Public Sentiment at Result of War. — Views of Senator 
Hoar. — The Teachings of the Fathers Become " Glittering Generalities." — " Those Nursery 
Rhymes that were Sung Around the Cradle of the Republic." — Debate Over the Spanish 
Treaty. — Possessions Acquired by the Treaty. — Increasing Responsibilities and Expenses 
as Result of War. — Already More than One Thousand Two Hundred and Fifty Million 
Dollars Directly Chargeable to that Cause. — "The Parting of the Ways." — Contrasted 
Views of World Powers. — The One Militant and Aggressive; the Other Peaceful and Moral. 
— LTnited States Always a W'orld Power in Latter Sense. — Illustrations of that Fact, — 
The Outlook 703 




1. Frontispioeo 

2. .Tulm Fi.-ike. :'.?, 

3. I'ciin Treaty Tree, and rhiladdpbia in ISOO, 30 

4. Thf Battery. New York City, in ISOO. - 37 

5. Broadway and Canal Street. 1812. - - 3S 

6. Bo.ston in 1773. 39 

7. Virginia Tobacco Team, 1800, - - . 42 

8. Charleston. S. C, in 17S0. - . - . 43 
1>. Fisher Ame.s. --..._. 47 

10. Bnrns' Coffee Honse. Bowling Green, - 49 

11. A Coloni*! Stage Coach, . - . . 52 

12. Green Dragon Tavern. Boston. - - - 54 

13. E.xchange Coffee House, Boston, - - r>^ 

14. The Jrdin Hancock House, - . - - r,r, 
1.5. New York in 1745. 57 

16. Head of Lady of Fashion. 1775. - - 5S 

17. Noah Welister. 63 

15. Ringing the Bell, July 4. 1776. ... 65 

19. Hall of Independence. Philadelphia. 1776. 67 

20. Hoisting the First Naval Flag, - . - 72 

21. John Paul Jones, 74 

22. The First American Naval Victory, - - 75 

23. Traveling During the Dark Day. - - 79 

24. Change of Scene .^ftcr the Dark Da.v. - S3 

25. The Wonderful Dark Day. - . . . so 

26. Washington's Sword, 88 

27. The Washington Elm, Cambridge, Mass,. 90 

28. Washington's Resignation. .... 91 

29. Amity Between England and America. - 95 
3(1. George the Third, 90 

31. Reception of the First Minister to England. 9S 

32. John Adams, 00 

33. Scene in Shays" Rebellion. - . - . 101 

34. Sliays' Forces in Massachusetts. - - 103 

35. Daniel Shays, 104 

36. General Lincoln, 106 

37. Enrolling the Constitution. - - . - 108 
3.8. The Convention at Philadelphia. 1787, - 110 

39. Franklin Pleading for Pacilication, - - 112 

40. Washington's Inaugtiration Bible. - - 115 

41. First Inauguration of a President, - • 117 

42. Presidential Mansion. 1789. ... 119 

43. Presidential Mansion. 1870, ... 119 

44. Results of the Cotton Gin, - . . . 122 

45. Eli Whitney's Cotton Gin. 1793. . . 124 

46. Eli Whitney. 126 

47. Washington. D. C in 1876. ... 133 

48. The Nation.il Capitol in 1876. - . . 134 

49. Statue of .\merica Surmounting the Capitol. 134 

50. Martha Washington. 137 

51. Death of Washington. December 14. 1799, 139 

52. George Washington as Colonel. - - - 140 

53. George Washington as General. ... 141 

54. George Washington as President. - • itl 

55. The Tomb of Washington. .... 142 

56. Monument to .\lexander Hamilton. - - 144 



38. 
39. 
GO. 
61. 
62. 
63. 
04. 

65. 
06. 
67, 



79. 

80. 
81. 
82, 
S3. 
84. 
S5. 
86. 
87. 



01. 
92. 



93. 
94. 



96. 

97. 

98. 

99. 
100. 
101. 
102. 
103. 
104. 
105. 



SrB.TECT. PAGK. 

Alexander naniiitim. ..... 145 

Aaron Burr. ....... 145 

Scene of the Burr and Hamilton Duel. - 1 18 

First Steamboat on the Hudson. - - 151 

Robert Fulton. 152 

Fulton's First Steamboat, .... 154 

Captain Isaac Hull. - - . - . 159 
Action Between the Constitution and 

Guerriere. ---.-.. 162 

American Defenses at New Orleans, . - 106 

Atidrew Jackson. --.--. 169 

Tile Battle of New Orleans, - - - 171 

Destruction b.y the Great Gale and Flood. 173 
The Ever-memorable Gale, September 23, 

1815. 175 

Hfirrors of the Whirlwind Throughout 

New England. - 178 

Landing of Lafayette at New York. - 181 

General Lafa.yette. 183 

Sword of Honor Presented to Lafayette. 18.5 

Lafayette's Residence. - ... - 186 

Lafaj-ette's Birthplace. 188 

Lafa.vette's Tomb. 190 

The Jefferson Mansion at Monticello. - 192 

Thomas Jefferson. .----- 194 

The Adams Mansion at Quincy. Mass., - 196 

The Victor's Wreath, 197 

Robert Y. Hayne. 109 

r>aniel Webster. 201 

Webster's Reply to na.vne. .... 204 

Monster Petition to Congress, ... 206 

John Quincy Adams. 208 

Adams Defending the Right of Petition, - 212 

EtTect of the Temperance Reformation, - 217 

Signing the Pledge. ..... 220 

Distinguished Temperance Advocates. - 223 

The Inventor Toiling in his Garret. . - 226 

Ellas Howe. Jr., 228 

Tlie Old and New ; Sewing by Hand and 

Machine. 230 

Relieving Pain by the Use of Ether, - 23 4 
The Three Claimants of the Discovery of 

Ether. 236 

Monument in Honor of the Discovery of 

Ether. 240 

Mining Operations in California, - - 242 

.Sutter's Mill. 244 

John A, Sutter. .--.-. 243 

.Tames W. Marshall, 247 

George Steers. .--•--- 232 
The Yacht America, . _ _ - - 254 
The " Cup of All Nations," - - - 256 
Treaty of Peace. Amity, etc., - - . 250 
Cnmmndore Perr.v, ...--- 261 
Naval Expedition to Japan TJnder Com- 
modore Perry. --.--- 264 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



29 



NO. SITBJECT. PAGE. 

inO. Run on a Bank, 267 

107. Excitement in Business Circles During the 

Panic. 2(iO 

108. Effects of tlie Hard Times, - - - - 271 

109. Booli o( Requests for Prayers, - - - 276 

110. Grnnp of Eminent Revival Preacliers. - 2S0 

111. Dwight L. Mood.v. 2S4 

112. Ira D. Sanl;ey. 2S1 

ILI. Great Revival Meeting In BrnokI.vn, - - 2S5 

114. State Capitol of Illinois, ... - 2S9 

115. Deljate Between Lincoln and Douglas. - 200 

116. Steplien A. Douglas, 204 

117. Interior of Turret of tlie Monitor. - - 296 

118. Commodore Franklin Buciiauan. - - - 29S 

119. Battle Between the Merrimac and Monitor, "01 

120. Lieutenant John L. Worden. - - - 30.1 

121. Pen I'scd in Signing Emancipation Procla- 

mation, -------- 305 

122. ■U-illinin H. Seward, 306 

1?3, Edwin M. Stanton, 307 

1^.4. Abraham Lincoln, .---.. 30.S 

125. Considering the Proclamation of Emanci- 

pation, 310 

126. General Meade's Headquarters. - - - 31.^ 

127. General George G. Meade, - - - - 317 
12,S. The Battle of Gett.vsburg, ... - 319 

129. .Tames Longstreet. 321 

130. Sohliers' Monument at Gett.vsburg, . - 323 

131. Headquarters at Atlanta. Ga., - - - 325 

132. General W. T. Sherman, ... - 327 

133. Sherman's March Through the South, - 32!) 
l.?4. General Grant Stating Terms of Surrender, 334 

135. The I'nion Army Entering Richmond. - 337 

136. President Lincoln's Early Home. - - 344 

137. Ford's Theatre. Washington, D. C, - 345 

138. Assassination of President Lincoln, - . 347 

139. House in Whicli Lincoln Died. - . - 34S 

140. J. Wilkes Booth, 349 

141. Lincoln's Home at Springfield. III., - . 350 

142. Sergeant Boston Corbett. ... - 351 

143. Burial Place of Lincoln, - . . - 3.53 

144. Patrick Sar-sfleid Gilmore. .... 35s 

145. National Peace Jubilee at Boston. 1869. 361 

146. The Great Cathedral. New York City. . 365 

147. Cardinal John McCloskey, - . - - 366 

148. Consecration of First American Cardinal, 36S 

149. William M. Tweed. 372 

150. The Tammany Wigwam. - . - . 374 

151. Horatio Seymour. --..-- 37.-, 

152. A. Oakey Hall. - 377 

153. The Tombs. New York City, - - . 381 

154. Rev. Edward Everett Hale. - . . - 384 

155. Mrs. Margaret Bottome, . - . . 3S5 

156. Rev. Francis E. Clark. - - - . - 3S7 

157. John Mitchell. 396 

158. T'riah S. Stephens. 398 

159. Samuel Gompers. 399 

160. Scripture Rolls. (03 

161. .Mt. Sinai Convent, 407 

162. Alfred the Great. 413 

163. John Wycllf, 414 

164. W.vcllf's Pulpit, 416 

165. Johann Gutenberg. ...... 417 

166. Desiderins Erasmus, ..... 419 

167. William Tyndale. 420 

168. St. Paul'.s Cro.ss, 421 

169. Vilv.>rde Castle. 423 

170. Myles Coverdale, -.-... 424 

171. A Chained Bible, 426 

172. J. R. Green, 427 

178. Hugh Latimer. 428 

179. James tlie First. 431 

180. Cardinal Newman. ...... 435 

ISl. Alexander II. of Russia, - - - • - 451 

182. Joseph E. Gary. 454 

1S3. Roscoe Conkling, 463 

1.84. Snow Drifts on Side Street, N. T. City, 465 

1S5. Redfleld Proctor. 469 

186. Fltzhugh Lee, 470 

187. The Maine. 471 

188. Captain Charles D. Slgsbee, .... 472 



NO. SUBJECT. PAGE. 

189. The John Ericsson Statue, ... - 47s 

190. John D. Long, 4SI 

101. The Oregon. 4S2 

192. .\dmiral George Dewey, .... 4,s:j 

193. Manila Ba.v. 4g4 

194. Admiral W. T. Sampson, - _ . _ 4S6 
105. Admiral Pascual Cervera, . - . - 4S7 

196. Lieutenant Ri<'liard P. Hobson, ... 4S9 

197. Gencr.'tl Joseidi Wheeler. .... 401 

198. Captain Charles E. Clark, .... 494 
109. General Nelson A. Miles. .... 495 

200. Admiral Robley D. Evans. .... 497 

201. .\dmiral Charles S. Sperry, ... - 498 

202. The Connecticut. 499 

203. The Dc-wey Arch. New York City. - . 501 

204. Alexander I. of Russia, .... 503 

205. Mme. <le Krudener, 505 

206. John Quincy Adams, .... - 507 

207. James Monroe, ...-.-- 509 

208. George Canning. 513 

209. James K. Polk, 514 

210. Grover Cleveland, ------ 517 

211. Lord Salisbury, 520 

212. Richard Olney, 521 

213. Melville W. Fuller. 523 

214. Captain Cook. 526 

215. Crater of Kilauea Volcano, . - . . 528 

216. Captain Vancouver, 535 

217. Kamehameha I. ---.-. 53^; 

218. Rev. Titus Coan, 542 

219. King Kalakaua. 549 

220. Queen Liliuokalani, 552 

221. Sanford B. Dole, 533 

222. John Jay, 558 

223. The Vyver, or Fish Pond, The Hague. - 563 

224. Hugo Grotins, 564 

225. Queen Wilhelmina. of Holland, - - - 565 

226. Andrew D. White. 507 

227. The House in the Wooil. - . . - 513s 

228. Horace Porter. 574 

229. David Ja.vne Hill, 573 

230. Joseph H. Choate. 580 

231. Elihu Root. 5.83 

232. The Rosenberg Library, Galveston, Texas, 587 

233. The Sea Wall at Galveston, . - - - 591 

234. Ccirtez, 596 

235. Philip II. of Spain. 597 

236. Alexander von Humboldt, - . - - 59s 

237. Goethe, 599 

238. P'erdinand de Lesseps. - ... - (501 

239. John C. Spooner. 603 

240. John Hay. 604 

241. Theodore Roosevelt. 605 

242. Sir Julian Panncefote, 607 

243. Colonel G. W. Goethals, . - - . ROS 

244. Relief Map of the Canal Zone. - - - 6119 

245. The Er.iperor of Japan. 614 

246. The Czar of Russia. 618 

247. The President and Envoys on the May- 

flower. ... 021 

248. The Dolores MLssion, 627 

249. San Franci.sco in 1855, 628 

250. General Funstou, 630 

LSI. Section of Market Street Before the Fire. 631 

232. Portion of Business Section After the Fire. 634 

233. Benjamin Franklin. 642 

254. Sir Humphrey Davy. ----- 649 

235. Michael Faraday. 631 

236. Joseph Henry, 652 

237. .Samuel F. B. Morse. 655 

258. Morse's Original -Apparatus. - . . 656 

259. Orders Conferred on Morse, - . - 639 

260. Cyrus W. Field. 66.? 

2G1. Alexainler Graham Bell. .... 665 

262. Thomas A. Edison, 669 

263. Searclilight on Vessel at Sea. - - • 670 

264. William Marconi. 674 

265. The Monarch Bearing Remains of George 

Peabody. 680 

266. Th" Bartholdl Statue, 683 

2C7, Empenir William II. of Germany, - 683 



30 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



2U8. 
209. 

:;to. 

271. 

273. 
274. 
275. 
270. 

278. 
279. 
2S0. 
281. 
2S2. 
283. 
28-1. 
285. 
2S6. 
287. 
288. 
289. 
290. 
291. 
292. 
203. 
294. 
295. 
296. 
297. 
298. 



SUBJECT. PAGE. 

Baron Kaneko Keutaro, ... - 0S7 

Ct'i-il JuUu Ithudes, ------ OSS 

James Bryee. 089 

llaltin l.utLi-1-, - 093 

Rev. Jobu Cotton. 090 

Emmanuel College, Cambriilye, England, 7U0 

John Harvard Monument, . - - - 7u2 

First Harvard College, 703 

Harvard College Campus, 1870, - - - 705 

Charles W. Eliot, 706 

Abbott Lawrenei- Lowell. - - - . 707 

James Blair. ------- 709 

Ellhu Yale, 711 

Timoth.v Dwigbt. 712 

Yale College In 1830, 713 

James MeCosh, ------ 714 

Woodrow Wilson, ------ 715 

First King's College. ----- 716 

Nicbolas Murray Butler, - - - - 717 

Jobn Marsball. 71S 

Horaee .Mann, 722 

James B. Angell. ------ 720 

Mary Lyon. 727 

Vassar College. ------- 728 

.\lii-e Freeman Palmer. 729 

William R. Harper, 730 

Ste|)llen CJirard, ---... 733 

Girard College, Philadelphia. - - - 735 

John Lowell. Jr., 739 

Louis Agassiz, ---..-. 740 

George Peabody, ---... 743 



NO. SUBJECT. PAGE. 

299. Johns Hopkins, 748 

300. Leiand Stanford, 751 

3ul. Greek Theatre, t'niversity of California, 753 

302. John Crerar. 755 

303. Peter Cottper, 756 

304. John Jaeob Astor, 758 

305. Samuel J. Tilden, 759 

300. J. I'ierpont Mcjrgan, 700 

307. Mrs. Russell Sage. ------ 762 

308. John D. Roekefeller, 704 

309. Andrew Carnegie, 705 

310. Robert C. Winthrop, 760 

311. In Winter Quarters, 772 

312. Sir Jobn Franklin, 773 

313. A Constant Companicai. . - - - 775 

314. Esquimau Women and Children, - - 779 

315. The Duke of the Abrnzzi, ... - 783 

316. Frederiek A. Cook, 785 

317. John R. Bradley, 786 

318. Reeonnoitering. 788 

310. Robert E. Peary, 789 

320. The Roosevelt, 791 

321. Etah --------- 792 

322. William McKinley. 803 

323. George F. Hoar, 805 

324. William P. Frye, 806 

325. Cusbman K. Davis, 807 

326. Whitelaw Reid, 808 

327. George Gray, 809 

328. William R. D,ay 810 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



Marvelous Achievements of Nineteenth Centurj'. — Far Surpass Tliose of All Previous Cen- 
turies. — Washington Could Travel No Faster. Xor Despatch Messages More Quickly. Than 
Ca?sar or Hammurabi. — Views of John Fiske. — " Tlie Past Contains Within Itself All the 
Germs of the Future." — Mr. J. X. Larned's Review of Historical Development. — The 
United States in ISOO. — -New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Compared. — Washington in ISOO. 
— Commercial and Social Life of Charleston. — Passion for Sport, Including the Rough- 
and-Tumble Fight. — Beginning of Cotton Culture and the Invention of the Cotton Gin. — - 
Migration to the Ohio Valley. — Local State Jealousies. — Contest Over Adoption of the Con- 
stitution. — Payment of Taxes an "Amiable Eccentricity." — Not a Dollar in the National 
Treasury. — Craze for Cheap Money and Depreciation of Currency. — Samuel Adams Pays 
$2,000 for Hat and Suit of Clothes. — Injury to Cause of Popular Government Worked by 
Popular Discord. — Opinions of Fisher Ames, Hamilton, and Others. — "Your People, Sir, 
Your People is a Great Bcafit." — The Post Office Department. — First Mail Despatched on 
American Continent. — Metliods of Travel, Inns, Etc. — The Early Stage Coaches and Famous 
Concord Stages. — Advent of Steam Railroad. — Home Life in the Colonies. — The Dining- 
Room and the Kitchen. — The Light of Our Fathers. — The Clergy and Churches. — Intem- 
perance the National Curse. — Moral Status of the People. — Intellectual and Literary 
Conditions and Publications. — No Scientific Attainments. — Opinions of "Tom" Moore, 
Noah Webster, and Others. — Contrast Between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. 



" Let our object be OUR COtlNTHT. OUR WHOLK COUNTRY, AND NOTHING BUT OUR COUNTRY. 
And by the blessing of God, may that country itself become a vast and splendid monument, not of oppression 
and terror, but of wisdom, of peace, and of liberty, upon which the world may gaze with admiration forever." 
— Daniel Websteb. 



'N one of the most charming passages of the Odyssey, Homer 
recites the trials of Penelope who, persistently followed by 
suitors, yet still hoping that Ulysses may return, finally 
consented to consider their proposals after she had finished 
the web upon which she worked, intended as the death- 
shroud for the ancient Laertes. Day by day Penelope and 
her maids, with their distaffs, worked at the web, 

" But every night-time she unwrougbt it all,"' 
thus keeping the suitors at bay for three years, when her 
" dear lord " returned, and slew all those who had taken 
advantage of the defenseless position of his wife. The 
" distaffs " used by Penelope and her maids, with only slight change of form, none 
of principle, are still to be found in many homes through the country in the " Spin- 
ning Wheels " which our grandmothers used. 

When Hammurabi, more than four thousand years ago the great King of Babylon, 
sent a messenger to a governor of one of his provinces; when Abraham hurried a 
trusted servant off to Lot; when Caesar despatched a lieutenant with instructions for 




32 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD TOWER. 



a general in Gaul, each of these messen- 
gers traveled as swiftly, — probably in the 
case of the Roman courier more swiftly, 
because of the fine Roman roads, — as did 
George Washington when he set out 
from Philadelphia in 1775 to take com- 
mand of the American army at Cam- 
bridge, though the " sliced of his desire " 
naturally urged him forward on his 
journey with impatient haste. Or, as a 
prominent British essayist, W. E. Gregg, 
writing about thirty years ago summed 
the matter up : " Few phenomena are 
more remarkable, yet few have been less 
remarked, than the degree in which ma- 
terial civilization — the progress of man- 
kind in all those contrivances -which oil 
the wheels and promote the comfort of 
daily life — has been concentrated into 
the present centui-y- It is not too much 
to say that in these respects more has 
been done, richer and more prolific 
discoveries have been made, grander 
achievements have been realized in the 
course of fifty or seventy years of our 
own lifetime than in all the previous 
lifetime of the race, since states, nations, 
and politics such as history makes us ac- 
quainted with, have had their being," — 
in effect boldly contrasting the advance- 
ment along all intellectual and material 
lines of the nineteenth centuo', — tlie 
general period covered liy this work, — 
with the the sum of all similar endeavor 
and development, of all the preceding- 
centuries. There have been other indi- 
vidual eras marked by great development 
and wonderful enlightenment, as the 
Age of Pericles, or the Age of the 
, Antonines; but the characteristics that 
have made them distinguished have 
been special in their nature, while the 
great forward movements of the nine- 
teenth century have been of universal 
interest and such as to transform the 
modes of life, and tendencies of the 
thought and activities of the people of 
all nations. Not the least interesting 
phase of the subject is the fact that one 
of the most, if not the most, important of 
the discoveries of this same nineteenth 
century, — the principle and laws of evo- 



lution, — has given to us a key to the 
mystery of the world's history, which 
reveals a continual unfolding through all 
the historic period that is beautiful in its 
suggestiveness and inspires a reverent 
liomage in the mind of every thoughtful 
and devout man or woman. Previous to 
the middle of the nineteenth century all 
great historical events and movements 
were looked upon as phenomena, each an 
independent act of the Ruler of the Uni- 
verse, and not necessarily nor even jirob- 
ably, having any direct connection with 
others; or. as each happening by chance, 
the Creator being, as Carlyle expressed it, 
" an absentee God, sitting idle ever since 
the first Sabbath, at the outside of His 
Universe, and ' seeing it go.' " 

To-day, however, the principles of evo- 
lution are generall.v recognized, and, we 
believe, the view so well expressed by John 
Fiske is well nigh universally accepted by 
thoughtful and studious people. " The 
past contains within itself all the germs 
of the future." he says. " Humanity is not 
a mere local incident in an endless and 
aimless series of cosmical changes. The 
events of the Universe are not the work of 
chance neither are they the outcome of a 
blind necessity. The Universe is not a 
machine, but an organism ; and the whole 
tendency of motlern science is to impress 
upon us ever more forcibly the truth that 
the entire knowable Universe is an im- 
mense unit, animated throughout all its 
parts by a single principle of life." And 
he further refers to the appearance of man 
upon the earth as the last act in " the 
great drama of creation," believing " that 
all the remaining work of evolution now 
consists in the perfecting o^f the creature 
thus marvellously produced." This has, 
perhaps, seemed theoretical and visionary 
to many; j'et the question whether the 
wonderful movements of the last century 
were sporadic, or an orderly and natural 
development of pre-existing conditions, is 
certainly a most absorbing one, — an in- 
quiry which must affect one's whole out- 
look upon life. Before taking u\i the 
individual subjects illustrating the mighty 
advances made during the past century. 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



therefore, it would seem helpful to con- 
sider whether any evidence can be dis- 
covered that would make such an orderly 
purpose in the development of human his- 
tory, looking toward the present era, ap- 
parent; and. also, whether there may not 
be found proof sufficient to warrant the 
belief that the present age of enlightened 
activity is not to be a limited period, but 
a continuous and more and more intelli- 
gent advancement of the race toward its 
idtimate goal of perfection. 

Mr. riske's theory and belief was that 
during the process of the evolution of the 
race there came a time when, in the order 
of natural selection, the direction of effort 
was changed from physical to psychical 
ends; that man, the animal, had become 
as complete an organism as could be made, 
or as was necessary for the furtherance of 
the Divine purpose; and that thereafter 
the whole course of his development was 
to be along lines that should continually 
enlarge his mental horizon and constantly 
increase his spiritual and intellectual 
achievements, — the " glorious consumma- 
tion " toward which organic evolution is 
lending being the production of the 
highest and most perfect psychical life, as 
'• the Creation and perfecting of Man has 
been the goal toward which Nature's work 
has been tending from the first." 

The distinguished historical writer, Mr. 
J. N. Larned, in a recent work entitled 
" Seventy Centuries," has concisely but 
most lucidly reviewed the history and de- 
velopment of the human race from the 
earliest times. The interest in the work 
for our present purpose lies in his mas- 
terly division of the historic period into 
six great epochs which illustrate the 
orderly development like six acts in a 
great drama. As the time covered by each 
period, or act, is from four thousand to 
two hundred years, there are, of course, 
many floodings and ebbings of the tide of 
progress during its years; yet it becomes 
clear that the sum-total of the events 
and activities of each period represents a 
distinct advance upon previous achieve- 
ment. The drama opens with the Semitic 
and Hamitic races supreme throughout 
3 



the then known world, and they hold the 
stage until about the sixth century before 
Christ, when a new actor enters in the 
form of the Persian branch of the great 
Aryan race, which utterly overthrows and 
forever destroys the early nations as rul- 
ing peoples. Then the Persian Aryan is 
overthrown by an European branch of the 
same family in the great victory of the 
Greeks over Xerxes, in 480 B. C, ending 
the first act or period. During the prog- 
ress of its events the race had advanced 
from the rude and semi-barbarous culture 
of Babylon and early Egypt — the most ab- 
solute of despotisms — to the time when the 
Greeks became masters of the Eastern 




JOHX FISKE. 



World, and an era of great enlightenment 
and culture sets in. At the beginning of 
the second act of the drama the Greeks 
hold the stage and early present the mar- 
vels of art, literature, political ideals, and 
philosophic thought which astonish the 
world to-day as much as ever, when 
viewed as the product of the people of one 
small country in less than two hundred 
years. Early in this act the wonderful 
conquests of Alexander complete the de- 
struction of the Asiatic despotisms, and 
the Greek language and Greek culture are 
carried to the ends of the earth. But the 
era of Greek supremacy represents an age 



34 



FEOM COLO:\"Y TO WORLD POWER. 



chiefly of great intellectual enlightenment, 
not of moral advancement. Yet the way 
was paved for the coming of the blaster 
teacher. But before His work could be 
effectual the whole world must be brought 
under one sway, and the Roman takes the 
stage, subduing the whole world physic- 
ally, yet himself conquered by the arts 
and philosophy of Greece, so that nothing- 
good is lost, and new elements of strength 
are introduced. The whole world being 
under one power maintaining everywhere 
order and peace, and the Greek language 
affording a universal means of communi- 
cation, the i^ath is straight for the coming 
of the grantl revelation of the Creator's 
purpose, and Christ appears, teaching for 
the first time in history the greatest of all 
truths which is thereafter to dominate the 
desire of mankind, — the Fatherhood of 
God, and its corollary the hrotherliood of 
man, — a truth that man will never again 
lose sight of. Unconsciously a tre- 
mendous support for this truth is now 
added to the sum of the world's knowledge 
and enlightenment by the great Roman 
concept of the Law of Nations, in gen- 
eral, teaching for the first time that there 
are certain fundamental rights that are 
common to all peoples; while the Roman 
further presents as his contribution to the 
advancement of the race the general idea 
of order under clearly defined legal prin- 
ciples. When, in course of time, these 
new ideas have become a permanent pos- 
session of the race, Greece and Rome have 
served their purpose and a new principle 
is needed. During all these years hardy, 
uncontaminated peoples have been develop- 
ing up in the North of Europe, their vei->- 
methods of life and the vast solitudes in 
which they lived, creating in them a pas- 
sion for freedom and an indomitable iuilc- 
pendence; and with the fall of Rome the 
great second act of the drama ending, the 
third opens with the inroads of the bar- 
barians who over-run and destroy most 
that is material of the older states. But, 
as Rome in conquering Greece absorlied 
all her teachings of philosophy, literature, 
art, and politics, so now the Northern in- 
vaders gradually settle down upon the 



lands of the conquered, but, in turn, ab- 
sorbing and being conquered by their re- 
ligion and culture, — nothing, again, of 
real value being lost, while the Teutons 
add to the sum of the world's spiiitual 
good the great principle of individual 
freedom and activity. All of the action 
of this tliird period, which extends to 
A. D. 1453, is involved in the settlement 
of the " New Nations," the constantly 
shifting of borders and governments; un- 
til toward the close of the period all the 
Nations have assumed practically the po- 
sitions that have since been maintained. 
But now "the old order changeth;" and 
from the opening of the fourth period, in 
1450, on, the dominant movements are to 
be along mental and intellectual lines, and 
not a constant struggle between nations 
for supremacy. Not that tumult is to 
cease. It is a part of the law of evolution 
that old forms and foi-ces may and do 
exist for centuries alongside the new ; 
but they are no longer the dominating and 
directing forces. So more or less inces- 
sant warfare will continue; and the full 
flowering of the new principles will be but 
gradually realized. But the real leaven 
that is to work from this time on will be 
spiritual and intellectual, and not ma- 
terial. And just here seems to begin the 
working of Mr. Fiske's principle of the 
change in the direction of the activity of 
the law of natural selection from physical 
to mental and spiritual lines. The fitst 
great influence in this period was that of 
the Renaissance, so-called, which was not 
in reality the birth of anything new, but 
" an expansion, a liberation, an enlighten- 
ment — an opening of eyes, and of ears, 
and of inner senses and sensibilities." 
Then follows closely the great religious 
lieformation, when the spirit of Liberty 
which has been more or less dormant for 
centuries realizes itself, and the shackles 
are forever broken that have bound men to 
the church. The next great Era is that of 
the Political revolutions, covering roughly 
the period from 1600 to 1800, the act open- 
ing with the great contest for civil and 
political liberty between Charles I. and 
Parliament, and ending with the revolu- 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



35 



lion of 1688, and the establishment of the 
first Constitutional government. Then fol- 
lows a long period of struggles for greater 
freedom of thought and speech, and 
for the rights of the individual as a man 
and as a citizen, culminating in the Amer- 
ican and the French Revolutions, and re- 
sulting actually in the total overthrow of 
the whole structure of absolutism and des- 
potism, — whether in church or state. And 
after seventy centuries of slow but sure 
evolution man, representing the race, 
stands on the threshold of the nineteenth 
century emancipated hodily, nientalh/, and 
spiritually ; and the way is clear and open 
for the unrestricted use and exercise of 
all his faculties, the sequel of which is the 
story of the marvelous outburst of energy, 
inquiry, invention, and activity which has 
in very truth, within one hundred years, 
transformed the world. 

Imperfectly as we have expressed the 
marvelous development of the race, we 
think we have outlined the process with 
sufficient clearness to illustrate our pur- 
pose, and, perhaps, to lead others to in- 
vestigate the subject more fully, firmly be- 
lieving that all who do so will exclaim 
with Tennyson 

" Yet I doubt not through the Ages one 
increasing purpose runs, 

And the thoughts of men are widen'd 
with the process of the Suns." 
And the strongest evidence that the vast 
and rapid changes of the nineteenth cen- 
tury are not to be, like those of other cen- 
turies, sporadic, is to be found, as will 
be seen in our further treatment of The 
subject, in the fact that all the achieve- 
ments of the human intellect during this 
period follow one another in order. Each 
new discovery becomes at once a powerful 
instrument in the hands of innumerable 
.'■killed workers, and each year, as has been 
said, " wins over fresh regions of the uni- 
verse from the unknovsTi to the known." 
We have become so accustomed to the al- 
most daily discovery of most important 
principles that we fail to appreciate their 
meaning or importance, even inventions 
or improvements that the most unscien- 
tifie person must recognize as revolution- 



ary causing hardly a passing comment. 
It will, however, be our effort in the fol- 
lowing pages to give some comprehensive 
idea of what the total for the nineteenth 
century really represents. 

It has been shovi'n how little the condi- 
tions of life or of business had changed 
during the entire historic period down to 
the nineteenth century. It is now neces- 
sary to obtain some clear conception, if 
possible, of what the mode of life, and 
state of commerce, science, and the arts 
really were at that time, so that an intel- 
ligent realization of what the vast changes 
which are apparent now, as the result of 
a little more than a century's develop- 
ment, really mean. The census of 1800 
showed the population of the entire 
United States to be 5,308,483, of which 
number nearly 1,000,000 were negro slaves. 
As the country had generally become more 
settled after the Revolutionary War, five 
important social and commercial centres 
had established permanently their lead — 
Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, 
and Charleston. Of these, Philadelphia, 
the National Capital until July, 1800, 
having a population of about 70.000, was 
the most distinguished not alone because 
of its prestige as the capital city, but also 
because it was better paved, lighted, had a 
better class of houses and inns, and main- 
tained a more refined and aristocratic 
social life than was to be found else- 
where. Owing to the repeated scourges 
of yellow fever, considerable attention 
had been given to drainage and sanitation, 
and a general appearance of greater clean- 
liness obtained than in any of its sister 
cities. The Due de Liancourt was one of 
the most intelligent and observant of 
travelers through the States in the latter 
part of the eighteenth century ; and in the 
narrative of his travels he says: "Phila- 
delphia is not only the finest in the United 
States, but may be deemed one of the 
most beautiful cities in the world. The 
profusion and luxury on great days, at the 
tables of the wealthy, in their equipages, 
and the dresses of their wives and daugh- 
ters, are extreme. I have seen balls on the 
President's birthday where the splendor of 



36 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



the rooms and the variety and richness of 
the dresses did not suffer in comparison 
with Europe; and it must be acknowl- 
edged that the beauty of the American 
ladies has the advantage in the compari- 



make use of her natural advantages. 
More roads and canals were building and 
planned than elsewhere; while a turnpike 
from Philadelphia to Lancaster was eon;- 
pleted, and the great highway to Pittsburg 




THE PENN TREATY TREE, AND PHILADELPHIA, ABOUT ISOO. 



son. The young women of Philadelphia 
are accomplished in different degrees, but 
beauty is general with them. They want 
the ease and fashion of French women, 
but the brilliancy of their complexion is 
infinitely superior. Even when they grow 
old they are still handsome; and it would 
be no exaggeration to say. in the numer- 
ous assemblies of Philadelphia it is impos- 
sible to meet with what is called a plain 
woman. As to the young men, they for 
the most part seem to belong to another 
species." And the historian Henry 
Adams, referring to the same period, de- 
clares that "it (Philadelphia) surpassed 
any city of its size on cither side of the 
Atlantic for most of the comforts and 
some of the elegancies of life." Pennsyl- 
vania, too, manifested far greater public 
S])irit. and a more deteriniiied purpose to 



was the most important artery of com- 
merce and national life to be found in the 
LTnion. Several important industries had 
started up about the city too. There were 
iron-works already in a flourishing condi- 
tion, and the most productive manufac- 
tures of paper, gunpowder, pleasure car- 
riages, etc., were located there. The city 
was also the headquarters of the Bank of 
the United States, with its capital of 
$10,000,000 and private banks were cap- 
italized at about $5,000,000 more. All ac- 
counts of travelers represented it as a most 
attractive and interesting city; and the 
native or foreigner who wished to see the 
most or best of the social or material life 
of the country went to Philadelphia, as 
to-day he goes to New York. 

The State of New York gained a lead 
in population over Massachusetts and 



IX COLONIAL DAYS. 



37 



Maine (then one state) for the first time 
in 1800, the former being credited with a 
population of 589,000, and the latter with 
one of 573,000; while their respective val- 
uations for purposes of taxation were 
.$100,000,000 and $8-1,000,000. Outside the 
city of New York, however, there were 
fewer evidences of prosperity and general 
comfort than in New England. In fact 
it was in increase of population alone that 
the city had shown any material advance 
since the Revolution. Tiie population of 
33,000 in 1790 had grown to GO.OOO in 
1800, and the city was compared by for- 
eign travelers with Liveriiool, which then 
bad a population of about 70,000. It was 
a typical sea-port town, dirty, undrained, 
and for the most part unattractive. No 
sanitary regulations were enforced, and 
terrible scourges of the yellow fever in 
1798 and 1803 swept oS hundreds of vic- 
tims, and drove all who could get away 
back to the higher country. The esti- 
mated city expenses for the year 1800 
amounted to $130,000, a marked contrast 
with those of the jiresent day. The ap- 



able change in the monotony of the resi- 
dence streets. The Battery was naturally 
the rendezvous and promenade for all the 
people, and was undoubtedly the most at- 
tractive " breathing place " and park to 
be found in the country at that time. A 
broad walk ran to the water's edge, and 
above it on a terrace were ranged thirteen 
guns which commanded the entrance to 
the rivers. The wharves were all on the 
East river side and extended from the 
Battery round to Peck Slip. All the 
warehouses, stores, and best residences 
were east of Broadway, Wall street at 
the opening of the century being the fash- 
ionable residence street, with the aristo- 
cratic Trinity Church and church-yard at 
its head. John Jacob Astor, who had not 
yet begun his great series of investments 
in city property, but was simply a furrier, 
dwelt quite in the suburbs where the 
present Astor house stands. Thoug^h the 
Battery was the great resort of the people, 
still there were other attractive and in- 
viting places outside the city. On the 
heights overlooking the Sound were sev- 



sik is. :* ; 



"^j-^^ 



r'S^S^E^iffi^Kv^^^W?' 




THE BATTERY', 1800. 



pcarance of the residence part of the city 
had been somewhat improved as the area 
laid waste by two large fires had been 
filled in by new houses of other than 
Dutch architecture, which made an agree- 



eral " Tea Gardens " which were places 
of note. At Brannon's, for instance, there 
was a greenhouse full of lemon trees and 
orange trees, and many varieties of trop- 
ical plants, and, " besides the tea, the best 



38 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



iced liquors and the best icod creams that 
were to be had on the island." But the 
most popular of these resorts was at 
Gravesend, a " tea-drinking- pleasure 
house ■' known far and near. The fine 



wanted a position it was at the Tontine 
that the notice was posted up." To live 
at the Tontine cost at least two dollars 
and fifty cents a day; but where No. 1 
Broadway now stands was a fashionable 




^vff-t^T^M'^ ^ *tt*iy ^'^bi 



BROADWAY AND 



yiews and the cool breezes were additional 
attractions, and local papers speak of the 
" thousands " who on Sunday took the 
ferry to Brooklyn and thence the road to 
Gravesend. These were days when people 
seem to .have taken the burdens of life 
lightly, the merchants finding abundant 
time for social gatherings in the coffee- 
houses, and the women for promenades on 
the Battery, and gossip. Just previous to 
1800 the merchants had left their old Ex- 
change at the foot of Broad street, and 
had made the new " Tontine Coffee 
House " their meeting place. " This 
building," says McMasters, " has been de- 
scribed as elegant and commodious and in 
its coffee-room, from eleven till two each 
day, the merchants and brokers were gath- 
ered. There politics were discussed, scrip 
and stock bought and sold, and business 
in a lar!;e way transacted. There were the 
insurance offices, blank checks on the city 
banks, and the huge books in which cap- 
tains and pilots spread such shipping 
news as they had been able to collect. If 
a merchant wanted a clerk, or a clerk 



boarding house, or family hotel, where the 
rates were seven dollars per week. But a 
little way out of the city board could be 
obtained for two or three dollars a week. 
The bulk of the capital of the city at this 
time was invested in shipping. Of manu- 
factures there were but few and those un- 
important. New York had a wide and 
rapidly growing country over which to 
extend its trade, as all of Massachusetts 
west of the Connecticut river, most of 
Connecticut and New Jersey, and all of 
the Hudson valley with its constantly in- 
creasing settlements, came within its zone 
of trade. But no great amount of wealth, 
no new creations of power, nor any con- 
siderable industries yet existed. There 
were two banks in addition to the branch 
of the United States Bank, with a total 
capital of about $2,500,000; and besides 
these but two other banks existed in the 
state, one at Hudson and the other at Al- 
bany. The total value of the exports from 
New York in 1800 was but $14,000,000, 
while the net revenue from imports for 
1799 was $2,373,000, the net revenue col- 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



39 



locted ill Massachusetts for the same 
^leriod being $1,007,000. 

The census of 1800 gave to Boston a 
population of 25,000. It was not an at- 
tractive town. Its footways and sidewalks, 
like its streets, were paved with round cob- 
blestones, with no curbings, though a gut- 
ter ran between the walks and the street. 
The streets were almost unlighted at 
night, the occasional oil lamp that was 
provided serving rather to make the dark- 
ness more sensibly felt than to lighten the 
way. Notwithstanding its large popula- 
tion, and its extended interests, it still 
retained the old New England town sys- 
tem of government, the management of 
its affairs being in the hands of selectmen, 
chosen annually at the " town meetings." 
The first charter for a city was issued in 
1822. Though there had been many im- 
provements in the way of building roads 
and of public and private buildings, still, 
notwithstanding the general economy and 



in a style of comfort and elegance, that 
compared favorably with the best homes 
and social life of Philadelphia, or of the 
best English mercantile classes. But law- 
yers, ministers, and the average trades- 
men found it difKcult to live in such a 
manner as their abilities and worth would 
warrant. There were no great corporations 
of any character to pay large retainers 
and " fat " fees to the lawyers. Litigation 
was for the most part over petty causes, 
and the litigants were far from rich; 
while down to the nineteenth century few 
ministers in New England received more 
than five hundred dollars a year. On 
these meagre salaries, however, they 
reared large families, and practiced char- 
ity and hospitalitv with considerable 
liberality. In a eulogy on the Rev. Abijah 
Weld, of Attleborough, Mass., President 
Dwight stated the amazing fact that on a 
salary of two hundred and twenty dollars 
a year Mr. Weld had reared eleven ehil- 




BOSTON IN 1776. 



thrift of the people, Boston and New Eng- 
land were poor. A few of the more prom- 
inent merchants, chiefly m foreign trade, 
had amassed what were then considered 
large fortunes, and built houses and lived 



dren, in addition to keeping a hospitable 
house and exercising a generous charity 
toward the poor. Temporarily, as a result 
of the French Wars, Boston was enjoying 
an unusual degree of prosperity. The ex- 



40 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



ports and imports of New England were 
comparatively very great, and its shipping 
is said to have been greater than that of 
New York and Pennsylvania. One factor 
in the volume of this shipping has 
brought the bitterest criticism upon Bos- 
ton, and few will deny that it has been 
well merited. A regular fleet of vessels 
was engaged in a peculiar tri-angular 
trade. They loaded at Boston with Med- 
ford rum, which was then taken to the 
coast of Africa where it was exchanged 
for negroes. Of course certain of the 
coast chiefs were a part of the machinery, 
and they constantly warred on their 
neighboring tribes, and held their captives 
to exchange with the American captain 
for his rum. Many other ways were de- 
vised, too, to get possession of natives. 
Frequently off some little coast settlement 
the innocent blacks would swarm in their 
canoes around the vessel attracted by the 
curious ship, unfamiliar to them. They 
could usually be lured on board, when all 
would be chained and cast into the hold. 
Death itself would have been intinitcly 
preferable to the sufferings these poor 
creatures were doomed to endure. The 
'•'cargo" was not complete until every 
available inch of space in the hold was 
" assigned." Each man was allowed six 
feet by sixteen inches to lie down in; boys 
were allowed five feet by fourteen inches; 
the women five feet, ten inches by sixteen 
inches; and the girls four feet by one foot 
each. To make them lie close the lash and 
rope's end were used. Brooks's " Histoi'y 
of Medford " gives several illustrations of 
the transactions of these vessels. The 
cargo of the " Caesar," for example, out- 
bound was : eighty-two barrels, six hogs- 
heads, and six tierces of New England 
rum; thirty-three barrels best Jamaica 
spirits; thirty-three barrels of Barbados 
rum; twenty-five pistols; two casks mus- 
ket balls; one chest arms; twenty-five cut- 
lasses. The return cargo was " In the hold 
on board the scow ' Caesar,' 153 adult 
slaves and two children." Frequently 
these return cargoes of slaves were taken 
directly to Southern points and sold; but 
generally they were taken to some " clear- 



ing house " in the West Indies, where they 
were exchanged for molasses, which was 
brought to Boston to make more rum, so 
that there should be no hitch in the per- 
fect working of the system. 

The great manufacturing interests that 
have made Boston and New England such 
hives of industry, and have been the 
sources of the great wealth so manifest in 
New England to-day, had as yet no exist- 
ence. The people were still dependent 
upon home industrj- for clothing and most 
of the necessaries of life. Two or three 
small cotton mills were being operated 
■nath doubtful success; but Massachusetts 
could not comjjete with England in lines 
of ordinary manufacture. The whale-oil, 
salt-fish, lumber, and rum were mostly 
shipiied abroad; but a few coasting sloops 
were eng-aged in the coasting trade, on 
which were shipped home-made linens and 
clothes, cheese, butter, shoes, etc. These 
were sent chiefly to Norfolk and the 
Southern ports, one sloop only plying reg- 
ularly between Boston and New York. 
Down to the nineteenth century three 
banks liad been established in Boston, one 
being a branch of the Bank of the United 
States, and the others local. The total 
capital of these institutions was about 
$2,500,000, while the capital of a number 
of small banks scattered through the 
smaller towns was about equal in 
amount. 

Baltimore had suddenly become a cen- 
tre of enterprise and activity after the 
war, and at the time we are considering 
had a population as large as that of Bos- 
ton, with an equal or larger shipping busi- 
ness. Washington was just rising, with 
doubtful success, from the marshes of the 
Potomac. When the seat of government 
was removed to that place from Philadel- 
phia in 1800, a most unattractive and un- 
promising scene presented itself. The 
" City " had only a few log- cabins and 
negro quarters, where, as one has said, 
" the plan called for the traffic of London 
and the elegance of Versailles." The half 
finished White House stood in a barren 
field overlooking the Potomac, witli two 
unattractive government buildings near 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



41 



it; while a mile and a half away across a 
swamp stood the two unfinished wings of 
the capitol, without a body. " Never," 
says Henry Adams, " did hermit or saint 
condemn himself to solitude more con- 
sciously than Congress and the Executive 
in removing the government from Phila- 
delphia to Washington; the discontented 
men clustered together in eight or ten 
boarding houses as near as possible to the 
capitol and there lived, like a convent of 
monks, with no other amusement or occu- 
pation than that of going from their lotlg- 
ings to chambers and back again. Even 
private wealth could do little to improve 
the situation, for there was nothing which 
v;ealth could buy. There were in Wash- 
ingfton no shops or markets, skilled labor, 
commerce, or people. Public efforts and 
lavish use of public money could alone 
make the place tolerable; but Congress 
doled out funds for this national and per- 
sonal object with so sparing a hand that 
their capitol threatened to crumble to 
pieces and crush Senate and House under 
the ruins long before the building was 
complete." 

Turning toward the south from Wash- 
ington, the evidences of prosperity became 
less and less apparent. Virginia had at 
this time a population of more than a half 
million whites and three hundred and 
fifty thousand slaves. Yet between Alex- 
andria and Charleston no place of any im- 
portance existed. Of roads there were 
practically none; and Jefferson com- 
plained that between Montiicello and 
Washington seven rivers were to be 
crossed, over four of which there were no 
bridges of any kind for their entire 
length. The land was already exhausted; 
and the most skilled husbandry which a 
few large land-owners like Jefferson prac- 
ticed could not secure a yield of more 
than eight bushels of wheat to the acre. 
Even where the continued planting of to- 
bacco had not exhausted the lands bad 
systems of agriculture and force of habit 
kept the farmers in their old ruts. Great 
estates were still the rule, situated mostly 
along the navigable rivers, sounds, and 
creeks of the Eastern Shore; but even on 



these the evidences of wealtli, and the 
semi-royal mode of life which prevailed 
a century before, were rarely in evidence. 
.As the Due de Lianeourt observed : " The 
Virginians are not generally rich, es- 
pecially in net revenue. Thus one often 
finds a well-served table, covered with 
silver, in a room where for ten years half 
the window panes have been missing, and 
where they will be missed for ten years 
more. There are few houses in a passable 
state of repair, and of all parts of the es- 
tablishment those best cared for are the 
stables." No better statement of the dif- 
ferent conditions that obtained in Vir- 
ginia and Pennsylvania could be found 
than that which appears in the account of 
the travels of an English Quaker, Robert 
Sutcliffe, who made a journey through the 
States in 1804. " In Pennsylvania," he 
says, " we met great numbers of wagons 
drawn by four or more fine, fat horses, 
the carriages firm and well made, and cov- 
ered with stout good linen bleached almost 
white (the ' Conestoga wagons ') ; and it 
is not uncommon to see ten or fifteen to- 
gether traveling cheerfully along the 
road, the driver riding on one of his 
horses. Many of these come more than 
three hundred miles to Philadelphia from 
tlie Ohio, Pittsburg, and other places; and 
1 have been told by a respectable Eriend, 
a native of Philadelphia, that more than 
one thousand covered carriages frequently 
come to the Philadelphia market. The 
appearance of things in the slave States is 
quite the reverse of this. We sometimes 
meet a ragged black boy or girl driving a 
team consisting of a lean cow and a mule ; 
sometimes a lean bull, or an ox, and a 
mule; and I have seen an ox, a mule, and 
a bull, each miserable in its appearance, 
comix)sing one team, with a half naked 
black slave or two riding or di'iving as 
occasion suited. The carriage or wagon, 
if it may be called such, appeared in as 
wretched condition as the team and its 
driver. Sometimes a couple of horses, 
mules, or cows, would be dragging a hogs- 
head of tobacco, with a pivot or axle 
driven into each end of the hogshead, and 



42 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEK. 



something like a shaft attached, by which 
it was drawn or rolled along the road." 

Although North Carolina ranked fifth 
among the sixteen states of the Union in 
population, being credited with 478,000 



five feet, and the space below is left open 
for the hogs, with whose charming vocal 
performances the wearied traveler is sere- 
naded the whole night long." 

But when one reached Charleston the 




VIRGINIA TOBACCO TEAM, 1800. 



inhabitants, yet it was the most unknown 
of all the states. No entei-prise was mani- 
fest, and so far as influence of any kind 
upon the political, social, and economic 
life of the country was concerned it might 
as well, apparently, have been stricken 
from the list of states. Travelers who 
were forced to pass through it, en route 
for Charleston, or other points farther 
south, made the most doleful reports of 
their experiences. One particularly intel- 
ligent traveler reports: "The taverns 
are the most desolate and beggarly 
imaginable ; bare, black, and dirty walls, 
one or two old broken chairs and a bench 
form all the furniture. The white females 
seldom make their appearance. At supper 
you sit down to a meal tlie very sight of 
which is sufficient to deaden the most 
eager appetite, and you are surrounded by 
half a dozen dirty, half naked, blacks, 
male and female, whom any man of com- 
mon scent might smell a mile off. The 
house itself is raised upon props four or 



whole scene changed. The city had in 
1800 a population of 18,000 and so was a 
close third to Baltimore and Boston. It 
possessed a large foreign trade and at all 
times vessels from Great Britain and the 
^^'est Indies could bo seen at the wharves. 
It had, too, a very large proportion of cul- 
tivated, refined people, most aristocratii- 
in their bearing- and manner. They were 
chiefly owners of large plantations who 
made the city their home for the greater 
part of the year, while the overseer man- 
aged the estate. Many of the men had 
been educated at the English universities 
and had brought back to Carolina an in- 
tense devotion to sports, especially of the 
lower class so much favored by the Eng- 
lish aristocrat. Like the wealthy Vir- 
ginian, the Carolina planter was a pas- 
sionate lover of the race course, as well 
as the patron of cock-fighting, and in too 
many cases of the brutal " set-to," known 
as the rough-and-tumble fight, which was 
a prize-fight without rules, and in which 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



43 



'.he biting off of an ear or nose, and the 
gouging out of eyes were permissible. 
This barbarous encounter was of more or 
less frequent occurrence all through the 
South, and particularly common in the 
southwest along the Ohio river. These 
Virginia and Carolina planters scorned 
any connection with trade, and looked upon 
tiie things done by merchants and trades- 
men as degrading. They were generally 
poor in immediate cash, yet ever ready to 
■ii'ager a slave on a horse race or five hun- 
dred dollars in tobacco or cotton upon a 
cock-fight, — the cocks always being shod 
with steel spurs to make the " sport " 
more bloody, and so more exciting. A 
most generous hospitality was offered at 
the homes of the great planters of both 
Virginia and the Carolinas, the passing 
stranger ever finding a warm welcome. 



from the fact that the great plantations 
were so isolated that even the sight of a 
strange face served to break the monotony 
of life, while from the stranger the 
planter might hope to get some news of 
what was going on in the world from 
which he was so absolutely separated. 

The people of Charleston, too, had been 
active in efforts to improve their trade, 
and extend the area that might be tribu- 
tary to the city. They readily saw that 
theirs was the natural shipping port for 
the whole Tennessee and northern Georgia 
territory, and they had secured a good 
road from the coast to Nashville, Tenn., 
over which a regularly established trade 
was being rai^idly built up. But two 
events had recently occurred that meant 
more to the far Southern States than any 
avenue of commerce they might open 




^. 



CHARLESTON IN 1780. 



In many cases where the house lay far 
back from the main-traveled road a slave 
was kept stationed at the highway to in- 
vite travelers to share the hospitality of 
the proprietor. This custom had arisen 



up. The first was the utilization of the 
recently invented Watt steam engine by 
the cotton manufacturers of England, 
enormously increasing the demand for 
cotton; and the other was the invention 



44 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



of the Whitney Cotton Gin. Here we come 
upon the first of the great inventions tliat 
have helped to transform tlie world dur- 
ing the nineteenth eentui-j'. The first 
cotton grown in the United States was 
lirolmhly in 1789. The next year a few 
bales, then called " packets," were sent to 
England and sold for twenty-two pence a 
pound. From this time the price steadily 
rose until in 17(t9 it reached forty-four 
cents in this country. In the meantime 
more and more attention had been given 
to its culture, and the crop of two hun- 
ch'cd thousand pounds in 1791 grew to 
twenty million in 1801, and twice that 
amount in 1803. In 1794: Whitney re- 
ceived the patent on his " gin," and in 

1801 South Carolina bought it, and in 

1802 North Carolina and Tennessee; and 
an immediate and tremendous impulse 
was given to the production of cotton. 
The planters increased their land holdings 
as fast and as far as possible, and a brisk 
demand arose for more slaves. The 
future of the South looked more promis- 
ing than that of most of the Northern 
states; and the citizen of Charleston 
easily saw his city passing Boston and 
Baltimore in wealth and commerce to take 
its place as the third city of the Union. 

Already, in 1800, nearly a half million 
people had pushed their way beyond the 
Alleghany and Blue Ridge mountains. 
By the routes already mentioned to 
Pittsburg, and another road that had been 
built from the Potomac southwest through 
Virginia to Knoxville, Tenn., and thence 
through the Cumberland Gap into Ken- 
tuek.v, there was a constant movement of 
emigration toward the Ohio valley. At 
Pittsburg and along the Monongahela 
river existed settlements already old, with 
a population of more than seventy thou- 
sand. Kentucky, the largest community 
west of the mountains, had a population 
of one hundred and eighty thousand 
whites and forty thousand negTo slaves; 
wliile about ninety thousand whites and 
fourteen thousand slaves were sparsely 
settled over the state of Tennessee. Cin- 
cinnati had a population of about fifteen 
thousand people, and at Marietta a New 



England colony had established itself. 
Buffalo and Rochester were not yet laid 
out. and the rough outline we have 
sketched of the area and conditions within 
(he United States of 1800 certainly has 
little that would lead the most optimistic 
of propliets to see even the faintest glim- 
merings of the great changes that were 
so soon to press upon each other witli a 
bewildering rapidity. As Henry Adams 
well says : " Nature was rather man's 
master than his servant, and the five mil- 
lion Americans struggling with the un- 
tamed Continent seemed hardly more 
competent to their task than the beavers 
and buffalo which had for countless gen- 
erations made bridges and roads of their 
own." The same authority estimates that 
tlie " probable valuation of the whole 
United States in 1800 was $1,800,000,000, 
equal to $328 for each human being, in- 
cluding slaves or $418 to each free white. 
This property was distributed with an 
approach to equality, except in a few of 
the Southern States. In New York and 
Philadelphia a private fortune of one 
hundred thousand dollars was considered 
handsome, and three hundred thousand 
was great wealth. Inequalities were fre- 
quent but they were chiefly those of a 
landed aristocracy. Equality was so far 
the rule that every white family of five 
persons might be supix)sed to own land, 
stock or utensils, a house and furniture 
worth about two thousand dollars ; and as 
the only considerable industry was agri- 
culture, their scale of life was easy to 
calculate — taxes amounting to little or 
nothing, and wages averaging about a 
dollar a day." 

But it was not only tlie lack of inven- 
tive faculty and the disposition to be sat- 
isfied with existing conditions; the low 
mental state and the lack of moral force 
that characterized a great part of the peo- 
ple, — it was not alone these things that 
filled many thoughtful people with dark 
fcjrebodings as to the future. In addition 
to these the want of a sentiment of na- 
tionalit.y and union filled many wi+h 
alarm. Between New England and New 
York, or New York and Pennsylvania, 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



45 



there was little of common interest; while 
hetween all three and the South there was 
still less. Moreover the inland empire 
that was being built up west of the Al- 
leghanies had no common ground of 
thought or action with the sea-board 
states; and its natural connection with the 
outside world seemed to be by way of the 
Ohio and the Mississippi rivers rather 
than over two hundred miles of mountains 
and forests to the Atlantic ports. 

The primary causes of this lack of com- 
mon interest are to be found in the des- 
perate and paralyzing conditions that ex- 
isted during the last two or three years of 
the Revolutionary War. At the outbreak 
of the war, and especially after the Decla- 
ration of Independence, the entire pop- 
ulation of the Colonies was thrilled with a 
spirit of patriotism and enthusiasm that 
promised great and speedy results. The 
repulse of the British regulars at Lexing- 
ton and Concord, followed by the essential 
victory at Bunker Hill, had convinced the 
Americans that under anything like 
equally favorable conditions they were 
more than a match for the British troops. 
But the people had no conception of what 
it meant to organize, drill, and equip an 
army, and were suspicious of every move- 
ment that looked toward the possible es- 
tablishment of a standing army; so that 
every obstacle was placed in the way of 
Washington's achieving much immediate 
success. The brilliant campaign of 1777 
in New Jersey, which was destined to es- 
tablish among military critics Washing- 
ton's position as one of the greatest gen- 
erals of history, only served to revive for 
a period the rapidly waning confidence of 
the people ; and when this was followed by 
the forced inaction and futile efforts of 
the next two or three years, chiefly due to 
the vacillating course and incompetency 
of the Continental Congress, an evil spirit 
of apathy and despair took possession of 
the popular mind, the worst result of 
■which was the revival of old-time local 
and state jealousies, and a hopeless indif- 
ference as to the outcome of the struggle 
for independence. Even the crowning 
victories in South Carolina and Virginia 



failed to dissipate this sentiment and to 
inspire hope; and it was only the most 
adroit and persistent effort of Washing- 
ton and a few of the great political leaders 
tliat was powerful enough to revive the de- 
sire for Union sufiiciently to secure a con- 
vention for the consideration of some new 
form of government. Even after the Con- 
stitution had been framed and laid before 
tlie people it was nearly two years before 
the approval of nine of the thirteen col- 
onies could be secured; while in the fight 
in the different states over its adoption 
the old sectional differences and selfish 
local interests were still further inflamed. 
Never did a great nation have its birth 
in greater pains and labor than did the 
United States. The war had cost $170,- 
(100,000 ; but there was no inclination on 
the part of the states to contribute 
toward the settlement of their share of the 
just claims incurred. So indifferent were 
the people to the public needs that at one 
time there was not one dollar in tlie na- 
tional treasury. The payment of taxes 
was regarded as an " amiable eccentric- 
ity." All these disgraceful and disheart- 
ening conditions, too, were aggravated by 
the deplorable state of the currency. The 
cvaze for " cheap money " was everywhere 
manifest in the rural communities, and 
every kind of a substitute for coin was in 
circulation, until it became impossible to 
fix upon any basis of values on which bus- 
iness transactions could be conducted. It 
would have seemed that the exijerience of 
the people with the Continental currency 
during the war should have taught them a 
lesson they would not soon forget ; but 
such was not the case. The Continental 
Congress, having no power to levj- taxes 
on the colonies, as early as 1775 began to 
issue bills. The first issue was for 
$300,000, redeemable in gold or silver in 
three years. Eurther issues in rapid suc- 
cession increased the amount outstanding 
in 1778 to about nine millions, and down 
to that date their value was maintained. 
But when Congress showed neither an in- 
clination nor ability to redeem the earlier 
issues, depreciation began and the decline 
was rapid ; so that by the end of that year 



46 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



The paper dollar was worth only sixteen 
cents in the Northern states and twelve 
in the Southern. Washington sadly ob- 
served that it took a wagon load of money 
to buy a wagon load of provisions. A 
small minority in Congress insisted upon 
the adoption of some method of taxation 
to relieve the situation ; but the general 
sentiment of that body was voiced by one 
member who indignantly asked why he 
should help to ta.x the people when they 
could go to the printing office and get a 
cartload of money. " Early in 1780," says 
John Fiske, " the value of the dollar had 
fallen to two cents, and before the end of 
the year it took ten paper dollars to make 
a cent. In October, Indian corn sold 
wholesale in Boston for $150 a bushel ; 
butter was twelve dollars a pound; tea, 
ninety dollare; sugar, ten dollars; beef, 
eight dollars ; coffee, twelve dollars ; and a 
barrel of flour cost $1,575. Samuel Adams 
paid $2,000 for a hat and suit of clothes. 
The money soon ceased to circulate, debts 
could not be collected, and there was a 
general prostration of credit. To say a 
thing 'was not worth a continental.' be- 
came the strongest possible expression of 
contempt." But. notwithstanding these 
bitter and recent experiences, nearly all the 
states within five years were flooded with 
local bills, and every conceivable thing 
that was transferable was offered in pay- 
ment for goods. In many places the mer- 
chants closed their stores and refused to 
do any business. vSuch conditions could 
not fail to result in the direst distress, 
which resulted in disorder and riots in 
many places, and the more serious 
" Shays' Rebellion " in Massachusetts. 
The sentiment that the Union was a fail- 
ure became common throughout the 
greater part of the country, and that no 
relief from the public ills could be looked 
f<n- from that source. Withiii twenty-five 
years after the adoption of the Constitu- 
tion no less than five distinct movcmonis 
looking toward secession received popular 
support in different parts of the country-, 
while the general principle of nullification 
was stoutly maintained by the Virginia 
and Kentucky Resolutions of 179S and 



1799. By the Funding Act of the first 
National Congress the financial situation 
was materially improved ; and by meas- 
ures of reasonable taxation a tolerable 
revenue was established both for the gen- 
eral and state governments. Business im- 
proved accordingly and the dejected and 
disheartened people slowly acquired a 
measure of confidence in the future of the 
Union, and hope came to reign in the 
place of despair. But even the imi^roved 
business conditions, and the increase of 
wealth could not obliterate state and sec- 
tional prejudices and jealousies; and any- 
thing like a real condition of political 
harmony and national unity was still far 
from realization at the opening of the 
nineteenth century. Happily, in a sense, 
the various aggressions of both England 
and France on the rights of Americans 
during the first quarter of a century of 
tlie nation's existence, with the resultant 
war of 1812, served in a measure to unite 
all the factions, and to create a sentiment 
of nationality and a community of in- 
terests, which the coming of the railroad a 
few years later, — breaking down all phys- 
ical barriers between the diverse sections 
of the country, and bringing the people 
of each locality into closer intercourse 
and acquaintance with those of every 
other, — served to perpetuate and make 
lasting. Though, as a sad experience 
proved, only the civil war could remove 
certain obstacles to a perfect harmony, 
and forever bury all ideas of nullification 
and separation by establishing an indis- 
soluble union of the people of the whole 
land, as distinguished from a federation 
of individually sovereign states. 

But the conditions which prevailed 
down to the war of 1812 — the jealousies, 
selfishness, indifference to the public wel- 
fare, — worked a lasting injury to the 
cause of popular government, which only 
the successful issue of the Civil War, es- 
tablishing a more solid and permanent 
union, served to relieve. European na- 
tions looked upon a govenunent by the 
people as a beautiful dream, perhaps, but 
impossible of realization; and the chaos, 
and almost anarchy, of the early period of 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



47 



our history only confirmed them in their 
opinion. The people could not be trusted 
to establish a government, and rule them- 
selves! And this conviction is voiced by 
all the foreign publicists and writers on 
the science of government of the first half 
of the nineteenth century, — Mill, Maine, 
and Freeman (in his earlier days) in par- 
ticular, — all illustrating' their argiiments 
from what they conceived to be the failure 
of ReiDublican institutions in America. 
More serious, however, was the breach 
made between the great leaders in the pop- 
ular movement here and the i>eople for 
whom they labored. Anyone reading the 
Journal of the Constitutional Convention 
will see that, however much Hamilton and 
a few others favored a more aristocratic 
form of government than that finally 
adopted, all were agreed that the govern- 
ment to be established should be one of, 
by, and for all the people of all the states. 
No one seriously questioned the ability of 
the people to act sanely and wisely in 
adopting and conducting their govern- 
ment. But the course of affairs and the 
conduct of the great rural communities 
during the twenty years following the 
adoption of the Constitution disgusted 
and alienated the leaders who had spared 
neither physical streng-th and health, ex- 
penditures of private means, nor incessant 
labor in behalf of the popular cause, until 
the line of division in sentiment between 
the two classes became marked and threat- 
ening. No one would doubt the patriot- 
ism of Fisher Ames; yet he but expressed 
the profound conviction of nearly all his 
class, when he wrote, in 1803 : " Our coun- 
try is too big for Union, too sordid for 
patriotism, too democratic for liberty. 
What will become of it. He who made it 
best knows. Its vice will govern it. by 
practising upon its folly. This is or- 
dained for democracies." In his most valu- 
able History of the Ignited States, Henry 
Adams has discussed this situation at 
length ; and among other illustrations of 
the spirit he quotes, " as neither more ex- 
travagant nor more treasonable than the 
rest," a paragraph from Dennie's " Port- 
folio," of 1803. "A democracy," says the 



writer, " is scarcely tolerable at any 
period of national history. Its omens are 
always sinister and its powers are unpro- 
pitious. It is on its trial here, and the 
issue will be civil war, desolation, and 
anarchy. No wise man but discerns its 




FISHER AMES. 

imperfections, no good man but shudders 
at its miseries, no honest man but pro- 
claims its fraud, and no brave man but 
draws his sword against its force. The in- 
stitution of a scheme of policy so radically 
contemjjtible and vicious is a memorable 
example of what the villainy of some men 
can devise, the folly of others receive, and 
both establish in spite of reason, reflec- 
tion, and sensation." But the too prevail- 
ing sentiment among these men was most 
tersely stated by Hamilton, who at a din- 
ner in New York, replying to some dem- 
ocratic sentiment, struck the table sharply 
with his hand, and exclaimed, " Your peo- 
ple sir, — your people is a great heasf." 
Small prophesy, surely, can be found in 
such political conditions of the firmly es- 
tablished LTnion, and mighty nation, now 
a leading " World Power." 

Such was the general character of the 
physical, material, and political conditions 
that existed in the United States in 1800. 
It will also be of interest to learn some- 



48 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tiling- of the cloniestie life of the i^ojile, 
the conveniences and aclvantages they en- 
joyed at homo and when they traveled, 
and of the intellectual advancement which 
had been reached when the nineteenth cen- 
tury opened. As it is the traveler alone 
who can obtain any satisfactory idea of 
the social and domestic conditions of a 
wide area of countiy, — settled by iieople 
of various nationalities. — each of whom 
li'oks upon the "home-land" customs and 
habits as the best and most rational, and 
all variant ones as peculiar or foolish, — 
the means of communication between dif- 
fei'ent parts of the country, and the 
modes of travel first claim our attention. 
There is hardly any institution in which 
the whole people to-day are so much in- 
terested as in the post-office department. 
It was not so, however, one hundred years 
ago, the difference due partly to the very 
poor service rendered and the high rates 
of postage, couiiled with the poverty of 
the people, and also to the sluggish mental 
condition of the great majority. The first 
mail ever despatched on this continent 
left New York for Boston on Xew Year's 
Day, 1C73. Francis Lovelace, the second 
English Governor of New York, who came 
over in 1G68, evolved a plan which he 
thought should promote the union of the 
English Colonies. This plan he outlined 
in a letter to Winthrop, at Hartford, in 
1G72, which has such a lasting interest 
as the origin of our great mail service 
that we quote it entire, as given by John 
Fiske. " I herewitli present you with two 
rarities," he wrote; "a pacquette of the 
latest intelligence I could meet withal, 
and a Post. By the first you will see what 
has been acted on the stage of Europe; 
by the latter you will meet with a monthly 
fresh supply; so that if it receive but the 
same ardent inclination from you as at 
first it has from myself, by our monthly 
advisees all publique occurrences may be 
transmitted between us, together with sev- 
eral other great convenieneys of publique 
importance, consonant to the commands 
laid on us b.v His sacred Majestie, who 
strictly injoine all his American subjects 
to enter into a close correspondency with 



each other. This I look upon as the most 
compendious means to beget a mutual 
undei-standing; and that it may receive all 
the countenance from you for its future 
duration, I shall acquaint you with the 
model I have proposed; and if you please 
but to make an addition to it, or sub- 
straction, or any other alteration, I shall 
be ready to comply with you. This per- 
son that has undertaken the employment 
I conceived most proper, being both stout, 
active, and indefatigable. He is sworne 
as to his fidelity. I have affixt an aimuall 
sallery on him, which, together with the 
advantage of his letters and other small 
portable paekes, may afford him a hand- 
some livelyhood. Hartford is the first 
stage I have designed him to change his 
horse, where constantly I expect he should 
have a fresh one lye. All the letters out- 
ward shall be delivered gratis, with a sig- 
nification of Post Payd on the sui>erscrip- 
tion; and reciprocally, we expect all to us 
free. Each first Monday of the month he 
sets out from New Y'ork and is to return 
within the month from Boston to us 
again. The maile has divers baggs, ac- 
cording to the townes the letters are de- 
signed to, which are all sealed up till their 
arrivemcnt, with the seale of the Seere- 
tarie's office, whose care it is on Saturday 
night to seale them up. Only by-letters 
are in an open bag', to disisense by the 
wayes. Thus you see the scheme I have 
drawne to promote a happy correspond- 
ence. I shall only beg of you your fur- 
therance to so universall a good work, that 
is to afford him directions where and to 
whom to make his application to upon his 
arrival at Boston ; as likewise to afford him 
what letters you can to establish him in 
that imployment there. It would be much 
advantageous to our designe, if in the in- 
tervall you discoursed with some of the 
most able woodmen, to make out the best 
and most facile way for a Post, which in 
processe of tyme would be the King's best 
highway ; as likewise passages and accom- 
modations at rivers, fords, or other neces- 
sary places." 

A locked box was set up in the Seere- 
tarv's office in New York, in which east 



IX COLONIAL DAYS. 



49 



bound letters were dropped day by day 
during the absence of the carrier. When 
he returned with his prepaid mail, he 
emptied his New York bag on a large table 
in the Coffee-House where citizens were 
most accustomed to congregate. And in 
that locked box in the Secretary's office, 
and the table at the Coffee-House, was 
the prophecy of the great Postal-System 
of the present day, which reaches the most 
remote settlements of the whole country. 
But the development was slow and hardly 
any improvement in methods was made 
for more than one hundred years. 

Shortly after the Revolution a general 
post-route had been marked out from Pas- 



letters taken along their lines. By an Act 
of Congress, February 20, 1792, the rates 
of postage were fixed as follows: Up to 
thirty miles, on a single letter, six cents: 
between thirty and sixty miles, eight 
cents; between sixty and one hundred 
miles, ten cents ; and so on, until between 
three hundred and fifty and four hundred 
and fifty miles it was twenty-two cents, 
and above four hundred and fifty, twenty- 
five cents. Much trouble later arose re- 
garding these rates, as the postmaster at 
each office was the solo judge of distances, 
and great abuses grew up in the way of 
overcharges. As a result of constant com- 
plaints, in 1811, the Government ordered 




BURNS's COFFEE HOUSE, BOWLING GREEN. 



samaquoddy in the Province of Maine to 
Georgia, with a few lateral branches from 
Boston, New York, and Philadelphia; 
the service rendered down to the end of 
the eighteenth century being conducted by 
mail carriers on horseback, with their bags 
hung on either side of their horses. No 
definite schedule of time for the starting 
or arrival of mails could be established, 
owing to the poor condition of the roads 
or trails traversed. Consequently the car- 
riers took their own time, conducting a 
private commission and agency business 
along their routes and appropriating, as 
perquisites, all postage collected on local 
4 



a careful topographical survey of the en- 
tire post-road from Maine to Georgia, as 
well as of the cross-roads. The distances 
between each of the post-towns was then 
published so that anyone could compute 
with accuracy just the amount of postage 
required. In this connection it is interest- 
ing to note that the historian of the 
British Post-office says that " in 1813 there 
was not a single town in the British King- 
dom, at the post-office of which absolutely 
certain information could have been ob- 
tained as to the charge to which a letter 
addressed to any other town would be 
subject." 



50 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



As a basis for charging- postage a letter 
was a single sheet of any size, each addi- 
tional sheet counting as an extra letter. 
That the people indulged in but little cor- 
respondence is manifest from the fact 
that, even at the high rates of postage, the 
gross revenue for the eighteen months be- 
ginning July 1, 1791 and ending Decem- 
ber 31, 1792, was only $92,988.40, the ex- 
penses for the same period being $76,- 
580.00, leaving a net revenue for the de- 
partment of $ie,-101.S0. The Postmaster- 
General was not yet a member of the 
cabinet, so insignificant were his duties. 
In 1791, something like a reorganization 
of the service was attempted, Timothy 
Pickering being placed at its head. 
There were then two hundred and sixty- 
four post-offices in the country. There 
were also the same troubles over what is 
now termed " second class " matter as fre- 
quently arise at present. Previous to 
Pickering's regime the Postmaster-Gen- 
eral would have nothing to do with news- 
papers. Local postmasters received them 
generally, and sent them along with the 
mails ; but they were not under obligation 
to do so. Consequently local papers re- 
mote from the coast towns were filled with 
complaints that the " Pennsylvania 
Packets," or the " New York Journals " 
were kept back, and polite but urgent re- 
quests were made that they be forwarded. 
But the new law of 1792 decreed that 
after its passage no postmaster should re- 
ceive or distribute newsisapers free of 
postage, which was fixed at one cent for 
any distance within one hundred miles, 
and beyond that distance at a cent and a 
half. By the same Congressional Act the 
" franking " privilege was given to mem- 
bers of Congress. These two latter fea- 
tures of the law aroused a storm of angry 
criticism and abuse of the Government all 
over the country. The postage on papers 
was declared to be " a vile tax on knowl- 
edge," and the Postmaster-General was 
brought into violent disputes with many 
editors. The " franking " privilege was 
regarded as a scheme to intrench itself 
in power by the dominant party, — "An 
aristocratic scheme." The general senti- 



ment as voiced by the press, has been well 
summed up by McMaster. " Why," it was 
said, " should the mass of the people be 
loaded with an odious tax, while a select 
few escaped ? Was the information likely 
to be conveyed in the letters of Congress- 
men better than the information to be 
found in ' Packets ' and ' Journals i ' 
What kind of information did these let- 
ters convey while the funding system was 
being framed (when Congressmen were 
openly charged with the use of their 
knowledge for speculative purposes) ? 
Had not these self-appointed aristocrats 
most shamefuly abused their privilege on 
that occasion ? That scheme of finances 
which collected a revenue from the mails 
by loading them with free letters might 
be understood by the minds of a Congress- 
man, but, happily, such minds were rare." 
By the schedules of that day. letters 
which left Philadelphia at eight in the 
morning were due in New Yorlv at two the 
next afternoon ; and exactly the same time 
was consumed in reaching Baltimore. 
Ordinarily it took four days for a letter 
to go from New York to Boston, — in win- 
ter, much longer. George Washington 
died December 14, 1799 ; but the news of 
his death did not reach Boston until the 
24th, though it was doubtless conveyed 
with the greatest speed possible, as it was 
an event of such momentous interest. At 
the time of the reorganization in 1792, 
President Washington was anxious that a 
system should be established that would 
insure the covering on all main routes of 
at least one hundred miles eveiy twenty- 
four hours; and as the mail carriers trav- 
eled only by day, it was proposed to hurry 
the mails along at night by giving them 
to stage coaches. But the country was too . 
poor for this added expense, so that mat- 
ters continued in about the same condi- 
tion until well into the nineteenth cen- 
tury. By 1800 the gross revenue from the 
mail service was $320,000, toward which 
letters contributed $290,000, and the bal- 
ance, we may presume, was largely from 
the postage on newspapers. It would 
seem that, at the rates of postage quoted 
above, an averace of eicht letters for a 



IN COLOXIAL DAYS. 



51 



dollar would be a fair one, which would 
indicate tliat about 2,320,000 letters were 
carried during' the year, or about one for 
each adult inhabitant of the country. 
But when it is considered what a large 
proportion of these letters must have been 
sent in due course of business, it would 
appear hardly probable that the average 
inhabitant outside the large cities could 
have mailed a letter much oftener than 
once in five years. 

As he had been for more than sixty cen- 
turies, so at the beginning of the nine- 
teenth century, the horse was the only 
motive power for travel, as well as almost 
the sole burden bearer, — some o.xen being 
in use. All through the land, and espe- 
cially in the south, the most common 
method of travel was in the saddle; and 
when the wife or daughter or children 
accompanied the traveler, they rode be- 
hind him on the pillion, which was a 
padded cushion with straps, sometimes 
having on one side a kind of platform 
stirrup. An amusing custom which en- 
abled four persons on a journey to ride 
part of the way, was the " ride-and-tie " 
system. Two would start on the horse, 
and two would walk. When those on the 
horse had ridden about a mile, they would 
dismount, tie the horse to a tree, and pro- 
ceed on foot. When the other couple 
came up to the horse they would mount, 
and, passing the foot travelers, at the end 
of another mile would dismount, tie the 
liorse, and proceed on foot ; and su in turn 
they alternately rode and walked a mile 
until they reached their journey's end. 
Horses of a rather scrubby character were 
very numerous, so that it was a common 
saying that " no one walked save a vaga- 
bond or a fool." After a time a good 
class of saddle horses was produced in 
Ehode Island, called the " Narragansett 
Pacers," which were very easy in motion 
and of great endurance. In Virginia and 
the Carolinas, however; from the earliest 
colonial days the best of English racing 
horses were imported and bred. Even 
down to the end of the eighteenth century, 
there were but few roads or turnpikes 
which could be traversed by coaches, and 



these were chiefly the great highways that 
connected the important cities and, in a 
few cases, extended in lateral directions, 
generally toward the west. In every 
direction, too, travel was restricted and 
made dangerous by a lack of bridges, and 
ferries were established only when a con- 
siderable and regular traffic made them 
profitable. It is interesting to note that 
the American mechanics thus early took 
the lead in bridge building, which has un- 
questionably been maintained to the 
present day. The first important work was 
the bridge from Boston to Charlestown. 
As an old account informs us the Charles 
river at the point where the old ferry 
crossed had about the same width as the 
Thames at London bridge. Here Lemuel 
Cox, a Medford shipwright, the fore- 
runner of a long succession of eminent 
builders, was successful in erecting a 
draw-bridge in 1786, which was considered 
the longest in the world, and a " triumph 
of engineering skill." This was followed 
by an era of bridge building which soon 
made travel much safer and far more 
agreeable. Road construction also re- 
ceived an important impetus at about the 
same period, and in New England espe- 
cially some quite long stretches of macad- 
amized road were built, — as the Salem 
and Boston turnpike, the Essex turnpike, 
and the Newburyport turnpike. The 
most notable highway of all, however, was 
the great " National Road " built by the 
National Government, really as a military 
measure. Its construction was first pro- 
posed in Congress in 1797, though the act 
authorizing it was not passed until nine 
years later. It extended at first from 
Cumberland to Wheeling, one hundred 
and thirty miles, and cost $1,750,000. 
It was sixty-five feet wide, of stone 
broken to pass through a three-inch 
sieve, then covered with gravel and 
rolled hard. From Cumberland to Balti- 
more the cost of construction fell on 
certain banks of Maryland, which were 
rechartered on condition that they com- 
plete the road, which eventually proved a 
great source of profit to them. Mrs. 
Earle, in her most interesting work, 



52 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



" Stage Coach and Tavern Days," has 
given valuable and entertaining accounts 
of these old " highways and by-ways." 
Another much traveled road at this time 
was the " Mohawk Turnpike." After the 
Revolution an epidemic of emigration 
broke out in New England and thousands 
turned their eyes and steps westward, the 
objective points being the Mohawk and 
Genesee Valleys. It is said that in the 
winter of 1795 twelve hundred sleighs 
passed through Albany in three days, 
loaded with sturdy New Englanders bound 
for the Genesee Valley. Roads were built, 
the prices of land rapidly advanced, and a 
genuine " boom " was created. Within a 
short time fifty-two taverns were opened 
within fifty miles of Albany, and even 
these were unable to accommodate the 
travelers. 

The first public road-wagon, the fore- 
runner of the stage coach, came into use 
early in the eighteenth century. It was 
not until the middle of the century, how- 
ever, that they became common and coach- 
ing became a recognized business, — several 
companies having been organized about 
that time. Then began the great variety 
of interesting announcements and ad- 
vertisements of independent and rival 
companies. The old road-wagon became a 




COLONIAL STAGE COACH. 

" stage chaise," a " stage coach," a " stage 
wagon," and even " stage chariots " were 
run on some routes. The typical vehicle, 
however, down to the present century, and 
which is still seen on many western lines, 
was the stage wagon, which was well de- 
scribed by an English traveler who made 
the journey from Philadelphia to Balti- 
more and return in 1795. "The vehicle," 
he sa.vs, " was a long car with four 
benches. Three of these in the interior 
held nine passengers. A tenth passenger 



was seated by the side of the driver on the 
front bench. A light roof was supported 
b,v eight slender pillars, four on each side. 
Three large leather curtains suspended to 
the roof, one at each side and the third 
behind, were rolled up or lowered at the 
pleasure of the passengers. There was no 
place nor space for luggage, each person 
being expected to stow his things where 
he could under his seat or legs. The en- 
trance was in front over the driver's 
bench. Of course the three passengers in 
the back seat were obliged to crawl across 
all the other benches to get to their places. 
There were no hacls to the benches to 
support and relieve us during the rough 
and fatiguing journey over a newly and 
ill-made road." And another foreigner, 
who had, however, lived in America thir- 
teen years, writing of the same subject in 
1806, uses almost the same words as the 
traveler quoted, describing the coach be- 
tween Philadelphia and New York. " The 
vehicle, the American Stage Coach," he 
says, "which is of like construciion 
throughout the country, is calculated to 
hold twelve persons, who sit on benches 
placed across, with their faces toward the 
horses. As there are no doors at the sides 
the passengers get in over the front 
wheels. The first get seats behind the 
rest, the most esteemed seat because you 
can rest your shaken frame against the 
back part of the wagon." About 1815 this 
rough and most uncomfortable coach gave 
place on the leading lines to an egg-shaped 
vehicle, more like the modern stages, with 
racks behind, fastened to the axle, for the 
carriage of baggage. These in turn gave 
place about fifteen years later to the most 
famous of all makes of coaches, which no 
one has ever attempted to improve upon, 
and which are still in constant demand 
and use in all parts of the world. This 
was the " Concord Stage," the first of 
which, establishing the type, was built at 
Concord, N. H., in 'l827. With its earlier 
and somewhat rougher form all who have 
visited Buffalo Bill's Wild West shows are 
familiar; and all travelers among moun- 
tain resorts which the railroad has not yet 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



53 



reached, are acquainted with its later and 
more perfected forms. The period be- 
tween 1820 and 1840 was the golden age 
of stage coach travel, both in England and 
the United States. The coaches had be- 
come comfortable vehicles, the business 
was systematized and better horses pro- 
vided, the stages were cut down from 
fifteen to twenty miles to from ten to 
twelve, and the roads had everywhere been 
greatly improved; and all who have ever 
ridden on top of a Concord coach through 
the mountains or a fine river country, 
with a pleasant party of companions en- 
joying the clear, fresh, frosty air of an 
autumn morning, will never forget the 
exhilaration and abounding joy of the ex- 
perience. Boston became the greatest 
coaching centre about 1820, and a great 
number of lines started from there. In 
1818 a combination was formed of all the 
lines in Eastern Massachusetts, Rhode 
Island, Maine, and New Hampshire, a 
veritable " Trust," and its business and 
profits were enormous. In 1829 there were 
seventy-seven stage coach lines from Bos- 
ton, which had increased to one hundred 
and six in 1832. The old and familiar 
newspaper, the Boston Traveler, was 
started as a coach paper in 1825. But, 
as one has well said, " none of these 
companies was shrewd enough to heed 
the warning ' Look out for the En- 
gine ; ' " and in 1838 the railroad had so 
far advanced in its operations that the 
great eastern stage company utterly col- 
lapsed, carrying ruin also 'to the great 
number of taverns, vast stables, black- 
smiths shops, etc., which had everywhere 
been established along the stage routes for 
the accommodation of travelers and to 
meet all demands of the business. The 
climax was reached at about the same 
time in England, and the catastrophe was 
equally ruinous. The great English novel- 
ists of the second and third quarters of 
the last century, particularly Dickens and 
Lever, gave us so many amusing, interest- 
ing, and exciting tales of the road, that 
they threw over the story of coaching such 
a halo of romance that one who has ever 
been inoculated by its spirit may never 



expect to fully recover from the infection. 
" Pickwick " was published in 1836, when 
the stage companies began to read the 
handwriting on the wall; and we can 
hardly close this brief account of the 
" good old days " of staging better than by 
quoting the words of Tony Weller's pro- 
test : " I consider that the rail is uncon- 
stitutional, and a inwader o' privileges. 
As to the comfort — as an old coachman I 
may say it — veres the comfort o' sittin' in 
a harm-chair, a lookin' at brick walls, an 
heaps o' mud, never eomin' to a public 
'ouse, never seein' a glass o' ale, never 
goin' thro' a pike, never meetin' a change 
o' no kind (bosses or otherwise), but al- 
ways eomin' to a place ven you comes to 
vun at all, the wery picter o' the last ! As 
to the honor and dignity o' travellin', veve 
can that be vithout a coachman, and vats 
the rail to sich coachman as is sometimes 
forced to go by it, but a outrage and a 
insult!" 

A very essential element in the matter 
of travel, especially after the weary 
travelers had been jolted over rough roads 
all day, in cramped positions on seats 
without backs, was the Inns. These were, 
of course, of the most varied character. In 
the larger towns of New England, the well 
settled parts of New York, and the Quaker 
settlements of Pennsylvania, commodious, 
neat, and clean taverns were to be found, 
which, though they would seem bare, in- 
convenient, and not over-restful places 
of entertainment to the traveler of to-day, 
yet were sumptuous hostelries in the es- 
teem of the public of a century ago. 
Reminiscences of some of these inns still 
linger in many localities, and in the 
memories of some who enjoy the greater 
conveniences of the twentieth century 
hotels. The Wadsworth Inn, at Hartford, 
Connecticut; The Buckman Tavern, at 
Lexington; the Bliss Tavern, at Haver- 
hill ; Howe's Tavern, at Sudbury, which 
Longfellow has immortalized as " The 
Wayside Inn," — all in Massachusetts, are 
typical of such houses. At them a warm 
welcome, a generous table, clean and com- 
fortable beds always awaited the visitor. 
In all cases one of the most inviting and 



54 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



comfortably furnished of the rooms was 
the " tap-room," where " mine host " from 
within a cage, not unlike those provided 
for clerks in modern banks, dispensed 
rum, flip, sack, a variety of wines, and 
beer to the thirsty assembly, and generally 
the thirst was a scorching one. On one 
side of the room there was an immense 



fr 




' -'■ M 


IHPIJP-^^ ,g| - 


m 


pmHHl^ '" 


rfi7^3ffi 


^^^^B 


^^^5 


^3n.-:-'-^-'^^^ 



THE GREEN DRAGON TAVEKN, BOSTON. 

brick fire-place, from which in winter the 
great logs sent out warmth and cheer for 
every guest. But the average inn which a 
traveler off the main highways would en- 
counter only added to the miseries of a 
journey. Dirty, with filthy table cloths, 
or a bare, greasy table, with little variety 
in the fare furnished, many a sore and 
half sick mortal went to a soiled be<l 
hungry, rather than eat the food offered, 
which generally consisted of some form of 
pork, — salt pork and bacon being the 
staples. But the custom that most dis- 
gusted travelers was that of putting sev- 
eral beds in one room, and frequently two 
or even three strangers into the same bed. 
Weld, one of the most intelligent of the 
Englishmen who visited this country 
about the opening of the last century, and 
whose record of travels forms one of the 
best source books, which all historians 
have freely drawn from, on arriving at 
Elkton, on the main road between Phila- 
delphia and Baltimore, asked the landlord 
what accommodations he had ? " Don't 
trouble yourself on that score," was the 
reply ; " I have no less than eleven beds 
in one room." And this custom prevailed 
more or less generally over all the states, 
north and south, apparently without pro- 
test from the American people. But the 



traveler was never sure of even the one of 
many beds in a room assigned him; a.s he 
was not infrequently awakened by the 
landlord entering the room with a candle, 
and designating to a later arrival half of 
his bed as the place where the new-comer 
should sleep. One can, therefore, hardly 
wonder at the indignant outburst of one 
sufferer, a Philadclphian, who queried : 
" What can be the reason for the vulgar, 
hoggish custom, common in America, of 
squeezing three, six, or eight beds into one 
room ? " These inns all put out preten- 
tious signs, many of which were interest- 
ing and many grotesque, — however in- 
ferior and scjualld the house itself might 
be. Before the war, many of them had 
large pictures of the King or some mem- 
ber of the royal family, or the royal arms, 
or some di.stinguished British officer. 
After the war, these, of course, gave place 
to portraits of Washington, or some dis- 
tinguished or favorite American officer. 
The average tavern was little more than a 
rough saloon with the most indifferent 
provision for meals or lodging. The quar- 
ter century after the close of the war was 
one of intense political ferment; and the 
rural tavern was the meeting place, day 
and night, for a half-drunken, brawling 
crowd, who spent their time in " discuss- 
ing " political questions, too often accen- 
tuating their arguments by the use of the 
knife or pistol, or settling the whole ques- 
tion by a free fight. 

There were, of course, in all the larger 
cities Irretentions houses of wide notoriety, 
toward which all travelers turned with 
eager steps upon their arrival. Such was 
the Exchange Coffee Plouse of Boston, 
which was seven stories high, had 200 
rooms, and had cost a half million dollars. 
Here were registers of all shipping, and 
it was also a naval rendezvous. Presi- 
dent Monroe stopped at the house in 
1817, and at a sumptuous banquet 
tendered him many men distinguished 
in the young nation's histoiy were as- 
sembled, — as Commodores Bainbridge, 
Hull, and Perry; Ex-President John 
Adams: Generals Swift, Dearborn, Cobb, 
and Humphrey; and Judge Story. Early 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



in' the century, too, the City Hotel, occu- 
pying a whole block on Broadway, at 
Thomas street, New York, held a similar 
leading position. It was run by two old 
bachelors, Jennings and Willard, who 
were said to be able to \;all by name any- 
one who had ever once stopijed at the 
house. It was commonly understood that 
Willard never went to bed, but was on 
hand always to perform his duty as host, 
bookkeeper, or cashier. When Niblo's 
Garden opened farther up town, it was de- 
cided that Willard must attend the house- 
warming, but when the time to start ar- 
rived it came to light that he liad not 



larger cities famous for some special dish, 
or dishes, as well as for their good cheer. 
In Philadelphia " cat fish " suppers at the 
Mendenhall Ferry Tavern were in high 
favor, as were " Turtle-feasts " at a popu- 
lar resort up East river, in New York. A 
clergyman traveling late in the 18th cen- 
tury, wrote: "There are several taverns 
pleasantly situated upon east river. New 
York, where it is common to have these 
turtle-feasts. These happen once or twice a 
week. Thirty or forty gentlemen and 
ladies meet and dine together, drink tea 
in the afternoon, fish and amuse them- 
selves till evening, and tlion return home 




THE KXCUANQE COFFEE HOUSE, BOSTON. 



owned a hat for several years. Equally 
famous was the London Coffee House of 
Philadelphia, which was the most popular 
meeting place and resort for officers of the 
government and army during and follow- 
ing the Revolutionary war. In the cities, 
frequently, one or more of the most stately 
homes and grand mansions became 
famous inns, as the " Indian Queen " in 
Philadelphia, which had at different times 
been the home of Sir Richard Penn, Gen- 
eral Howe, Robert Morris, and Presidents 
Washington and Adams. There were, too, 
certain taverns and road-houses near the 



in Italian chaises, a gentleman and lady 
in each chaise. On the way tliere is a 
bridge, about three miles distant from 
New York, which you always pass over 
as you return, called the ' Kissing Bridge,' 
where it is a part of etiquette to salute the 
lady who has put herself under your pro- 
tection." One can easily imagine with 
what speed the poor horses were driven 
until the " Kissing Bridge " was reached, 
and how leisurely they were allowed to jog 
along toward home after it had been 
passed. 

The home life of the people at the close 



56 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



of the colonial days, which was not ma- 
terially changed until well into the nine- 
teenth century, was exceedingly primitive. 
The five large cities, at the beginning of 
that century, had less than 200.000 in- 
habitants, leaving a rural population of 
upwards of 5,000,000, or 4,000,000 ex- 
elusive of slaves. In the cities, among the 
richer families, there were evidences of 
great comfort, and better household ap- 
pointments, than prevailed elsewhere. But 
even in the more elegant homos the 
superiority to the conveniences and ar- 
rangements of the average home consisted 
chiefly in the greater elegance and costli- 
ness of materials used, both for building 
and decoration, rather than in any es- 
sential differences in the mode of life. 
Many city homes were large and impos- 
ing structures of stone and brick ; and in 
many rural communities were isolated 
structures of similar character, though 



The country had been settled by people 
from many laJids, to whom long associa- 
tion liad made certain styles of houses 
dear; and in the land of their adoption 
they tried to reproduce the " homeland " 
so far as possible, and so in a degree alle- 
viate the pangs of homesickness. New 
England houses, therefore, were suggest- 
ive of England, both in their external 
appearance, and in the surroundings, 
where by planting English flowers and 
hedges, an effort was made to reproduce 
the home atmosphere of the mother coun- 
try. In Virginia, the rich cavaliers who 
were the early settlers built noble speci: 
mens of the country houses of their 
wealthy counto-men, many of which could 
hardly be equaled anywhere in the colo- 
nies. They attempted, too, a style of fur- 
nisliing and an elegance in all their 
surroundings that tended to rob exile of its 
cliief horrors, and to make life in the 




THE JOHN HA.MCOCK HOUSE — TYPICAL COLO.MAL MANSION 



generally constructed of wood, whose 
architecture is still greatly admired and 
copied, and which it would be difficult to 
improve upon for interior arrangements, 
whether beauty or comfort is considered. 



wilderness of the new world a reflection 
of the social conditions and atmosphere 
of the homeland for which their hearts 
still yearned, to which they looked for all 
the amenities of life, — importing liberally 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



57 



the evil as well as the good products and 
influences. In New York, settled by 
the Dutch, the prevailing- early archi- 
tecture was from Holland, and churches, 
houses, and furnishing-s all suggested 



utensils for cooking, as well as the 
" warming pan," usually of copper or 
brass, about a foot in diameter and four 
inches deep, which in very cold weather 
was filled with live coals, and then used 




Ni;\V YORK IN 1745. 



Amsterdam and Delft as distinctly as 
the New Englander reproduced Old Eng- 
land. In the interiors, however, there 
was greater uniformity. In the homes 
of the average Americans the kitchen 
was the centre of life, light, and socia- 
bility; and its most prominent feature 
was the great brick fireplace which 
during the long winter months was 
the source of heat for all the household, 
as well as the centre of nearly all the ac- 
tivities of the housekeepers. On its hearth 
some fire was kept perpetually alive, if 
only a few embers, as matches had not yet 
come into use and the only means of 
striking a light was from the old flints, 
which was an uncertain and tedious pro- 
cess; consequently candles and the pine 
knots were lighted from the fire on the 
hearthstone. These fire places were of 
immense size, and the fore and back logs 
were frequently drawn into the kitchen 
by a horse, or on sleds. On the great 
cranes himg a variety of pots and kettles, 
and on the side walls were hung all the 



to warm the sheets of the beds before the 
family or guests retired. What we call 
the dining table was then known as the 
" Board," and the table-cloth was the 
board-cloth. These tables were made of 
two or three smooth boards fastened to- 
gether, which were placed upon supports 
consisting of crossed strips of wood, like 
the saw-horse, — such tables, in fact, as are 
still in use at church or fraternal society 
suppers. Of table linen and napkins there 
was usually a generous supply, as they 
were the special pride of the housewife 
and represented her own, or her daugh- 
ter's, work at the spinning wheel. The 
centre-piece, when the table was dressed, 
was a large salt cellar, generally of pewter ; 
and those seated at the table were placed 
'■ above the salt," where sat the husband 
and wife at the head of the table, with any 
people of distinction or honored guests 
at their right or left ; or " below the salt," 
where people of less consequence or chil- 
dren were seated. Of course it is impos- 
sible to learn just when social customs and 



58 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



uses change, or give place entirely to new 
conditions; but it is certain that e^xcept 
in the homes of the wealthy people, pewter 
was the material iised for all table ware 
until after the Revolution, china or earth- 
enware being very rarely seen; and even 
after they had come into more common 
use, or had become more fashionable, 
pewter still held a warm place in the 
housekeeper's heart. As one of our best 
authorities has said: "Pewter was used 
until this (19th) century in the wealthiest 
homes, both in the north and south, and 
was preferred by many who owned rich 
china. Among the pewter-lovers was the 
Revolutionary patriot, John Hancock, 
who hated the clatter of the porcelain 
plates;" and what was called a "garnish 
of pewter," that is, a full set of pewter 
platters, plates, and dishes was one of the 




HEAD or A LADY OF FASHION, 1776. 

richest and most coveted of wedding gifts. 
But it was late in the eighteenth century, 
and, in fact, well on in the nineteenth in 
some localities, before plates came into 
common use. All through the Colonial 
I)eriod the " trencher " was used in its 
place in this country as it was in Eng- 
land. This was made of wood, frequently 
onlv a block of wood ten or twelve inches 



square and about four inches deep, hol- 
lowed out in the middle so that it made a 
sort of bowl. In this the food was i^laced, 
porridge, meat, vegetables, etc., and from 
it generally two persons ate, using their 
spoons or fingers as might be most con- 
venient. For forks were as late in 
coming into use as was china, and even in 
the last half of the eighteenth centurj 
were hardly common even at the tables of 
the more wealthy city people. When 
elaborate meals were prepared, they were 
not served in courses as to-day; but pride 
was taken in loading the board-cloth with 
everything conceivable and obtainable 
that could be eaten. In his diary John 
Adams has left an account of some of 
the dinners to which he was invited when 
he went to Philadelphia. At the house of 
Miers Fisher, a young Quaker lawyer, he 
says, " This plain Friend, with his plain 
but pretty wife with her Thees and Thous, 
had provided us a costly entertainment; 
ducks, hams, chickens, beef, pig, tarts, 
creams, custards, Jellies, fools, trifles, 
floating islands, beer, porter, punch, wine, 
etc.;" and at the home of Chief Justice 
Chew, he says, " about four o'clock we 
were called to dinner. Turtle and every 
other thing, flummery, jellies, sweetmeats 
of twenty sorts, trifles, whipped sillabubs, 
floating islands, fools, etc., with a dessert 
of fruits, raisins, almonds, pears, peaches, 
etc." Of course even the elaborate din- 
ners of the less opulent in rural communi- 
ties bore little resemblance to these semi- 
barbaric feasts; yet with the latter as with 
the former, a desire prevailed to make the 
greatest and most attractive showing of 
food possible. And among both classes no 
dinner was complete without a liberal 
supply of drinks of varying character, 
ranging from the beer, ale, and cider of 
the average home to the " fifteen kinds of 
wine, besides cider, beer and porter," 
which were served by Col. Duer of New 
York, in 1787, when the Rev. Dr. Cutler 
dined with him, as recorded in the latter's 
diary. In rural homes, when the meal 
was over the table was quickly removed, 
and the kitchen and dining-room became 
the living room, especially in the winter. 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



59 



as no other room was heated. Usually all 
along the ceiling rafters were hung strings 
of dried apples and pumpkins, which the 
prudent housewife took care to prepare in 
abundance during the autumn. But her 
chief concern was the laying by of a sup- 
ply of candles that should last through the 
long winters. These were chiefly the 
ordinary tallow candles, though among the 
wealthier classes spermaceti candles were 
in use, as well as those made of the wax of 
the bay-berry, which grew in profusion in 
many isarts of the country. These were 
particularly favored in the homes of the 
rich because of the peculiarly agreeable 
odor that followed the putting out of the 
light; and in fashionable social gatherings 
it was quite a conmion thing to extinguish 
the lights to enjoy the perfume. Among 
those whose incomes were very limited the 
I'.sual light was furnished by the pine tree 
knots, which were usually " cloven into 
two little slices, something thin, which arc 
so full of the moysture of turpentine and 
pitch that they burne as cliere as a torch." 
As these pine candles gave out a great 
deal of smoke, and their burning was ac- 
companied by pitchy droppings, they were 
usually ijlaced in a corner of the fireplace, 
on a flat stone. Mrs Earle tells of an old 
Massachusetts minister who boasted that 
every sermon of the hundreds he had writ- 
ten had been copied by the light of these 
torches; and when we remember the 
length of the sermons of those days this is 
no mean indorsement of the pine tree 
candle. Among the slaves and the poor 
whites of the south, these pine knots fur- 
nished practically the only light used. 
But among the wealthy in the cities, 
pressed glass lamps were used, of styles 
and forms that may be seen in some 
country stores at the present day, in which 
whale or fish oils were burned. 

Next to the homes, the church was, 
over the greater part of the country, the 
centre and the most potent influence of 
colonial life. In New England this was 
particularly true, the influence of the 
clergy even down to the eighteenth cen- 
tury being well nigh supreme, and in many 
cases it was exercised in a most tyrannical 



manner. Fortunately they were, as a rule, 
an educated and enlightened class of men, 
and their general influence in a com- 
munity tended to sobriety and seriousness 
of life. The churches were barren and 
uninteresting, and even in the severe 
winters of New England were never 
heated. Women, as a rule, took small 
foot-stoves, filled with coals, to church 
with them, but, while they kept the feet 
warm for a time, they only served to make 
the general chill and dampness of the at- 
mosphere more sensible. Generally the 
pews were the square box pews still to be 
seen in many old churches, and the seats 
were plain board benches along three sides, 
which could be raised during the singing 
of the psalm so that the audience could 
have the support of the pew walls during 
that long and trying ordeal. When, at the 
close of the singing, or end of the service, 
the people dropped their seats the noise 
was deafening, and in summer could be 
heard for a long distance. As an old poem 
puts it 

" And when at last the loud Amen 
Fell from aloft, quickly then 
The seats came down with heavy rattle. 
Like musketry in fiercest battle." 
The pulpit was generally opposite the 
main entrance to the church, and raised 
from ten to fifteen feet above the floor 
level; and over it hung a sounding board 
suspended from the ceiling by a brass rod. 
To reach this the minister ascended a 
flight of stairs, which then became the 
vantage ground from which the " titheing 
man " or the deacons watched the congre- 
gation, and in due course turned the hour 
glass which stood in front of the pulpit. 
The sermons of those days were serious 
affairs, as were also the prayers. No 
minister conceived that he was in any 
sense doing his duty unless he preached 
two hours at each service. It is recorded 
that when the First Church in Woburn 
was dedicated, the minister preached for 
nearly five hours; and a Fast Day prayer 
of four hours is also a matter of record. 
The singing was hardly less tedious than 
the other features of the service. None of 



GO 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



the congregation had any notes, and sing- 
ing by ear was not productive of harmony. 
Usually the psalms were " lined " or 
" deaconed," — that is, the deacon from the 
pulpit steps read a line, which was then 
sung by the congregation; and it is said 
tliat the "lining" and singing of sonu' 
psalms occupied a full half hour, during 
which the congregation stood. There were 
no church organs; pitch-pipes were used 
to get the key; and after a time bass-viols, 
clarionets, or flutes were introduced to 
help the singers. Violins, however, were 
too closely associated with frivolous dance 
music to find any place in the church 
service. 

Both the Sabbath and its services were 
less puritanically observed in New York, 
where the Dutch Reformed was the estab- 
lished church, than in New England, 
though even there the recognized duties 
and services were such as would make an 
ardent churchman of the twentieth cen- 
tury quail. As one went farther south, 
religion and church ordinances and cus- 
toms were taken far less seriously. In 
Virginia the Church of England was the 
established church, and it was not until 
after the Revolution that other denomina- 
tions gained any foothold. During the 
Colonial i>eriod, of course, the regular 
Church of England service was used in all 
its churches, which was materially altered 
after the separation from the mother 
country, and the Protestant Episcopal 
Church of America succeeded to tlie Eng- 
lish Church. 

During the formative period of Ameri- 
can life, — social and intellectual as well 
as religious, — the ministry played a most 
conspicuous and, with rare exceptions, a 
most stinnilnting and healthful part. It 
would be difficult to find any body of men 
at any period of the world's history, who 
held loftier ideals, or were for their age, 
better educated; who with rare unselfish- 
ness ever strove to lift the people to their 
ideal standards, and placed at their service 
the results of their study and experience. 
Their whole creed and outlook upon life 
seems to us to-day stern and forbidding; 
but the times and the social and political 



conditions were very different from ours, 
and called for different men and measures. 
There were many New England ministers, 
especially in the larger cities, who became 
puffed up with pride, and were arbitrary 
and dictatorial in their manner and 
speech, and cruel in their enforcement of 
their individual ideas; and they, unfortu- 
nately, have taken a prominent place 
among the worthies in history. But all 
about them were noble men, true pastors, 
who, with but little return, gave to their 
people themselves and all they had; and 
who were most important factors in the 
development of the character and thought 
of their people — a character and mental 
activity of which every New Englander 
is justly proud, and whose characteristics 
can be easily observed in almost every 
part of the northern United States to-day, 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast. 
There were, of course, many ministers in 
all the Colonies who were hardly examples 
which their flocks should follow. Not a 
few in particular were caught in the 
snares of intemperance, and were more or 
less constantly under the influence of 
lii|uor. So different, however, was the 
public sentiment of those days from that 
of this century, that such lapses were not 
seriously regarded. In his histor>' nf 
Andierst College, Prof. Tyler cites sev- 
eral cases of excessive use of liquors 
among New England ministers, and one 
or two where the minister was badly in- 
toxicated while presiding at the Com- 
mmiion service. But, happily, such cases 
were exceptional and rare. Virginia suf- 
fered more than the other Colonies in this 
regard, because her ministers were, as a 
rule, sent out from England and were too 
often men who had disgraced themselves 
and the church there before being sent 
here. Relying upon the authority of 
Bishop Meade. John Fiske cites the follow- 
ing case: " In 1711 a bequest of one hun- 
dred pounds was made to the vestry of 
Christ Church parish in Middlesex, pro- 
viding that the interest should be paid to 
the minister for preaching four sermons 
each year against ' the four reigning vices. 
— viz: atheism and irreligion, swearing 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



61 



and cursing, fornication and adultery, and 
drunkenness.' Later in the eentury the 
living was held for eighteen years, and 
the sermons were preached, by a minister 
who was notoriously guilty of all the vices 
mentioned. He used to be seen in the 
tavern porch, reeling to and fro, with a 
bowl of toddy in his hand, while he called 
to some passer-by to come in and have a 
drink. When this exemplary man of God 
was dying in delirium, his last words were 
halloos to the hounds." In 1726 a thought- 
ful and worthy minister named Lang 
wrote to the Bishop of London about the 
scandalous behavior of the clergy, of 
whom the sober f)art were " slothful and 
negligent " while the rest were debauched 
and " bent on all manner of vices." 

Apart from the excessive use of liquors 
the morals of the people were above the 
average. Theft was comparatively un- 
known, as the promiscuous mixing of 
strangers in the same bed or bedroom in 
the taverns would manifest, if nothing 
else did, as nowhere are there accounts 
of robbery even under such favorable con- 
ditions. There was. too, a very general 
spirit of brotherliness and helpfulness 
manifested in every community. But 
drunkenness was the besetting sin of the 
people. Everywhere, and on every oc- 
casion, everybody, almost without excep- 
tion, drank not only wines, but hard 
liquors, and fearful decoctions that were 
brewed from them. Even boys of twelve 
were accustomed to have at home, or get 
at the tavern, their toddy or draught of 
black-strap. From the standpoint of 
temperance the outlook was certainly a 
most discouraging one, and none of the 
scientific achievements and advances of 
the last century are more remarkable and 
noteworthy than the moral upheaval 
which has produced from the drunken 
conditions and sentiments of one hundred 
years ago, the high standard of temper- 
ance that now obtains. The social life of 
the eighteenth century in the Colonies and 
the new Union was much cleaner than 
such a prevalence of heavy drinking 
would lead one to suppose. There was a 
literary paper of some pretension and a 



fair measure of success published in Phil- 
adelphia, whose interests were decidedly 
pro-English, and whose columns were 
open to any criticism of American politi- 
cal or social life. In it, in 1803, a writer 
said : " I heard from married ladies, whose 
station as mothers demanded from them a 
guarded conduct, — from young ladies 
whose age forbids the audience of such 
conversation, and who using it modesty 
must disclaim, — indecent allusions, indeli- 
cate expression, and even at times im- 
moral innuendoes. A loud laugh or a 
coarse exclamation followed each of these, 
and the young ladies generally went 
through the form of raising their fans to 
their faces." In analyzing this and other 
similar general statements, however, 
Henry Adams well says : " Yet public rec- 
ords might be searched long before they 
revealed evidence of misconduct, such as 
filled the press and formed one of the 
commonest topics of conversation in the 
society of England and France. Almost 
every American family, however respect- 
able, could show some victim to intemper- 
ance among its men, but few were morti- 
fied by a public scandal due to its women." 
Excessive drinking, too, was not an exclu- 
sively American habit, but was the curse 
of Great Britain as well as of the LTnited 
States. Many proofs of this could be 
advanced, but one will sufiice. Dr. Mc- 
Cosh, the late distinguished president of 
Princeton University, left among his 
papers an autobiographical sketch, which 
Professor Sloane afterward made the 
basis of his life of the President. In that 
sketch Dr. McCosh gave quite detailed 
accounts of his experiences as pastor in 
Scotland during the early part of the 
nineteenth century. He refers to two 
weaknesses of the jjeople that caused hi:n 
more trouble and anxiety than all the 
others. One was the excessive drinking. 
His people drank on any and all occasions. 
Christenings, weddings, deaths, were al- 
ways occasions of assembling of all the 
relatives and friends for a day or two's de- 
bauch. And he mentions one case in par- 
ticular where a man died in mid-winter 
back in the hill country. The relatives 



G2 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



and friends came from miles around, a 
great feast was spread and eating and 
drinking- lasted througli the night. The 
next forenoon they started through the 
deep snow and over the bleak hills to the 
burial ground several miles away, only 
to find when they reached it that they had 
left the corpse at home. 

As has been said the chief interest of 
the people was in agriculture, as it was 
the principal source of what wealth they 
jiossessed. Science and invention at the 
opening of the nineteenth century were 
subjects of which the vast majority of the 
lieople had no knowledge. Two medical 
S(diools had been established toward the 
close of the last century ; but so far as an 
acquaintance with the character or causes 
of diseases, and methods of treatment, 
was concerned the medical profession had 
apparently made little, if any, advance 
since the days of Hippocrates and Galon. 
Whatever the nature of the patient's ail- 
ment but three remedies were used, — 
bleeding, purging, and blistering; and 
they were employed singly or collectively 
in every case. It has hardly ever been 
doubted that Washington's life would 
have been prolonged many years had he 
received any rational treatment during his 
brief illness; but he was bled, purged, and 
blistered until even his strong vitality 
was utterly destroyed, and complete ex- 
haustion resulted in a speedy collapse. 
Xot a few thoughtful men have regarded 
the treatment of his case as closely akin 
to professional murder; and one of his 
three doctors confessed that they had made 
a mistake in bleeding their victim the last 
time, as he had not vitality enough left 
to survive the drain upon his system. 

Nor was the condition different in other 
scientific fields. An engineer, civil or 
mechanical, could hardly be found. So 
True was this that when, in 170". a com- 
pany was formed in Boston to build a 
canal from the Merrimac river to Boston 
harlior, no competent engineer could be 
found in Boston to make the survey of 
an easy route of less than thirty miles, 
and the directors were forced to send to 
Philadelphia, and secure the services of 



an English engineer whom the Delaware 
and Schuylkill Canal Company had em- 
ployed. Philadelphia liad one citizen pos- 
sessed of considerable scientific knowledge 
and experience. La Trobe, an architect by 
profession. Writing to a friend in 
France, in 1811, he said: "Thinking 
only of the profession and the affluence 
that it yields in Europe to all who follow 
it, you forget that I am an engineer in 
America ; that I am neither a mechanic 
nor a merchant, nor a planter of cotton, 
rice, or tobacco. You forget, for you know 
it as well as I do, that with us labor of 
the hand has precedence over that of the 
mind; that an engineer is considered only 
as an overseer of men who dig, and an 
architect as one that watches others ivho 
hew stone or wood." 

Nor is a survey of the literary field 
more inspiring. Apart from political 
pamphlets, many of which were of the 
highest literary form, and written in the 
purest and most expressive English, there 
was but little interest manifested in the 
productions of the mind. Of newspapers 
there was an endless succession ; but there 
was little in their columns that tended to 
advance education, or to enlighten their 
readers. The first newspaper in the Col- 
onies was the " Boston News Letter," pub- 
lished by John Campbell, a Scotchman, 
who was a bookseller and postmaster in 
Boston. Its first issue, April 24, 1704, 
was a folio, ijrinted in small pica tyjje. 
The first page was filled with an extract 
from " The London Flying Post," respect- 
ing the Pretender. The Queen's speech to 
the Llouses of Parliament, a few articles 
under the Boston head, four short para- 
graphs of marine intelligence from New 
Yorlc, Philadelphia, and New London, and 
an advertisement formed its entire con- 
tents. Though these publications in- 
creased rapidly in number, the estimate 
of a competent critic of the papers of 1800 
will show that they had not materially 
changed their character. " The student 
of history," he says, " might search for- 
ever these storehouses of political calumny 
for facts meant to instruct the public in 
any useful subject. A few dozen adver- 



IN COLONIAL DAYS. 



63 



tisements of shipping and sales; a marine 
list; rarely, or never, a price list, unless 
it was European; copious extracts from 
English newspapers, and long columns of 
political disquisition, — such matters filled 
the chief city newspapers, from which the 
smaller sheets selected what their editors 
thought fit. Reporters and regular cor- 
respondents were unknown. In such 
progress as had heen made Philadelphia 
took the lead and in 1800 was at the 
height of her influence." L^nfortunately 
it was not journalism alone that was 
material and earthy; but throughout the 
land literature languished. It is true that 
President Dwight had given expression to 
his poetic genius in an epic poem, in 
eleven hooks and ten thousand lines, en- 
titled, " The Conquest of Canaan ; " and 
Joel Barlow had attempted to fire the 
sluggish American intellect by his "Vision 
of Columbus " in seven thousand lines ; 
yet their readers were few, though select; 
the popular ear being deaf to the poet's 
highest flights of song. Joseph Dennie, 
possessed of a refined and poetic tempera- 
ment, after graduating from Harvard 
College and failing to find in Boston an 
atniosphoi'e congenial to his literary as- 
pirations, had removed to Philadelphia, 
which he thought more tolerable tlian any 
other city of the United States. There, in 
1801, he established his "Portfolio," a 
weekly journal of not a little merit, though 
severely critical of American social and 
intellectual conditions. Here with a few 
kindred spirits, among them Charles 
Brockden Brown, the first American nov- 
elist of note, he nursed his contempt for 
the plebeian spirit that dominated his 
countrymen, though through the columns 
of his paper he tried by criticism, sug- 
gestion, and appeal to excite an apprecia- 
tion of higher things. In 1804 the popu- 
lar Irish poet, " Tom " Moore, visited the 
United States and was charmed with the 
manners and tastes of this little com- 
pany. " If I did not hate, as I ought," he 
wrote, " the rabble to which they are op- 
pnsed, I could not value as I do the spirit 
with which they defy it; and in learning 
from them what Americans can he, I but 



see with the more indignation what Amer- 
icans are." And breaking forth into verse 
he not only sang of his affection for these 
friends, but in the last four lines ex- 
pressed only too clearly the impression 
which the superficial observer received 
from a general view of American life. 

" Yet, yet forgive me, you sacred few, 

Whom late by Delaware's green banks I 
knew; 

Whom, known and loved, thro' many a 
social eve 

'Twas bliss to live with, and 'twas pain 
to leave. 

Oh, but for such, Columbia's days were 
done ! 

Rank without ripeness, quickened with- 
out sun. 

Crude at the surface, rotten at the core, 

Her fruits would fall before her spring 
were o'er." 




NOAH WEBSTEK. 

Porha]5s the whole subject of the state 
of learning and scholarship in the States 
cannot be better summed up than it was 
by Noah Webster, who wrote upon the 
subject in 1800. After claiming for New 
Englanders a familiarity with theology, 
law, politics, and light English literature, 



64 



FROM COLOxXY TO WORLD POWER. 



he saj's : " But as to classical learning, 
history (civil and ecclesiastical), mathe- 
matics, astronomy, chemistry, botany, and 
natural history, excepting here and there 
a rare instance of a man who is eminent 
in some one of these branches, we may 
be said to have no learning at all, or a 
mere smattering. . . . Our learning is 
superficial in a shameful degree; our col- 
leges are disgracefully destitute of books 
and philosophical apparatus; and I am 
ashamed to owti that scarcely a branch of 
science can be fully investigated in Amer- 
ica for want of books, especially original 
v/orks. This defect of our libraries I have 
experienced myself in searching for ma- 
terials for the history of epidemic dis- 
eases. ... As to libraries, we have 
no such things. There are not more than 
three or four tolerable libraries in Amer- 
ica, and these are extremely imperfect. 
Great niunbers of the most notable au- 
thors have not found their way across the 
Atlantic." 

We have endeavored to give as detailed 
an account as our space would admit of 
the social, intellectual, moral, and politi- 
cal spirit and conditions that obtained in 



the United States during the years imme- 
diately following the formation of a union 
by the thirteen Colonies down to the open- 
ing of the nineteenth century, which may 
be considered as the childhood of the na- 
tion. It is not altogether a pleasing 
picture, though it serves to heighten the 
glory of the nation's youth, as manifested 
in the marvelous development from a 
stage of comparative jwverty to one of im- 
mense wealth, from an intellectual apathy 
and sluggishness to such a state of mental 
activity and inventive fertility as the 
world never before has known; and from 
a prevailing attitude of political jealousy 
and suspicion, constantly threatening dis- 
union and separation, to one of concord 
and harmonious action from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific, and from Canada to Jlex- 
ico, under an established constitution, and 
stable national and state governments. 
Of the details of this wonderful growth 
the following chapters will give the salient 
features and dominant characteristics, 
which cannot fail to mightily strengthen 
tne faith of the reader in the virtue and 
permanency of American institutions and 
ideals. 



u. 



BIRTH OF THE NEW REPUBLIC— 1776. 



Declaration of American Independence and National Sovereignty, July Fourth, 1776. — The Gauntlet of 
Defiance thrown at the Feet of the Britisli Empire by Her Youngest Colonies. — Vast Disparity, in 
Power and Resources, between tlie Contestants. — The whole World looks on Astonished. — Seven 
Years' BI"ody and Desolating War. — Tlie American Cause Triumphant.--Grandest Modern Event. 
America Resists Unjust Taxation. — Hauglity Obstinacy of King George. — Burning Eloquence of Pat- 
rick Henry. — His Summons, " We Must Fight." — Washington Endorses this Sentiment. — Determina- 
tion of the People. — War Preferred to Submission — Momentous Action by Congress. — Separation from 
England Decreed. — Effect of the Act in America. — Its Reception in England. — Excitement of the 
King and Court. — Lord Chatham, America's Advocate. — His Passionate Change of Views — Scorch- 
ing Speech against the Colonies. — He is Struck Dead while Speaking. — Magnanimity of Burke and Fox. 
— Recognition from France Secured. — Her Timely Aid in the Struggle. — Victories over the British 
Armies. — England Gives Up the Contest. — World-v^-ide Welcome to the New Nation. 



" It will be celebrated by aucceedins; pencrations. as the ^eat anniverear.v festival. It ouiiht to be commemorated aa the day of deliverance, 
by Goleinn acta ot devotion to Almighty God. It ought to be toleinnized with r>omn and parade, with *^hows, frames, aportfl, guns, bella, bon- 
(ireB, and illuminations, from one end of the continent to the other, fiom thia time torth, forevermore."— Jou.v Adaus. 




[N the Fnui'th of July. 17TC, there wa.s born in 
the western world a New Nation, — the Re- 
public OF THE UxiTED STATES. Defiance to 
tyrants was emblazoned in empyreal light upon 
brow, and Freedom and Justice were the 
frontlets between her eyes. Mon- 
archs, crowned with kingly dia- 
dems, stood aweil at the august 
manifesto, and at the solemn ar- 
raignment of King George before 
the judgment of mankind, and 
parliaments and cabinets started 
in dismay to their feet ; but the 
People, as they descried the eagle 
of Liberty spreading her wings, 
and soaring proudly aloft, breath- 
ed freer and took stronger heart, 
as the clear ring of her voice 
sounded through the air, declar- 
;;^ ing, with grandly rounded enun- 
-^»;?'i'>^ elation, that "all men are created 

; J BLNGING OF THE BELL, JULY 4, 1776. CqUal." 

*= Refusing to pay the tribute of taxation arbitrarily imposed 
upon them at the point of the bayonet by the British crown, — 
5' 



(iG 



FROM COLOXY' TO WORLD POWER. 



failing, too, to move the king and his min- 
isters from their career of liaughty and 
reckless obstinacy, — the thirteen American 
colonies found themselves reduced to the 
alternative of abject submission to their 
so-called royal masters, or of armed resist- 
ance. Already there had flashed through- 
out the country the electric words of Pat- 
rick Henry, " We must fight ! An appeal 
to arms and to tlie God of Hosts is all 
that is left us. I repeat it, sir, we must 
fight ! " And as the blood of patriot 
hearts had now flowed freely and bravely 
at Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker 
Hill, Washington declared, in words of 
solemn emphasis and characteristic brevity, 
" Nothing short of Independence, it ap- 
pears to me, can possibly do." He also 
warmly approved and commended Paine's 
pamphlet, " Common Sense," written to 
this end. Tiie sons of liberty shouted their 
responsive acclaim to this manly summons 
from the great American soldier — Wash- 
ington — and, like the sound of many wa- 
ters, the spirit of national independence 
which thus possessed the people came ujjon 
the continental congress, then in session in 
the State-house at Philadelphia, Pennsyl- 
vania. 

It was in this temple of freedom, where- 
in was sitting as noble and august a legis- 
lative body as the world ever saw, that 
Richard Henry Lee introduced a resolu- 
tion, on the 7th of June, 1776, declaring, 
" That the United Colonies are and ought 
to be free and independent States, and tliat 
their political connection with Grreat Brit- 
ain is and ought to be dissolved." Upon 
this resolution there sprang up at once an 
earnest and powerful debate. It was op- 
posed, principally, on the ground that it 
was premature. Some of the best and 
strongest advocates of colonial rights spoke 
and voted against the motion, which at last 
was adopted only by a vote of seven States 
in its favor to six against. Some of the 
delegates had not received definite instruc- 
tions from their constituents, and others 
had been requested to vote against it. Its 
further consideration was accordingly post- 
poned until there was a prospect of greater 



unanimit}'. On the eleventh of June, 
therefore, a committee was appointed to 
draft a formal Declaration ; this commit- 
tee consisting of Benjamin Franklin, John 
Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Roger Sherman, 
and Robert R. Livingston. 

On the twenty-eighth of June, the com- 
mittee made their report, and presented 
the Declaration which they had drawn up. 
The first or original draft was penned by 
Mr. Jefferson, chairman of the committee. 
On the second of July, congress proceeded 
to the serious consideration of this mo- 
mentous paper ; the discussion, as to the 
tone and statements characterizing the 
document, and the propriety of adopting 
at that time a measure so decisive, lasted 
for nearly three days, and was extremely 
earnest. It was so powerfully opposed by 
some of the members, that Jefferson com- 
pared the opposition to " the ceaseless ac- 
tion of gravity, weighing upon us by night 
and by day." Its supporters, however, 
were the leading minds, and urged its 
adoption with masterly eloquence and abil- 
ity. John Adams, Jefferson asserts, was 
" the colossus in that debate," and "fought 
fearlessly for every word of it." The bond 
which was formed between those two great 
men on this occasion seems never to have 
been completely severed, both of them 
finally expiring, with a sort of poetic jus- 
tice, on the fiftieth anniversary of the act 
which constituted their chief glory. 

Well and truly did the mighty patriot 
Adams characterize this event as the most 
memorable epoch in the history of Amer- 
ica. " T am apt to believe," said he, " that 
it will be celebrated by succeeding genera- 
tions, as the great anniversary festival. It 
ought to be commemorated as the day of 
deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to 
Almighty God. It ought to be solemnized 
with pomp and parade, with shows, games, 
sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illumina- 
tions, from one end of this continent to 
the other, from this time forth forever- 
more ! " The result has equaled the great 
patriot's wishes. Tradition gives a dra- 
matic effect to its announcement. It was 
known, throughout the city, that the great 



BIKTH OF THE NEW REPUBLIC— 1776. 



67 



event was to be determined tliat day, by 
the last formal acts ; but the closed doors 
of couoress excluded the populace from 
witnessing the august assembly or its pro- 
ceedings, though thousands of anxious 
citizens had gathered around the building, 
eager to hear the words of national des- 
tiny soon to be officially proclaimed. From 
the hour when congress came together in 
the forenoon, all business was suspended 
throughout the city, and the old bellman 
steadily remained at his post in the steeple, 
prepared to sound forth to the waiting 
multitudes the expected glad tidings. He 
had L'ven stationed a boy at the door of the 
hall below, to give immediate signal of the 
turn of events. This bell, manufactured 



felt such a professional pride, the electri- 
fied old patriot rung forth such a joyous 
peal as was never heard before, nor ceased 
to hurl it backward and forward, till every 
voice joined in its notes of gladness and 
triumph. The roar of cannon, and illu- 
minations from every house and hill-top, 
added to these demonstrations of uni- 
versal rejoicing. 

And this was the type of that exultation 
which everywhere manifested itself, as the 
news spread with lightning rapidity from 
city to city and from State to State. Every 
American patriot regarded the declaration 
by congress as the noble performance of 
an act which had become inevitable ; and 
the paper itself as the complete vindica- 




HALL OP LNIII.l 



. i-lilLAUELl'UlA, 1776, 



in England, bore upon its ample curve the 
now prophetic inscription, "Proclaim lib- 
erty throughout all the land unto all the 
inhabitants thereof." Hours passed on, 
and fear began to take the place of hope 
in many a heart ; even the venerable and 
always cheerful bellman was overheard in 
his despondent soliloquy, " They will never 
do it! they will never do it!" Finally, 
at about two o'clock in the afternoon, 
the door of the mysterious hall swung 
open, and a voice exclaimed, " Passed ! — 
it has passed ! " The word was caught up 
by ten thousand glad mouths, and the 
watch-boy now clapped his hands and 
shouted, " Ring ! Ring ! " Seizing the iron 
tongue of the bell in which he had long 



tion of America before the bar of public 
opinion throughout the world. When it 
was read by the magistrates and other 
functionaries, in the cities and towns of 
tlie whole nation, it was greeted with 
shouts, bonfires, and processions. It was 
read to the troops, drawn up under arms, 
and to the congregations in churches by 
ministers from the pulpit. Washington 
hailed the declaration with joy. It is 
true, it was but a formal recognition of a 
state of things which had long existed, but 
it put an end to all those temporizing hopes 
of reconciliation which had clogged the 
military action of the country. On the 
ninth of July, tlierefore, AVashington 
caused it to be read at six o'clock in the 



68 



FROM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWER. 



evening, at the head of each brigade of 
tlie army. " The general hoj^es,"' said lie 
in his orders, '•'that this imijortant event 
will serve as a fresh incentive to every 
officer and soldier, to act with fidelity and 
courage, as knowing that now the peace 
and safety of his country depend, under 
God, solely on the success of our arms ; 
and that he is now in the service of a 
State, possessed of suificient power to re- 
ward his merit, and advance him to the 
highest honors of a free countrj-." The 
troops listened to the reading of this with 
eager attention, and at its close broke forth 
in tumultuous applause. 

The excitable populace of New York 
were not content with the ringing of bells 
and the other usual manifestations of 
public joy. There was a leaden eques- 
trian statue of George the Third iu the 
]>owling Green, in front of the fort. 
Around this kingly effigy the excited mul- 
titude, surging hither and thither, unit- 
edly gathered, and pulling it down to the 
ground, broke it into fragments, which 
fragments were afterwards conveniently 
molded into bullets and made to do service 
against his majestj^'s troops. Some of the 
soldiers and officers of the American army 
having joined in this jiroceeding, Wash- 
ington censured it, as having much the 
appearance of a riot and a want of disci- 
pline, and the army was ordered to abstain, 
in the future, from all irregularities of the 
kind. 

in Boston, that citadel of radical insub- 
ordination to "his majesty," the public 
joy knew no bounds, and even the British 
prisoners were courteously summoned to 
witness the sjjirit with which a brave peo- 
ple, determined to be free, dared to defy 
the British throne. On the seventeenth 
of July the British officers on parole re- 
ceived each a card from the governor, re- 
questing the honor of said officer's attend- 
ance at a specified hour on the morrow, in 
the town hall. As rumors were jjretty 
well afloat, however, touching the decided 
step that had been taken at Philadelphia, 
the officers were not without a suspicion as 
to the purport of the meeting, and hesi- 



tated for a while as to the consistency of 
giving the sanction of their presence to a 
proceeding which they could not but re- 
gard as traitorous. Curiositj', however, 
got the better of these scruples, and it was 
resolved, after a brief consultation, that 
the invitation ought to be accepted. 

On entering the hall, the king's officers 
found it occupied by 'rebellious' function- 
aries, military, civil, and ecclesiastical, and 
among whom the same good humor and 
excitement prevailed as among the throng 
out of doors. The British officials were 
received with great frankness and cordi- 
ality, and were allotted such stations as 
enabled them to witness the whole cere- 
mon}'. Exactlj' as the clock struck one. 
Colonel Crafts, who occupied the chair, 
rose, and, silence being obtained, read 
aloud the declaration, which announced to 
the world that the tie of allegiance which 
had so long held Britain and her North 
American colonies together, was forever 
separated. This being finished, the gen- 
tlemen stood up, and each, repeating the 
words as they were spoken by an officer, 
swore to uphold, at the sacrifice of life, 
the rights of his country. Meanwhile, the 
town clerk read from a balcony the solemn 
declaration to the collected multitude ; at 
the close of which, a shout began in the 
hall and passed like an electric spark to 
tlie streets, which now rang with loud Jiuz- 
zas, the slow and measured boom of can- 
non, and the rattle of musketry. The 
batteries on Fort Hill, Dorchester Neck, 
tlie castle, Naritasket, and Long Island, 
each saluted with thirteen guns, the artil- 
lery in the town fired thirteen rounds, and 
the infantry scattered into thirteen divis- 
ions, poured forth thirteen volleys, — all 
corresponding to the number of states 
which formed the Union. There was also 
a municipal banquet, at which speeches 
were made and toasts drank ; and in the 
evening a brilliant illumination of the 
houses. 

In Virginia, the proclamation of inde- 
pendence was greeted with that same 
ardor of enthusiasm which for so many 
years bad characterized the people of that 



BIRTir OF THE NEW REPUBLIC— 1776. 



(ii) 



ancient commonweaHli, in the course of 
political freedom. In South Carolina, too, 
the declaration was read to the assembled 
multitudes, amid the greatest rejoicings, — 
public addresses, military and civic proces- 
sions, bands of music, firing of cannon, 
and kindred demonstrations of popular 
favor. In all the colonies, indeed, the 
declaration was hailed as the passing away 
of the old world and the birth of the 
new. 

But the declaration, though it thus 
solemnly inaugurated a new nation and 
made the colonies, for the time, the theater 
of patriotic jubilee, involved startling per- 
ils and imposed momentous duties ; for it 
was a defiant challenge to combat thrown 
by a mere province in the face of the most 
colossal power in all Christendom. This 
important paper commences with stating 
that, " When in the course of human 
events it becomes necessary for one people 
to dissolve the political bands which have 
connected them with anotlier, and to as- 
sume among the powers of the earth, the 
separate and equal stations to which the 
laws of Nature, and of Nature's God, en- 
title them, a decent respect to the opinions 
of mankind requires that they should de- 
clare tlie causes which impel them to the 
separation." 

The causes are then stated, and a long 
enumeration of the oppressions complained 
of by America is closed by saying that 
" a prince, whose character is thus marked 
by every act which may deiine a tyrant, is 
unfit to be the ruler of a free people." 
History may be searched in vain for words 
so bold and scathing, used by a colony 
against a powerful sovereign. 

The fruitless appeals which had been 
made to the people of Great Britain are 
also recounted, but " they too," concludes 
tjiis declaration, " have been deaf to the 
voice of justice and of consanguinity. We 
must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity 
which denounces our separation, and hold 
them, as we hold the rest of mankind, 
enemies in war, in peace friends." Then 
comes the portentous conclusion — 

" We, therefore, the representatives of 



the United States of America, in general 
congress assembled, appealing to the Su- 
preme Judge for the rectitude of our inten- 
tions, do, in the name, and by the author- 
ity of the good people of these colonies, 
solemnly publisli and declare, that these 
United Colonies are, and of right ought to 

be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES ; that 

they are absolved from all allegiance to 
the British crown, and tliat all political 
connection between them and the State of 
Great Britain, is, and ought to be, totally 
dissolved; and that, as free and independ- 
ent states, they have full power to levy 
war, conclude peace, contract alliances, 
establish commerce, and do all other acts 
and things, which independent states may 
of right do. And for the support of this 
declaration, with a firm reliance on the 
protection of Divine Providence, we mutu- 
ally pledge to each other, our lives, our 
fortunes, and our sacred honor." 

In the whole country, however, between 
New England and the Potomac, which 
was now to become the great theater of 
action, although a vast majority was in 
favor of independence, there existed an 
influential number, who not only refused 
to act with their countrymen, but were 
ready to give information and aid to the 
enemy. Most of these tories were wealthy 
and haughty, and rendered themselves ex- 
tremely unpopular. Laws passed by the 
new State authorities had subjected these 
persons to fines and imprisonments, and 
their property to confiscation. They en- 
dured many outrages, and were treated to 
"tarrings and featherings" innumerable, 
by the more violent among the angry pop- 
ulace. To prevent these outrages, con- 
gress gave the supervision of tories to 
committees of inspection. Many of these 
obnoxious families finally left the country, 
and in course of time the tory element was 
eradicated or completely silenced. 

Scarcely less interesting and important 
is the character of the reception which 
this remarkable document met on its ar- 
rival in England. Of the noble band of 
American patriots who had been chosen to 
deliberate and act for the best good of the 



70 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD POWEK. 



oppressed colonies, and who, preceding the 
final act of the declaration of independ- 
ence, had sent forth the most magnani- 
mous appeals to Britain's sense of justice, 
— of these men and their works, there had 
gone forth one of the grandest eulogies 
from the elder Pitt (Lord Cliatham), the 
greatest of Britain's statesmen, who, in 
his place in parliament, dared to say — 

" I must declare and avow that in all 
my reading and study — and it has been 
my favorite study ; I have read Thucydi- 
des, and have studied and admired the 
master states of the world — that, for so- 
lidity of reasoning, for force of sagacity, 
and wisdom of conclusion, under such a 
complication of circumstances, no nation 
or body of men can stand in preference to 
rlie general congress of Philadelphia." 

But when, a few years after, it was pro- 
posed, by tlie Britisli prime minister, to 
conciliate the exasperated colonies by treat- 
ing them as a people possessing certain 
independent rights and powers, Pitt 
sliowed the exalted estimation in which 
lie held the rebellious colonies as part of 
the British realm, by opposing such a 
course, in a speech of almost dramatic 
power and effect, and from which, owing 
to the exhaustion it produced in his own 
shattered system, the great peer and ora- 
tor almost immediately died. 

In France, the declaration of independ- 
ence by the American colonies was greeted 
with secret satisfaction by the court and 
rulers, and aroused to universal gladness 
the popular heart. Reviewing the scene 
and its actors, one of the most brilliant 
and popular orators of that intrepid nation 
was led to say: "With what grandeur, 
with what enthusiasm, should I not speak 
of those generous men who erected this 
grand edifice by their patience, their wis- 
dom, and their courage ! Hancock, Frank- 
lin, the two Adamses, were the greatest 
actors in this affecting scene ; but they 
were not the only ones. Posterity shall 
know them all. Their honored names 
shall be transmitted to it b^' a happier 
pen than mine. Brass and marble shall 
show them to remotest ages. In behold- 



ing them, shall the friend of freedom feel 
his heart palpitate witli joy — feel his ej'es 
float in delicious tears. Under the bust of 
one of them has been written, ' He wrested 
thunder from heaven and the scepter from 
tyrants.' Of the last words of this eulogy 
shall all of them partake." Still more preg- 
nant were the words of the great Mira- 
beau, as, citing the grand principles of the 
American Declaration, from his place in 
the National Assembl}', " I ask," he said, 
"if the powers who have formed alliances 
with the States have dared to read that 
manifesto, or to interrogate their con- 
sciences after the perusal ? I ask whether 
there be at this day one government in 
Europe — the Helvetic and Batavian con- 
federations and the British isles excepted 
— wliich, judged after the principles of the 
Declaration of Congress on tlie fourtli oi 
July, 1776, is not divested of its rights!" 
For more than a year, commissioners 
from congress, at the head of whom was 
Dr. Franklin, resided at the court of 
France, urging upon tliat government to 
acknowledge the independence of the 
United States. But the success of the 
American struggle was regarded, as yet, 
too doubtful, for that country to embroil 
herself in a war with Great Britain. But 
that great event, the capture cf the British 
army at Saratoga, seemed to increase the 
probability that the American arms would 
finally triumph, and decided France to 
espouse her cause. The aid which France 
now brought to the Americans was of 
great importance. It is even doubtful 
whether the colonies, without her contri- 
butions of money, nav3-, and troops, would 
have been able to resist Britain with final 
success ; at least, the struggle must have 
been greatly prolonged. To this inter- 
vention, however, France was inclined, be 
her own hostility to England, whom she 
delighted to see humbled, especially by a 
people struggling for independence. Fi- 
nally, after the surrender of Cornwallis to 
General Washington, the French court 
pressed upon congress the propriety of ap- 
pointing commissioners for negotiating 
peace with Great Britain. In accordance 



BIRTH OF THE NEW REPUBLIC— 1776. 



with this advice, John Adams, Benjamin 
Franklin, John Jay, and Henry Laurens, 
were appointed. The commissioners met 
Messrs. Fitzherbert and Oswald, on the 
part of Great Britain, at Paris, and provi- 
sional articles of peace between the two 
countries were there signed, November 
thirtieth, 1782; the definitive treaty being 
signed on the third of September, 1783. 
Holland acknowledged the independence 
of the United States in 1782; Sweden, in 
February, 1783; Denmark, in the same 
month ; Spain, in March ; Russia, in July. 
And thus, the Republic of the United 
States of America became an inde- 
pendent power among the nations of the 
earth. 

It was not unknown to the wise and 
venerable enactors of the Declaration, that 
their signatures to such an instrument 
would be regarded in England as an act 
of treason, rendering them liable to the 
halter or the block. In the full apprecia- 
tion of all this, every man of them placed 
his name upon the immortal parchment. 
The only signature which indicates a 



trembling hand, is that of Stephen Hop- 
kins, but this was owing to a nervous 
affection ; for, so resolute was he in con- 
gress, that, when some of the members 
suggested a hope of reconciliation, Mr. 
Hopkins replied, that " the time had come 
when the strongest arm and the longest 
sword must decide the contest, and those 
members who were not prepared for action 
had better go home." The boldest signa- 
ture is that of John Hancock, he whom 
the British had excejjted in their offers of 
jDardon, as one "whose offenses are of too 
flagitious a nature to admit of any other 
consideration but that of condign punish- 
ment." The number wlio signed the Dec- 
laration was fifty-si.\ ; and the average 
length of their lives was about sixty-five 
years. Carpenters'Hall — or Independence 
Hall — in Philadelphia, where these tre- 
mendous scenes transpired, is still one of 
the places which every American looks 
upon with patriotic pride; for within that 
temple was born a Nation, in whose des- 
tiny were wrapped the interests of Liberty 
and Civilization to the end of time. 



III. 

FIRST AMERICAN NAVAL VICTORY.— 1779. 



John Paul Jones, Commanding the Bon Homme Richard, Fights and Captures King George's Power- 
ful Ship-ofWar, tlie Serapis, in British Waters. — Crowds of Spectators Line tlie Englisli Coast. — The 
Most Sanguinary Battle Ever Fought Between Single Ships. — Jones is Hailed as " The Washington 
of the Seas." — World-wide Interest of this Comhat. — Commodore Jones's Early Career. — Offers his 
Services to Congress. — Appointed a Naval Lieutenant. — Joins the Continental Fleet. — The First io 
Hoist its Ensign. — Style and Motto of the Flag — Sails from France on a Cruise. — Terror Createil by 
bis Movements. — Characteristic Anecdotes. — Two British Frigates in Sight. — Jones Ready for Bloody 
Work. — The Ships Muzzle to Muzzle. — Superiority of the Serapis. — A Most Deadly Contest. — Both 
Vessels on Fire. — Jones Attac'sed by Another Foe. — One of his Vessels Treacherous. — Remarkable 
Scenes. — Britain's Flag Struck to America. — An Act Without Precedent. — Sinking of the Victori- 
ous Vessel. 



' The moit obBtinale and bloody bstttlc in th^- annuls of naval warfare." — J. Fenimore Cooper. 




UCH an exploit as that performed by John Paul Jones, in 1779, 
by which, in plain sight uf tlic English coast, he flung to the breeze 
tlie gaUaiit eiisigti ot the United States, and, witli Britons as wit- 
nesses of his daring, fought, victoriously, a battle whicii has always 
been spoken of as the most obstinate and sanguinary combat that 
ever occurred between single sliips, can never be read of by Ameri- 
with other than the deepest and most enthusiastic interest. The 
1 \^ victory came, too, at one of the darkest hours in the revolutionary cam- 
* ' paigii, and served to gladden and encourage, for the time being, the de- 
liondcnt hearts of honest patriots. The vaunted iuvincibleness of the 
ritish navy became a b\--word of contumely, the world over, from the 
time .Jones nailed his flag to the mast, and, under the calm 
sky and round harvest moon of September, dealt forth a storm 
of deatli and desolation upon the enemies of his adopted coun- 
try. The action may well be pronounced one of the most 
terrible on record, from its unusual duration for a naval bat- 
tle, from the ferocity which the combatants displayed, and 
from the proximity of the two vessels, the muzzles of the 
ships' batteries almost reaching into each other's port-holes. 
•John Paul was born in Scotland, on the sixth day of 
July, 1747, and the scenerj' and associations of his birth- 
place — Arbigland — and its vicinity, doubtless encouraged 
'\/ \ \Mj> ^'^^^ restless spirit of adventure and love of change, as 
W^^iIE^ well as that ardent enthusiasm in tlie objects of his pur- 
'-'^^5 suit, which so strikingly characterized his career througli life. 
t- At the age of twelve, he was ajiprenticed to a mercliant 
FIRST xav.^l flag, of Whi tchaveu, who carried on a considerable trade with 



FIRST AMEEICAN NAVAL VICTOEY— 1779. 



(o 



the American colonies. His first voyage 
was made before lie was thirteen years old, 
being to Virginia, where his elder brother 
was established as a planter. He was after- 
ward engaged for a short time in the slave 
trade, which he left in disgust, and made a 
number of voyages to the West Indies. 

In 1773, John Paul removed to Virginia, 
to attend to the affairs of his brother, who 
had died childless and intestate. He now, 
for some unknown reason, assumed the ad- 
ditional surname of Jones, and which he 
retained through life. At the commence- 
ment of the revolutionary conflict, his feel- 
ings became warmly enlisted in the cause 
of the colonies, and this spirit fully pre- 
pared him for the active part he soon un- 
dertook in their behalf. An offer of his 
services, which he made to the colonies, 
was accepted, and, on the twenty-second 
of December, 1776, by a resolution of con- 
gress, he was appointed lieutenant in the 
American navy. 

It was Lieutenant Jones who hoisted, 
with his own hands, the first American 
naval flag on board the American frigate 
Alfred, the flag-ship, tlie national ensitjii 
being thus for the first time displayed from 
a man-of-war. The circumstances attend- 
ing this interesting occasion are stated to 
have been as follows: The Alfred was an- 
chored off the foot of Walnut street, Phila- 
delphia. On a brilliant morning, early in 
February, 1776, gay streamers were seen 
fluttering from every mast-head and spar 
on the river Delaware. At nine o'clock, a 
full-manned barge thridded its way among 
the floating ice to the Alfred, bearing the 
commodore. He was greeted by the thun- 
ders of artillery and the shouts of a multi- 
tude. When he reached the deck of the 
flag-ship. Captain Salstonstall gave a sig- 
nal, and Lieutenant Jones gallantly pulled 
the ropes which wafted the new flag mast- 
head high. It was of yellow silk, bearing 
*;he figure of a pine tree, and the signifi- 
cant device of a rattlesnake in a field of 
thirteen stripes, with the ominous legend, 
" DonH tread on me!" This memorable 
act, it was Jones's high honor and privilege 
to perform when in his twenty-ninth year; 



an honor, too, of which, as events afterward 
proved, he was fully worthy. 

On the fourteenth of August, 1779, Jones 
sailed from the roadstead of Groix, France, 
in command of a small squadron, consisting 
of the Bon Homme Richard, forty-two guns, 
the Alliance, thirty-six guns, the Pallas, 
thirty-two guns, the Cerf, twenty-eight 
guns, and the Vengeance, twelve guns. 
Two privateers afterwards joined them, but 
did not continue with them till the end of 
the cruise. The efficiency of the expedi- 
tion was marred by a want of subordination 
on the part of some of the officers, who do 
not appear to have been willing to yield 
prompt obedience to orders. Captain Lan- 
dais, of the Alliance, habitually disregarded 
the signals and orders, throughout the 
cruise, and, towards tlie close, committed 
acts of open hostility to his superior. But, 
notwithstanding the difficulties against 
which he had to contend, Jones inflicted 
great damage on the enemy ; he coasted 
Ireland, England, and Scotland, making 
many prizes, and carrying terror wherever 
he appeared. 

But the action which gave the most dis- 
tinguishing renown to Jones's brilliant ca- 
reer, and which so early gave prestige to 
American prowess on the ocean, is that of 
which a detailed account is given below : 

It was about noon, on the twenty-third 
of September, 1779, a fleet of over forty 
sail appeared off Flamborough Head, on 
the coast of Yorkshire, and Jones at once 
gave up the pursuit of a vessel in whose 
track he was just then following, with all 
jjossible speed, and made signals for a gen- 
eral chase. The sails in sight were a fleet 
of English merchantmen, under convoy of 
the ships-of-war Serapis and Scarborough, 
and as soon as they saw themselves pur- 
sued the}' ran in shore, while their convoj's 
that protected them bore off from the land 
and prepared for an engagement. The 
Bon Homme Richard set every stitch of 
canvas, but did not come into fighting po- 
sition toward the enemy until about seven 
o'clock in the evening, at which time, from 
the darkness having set in somewhat, ob- 
jects on the water were dimly discerned. 



74 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD ROWER. 



though not with such difficulty as would 
have been the case had not the moon 
shone forth with great brightness, and the 
weather proved serene and beautiful. 
When within pistol-sliot, the hail from the 
Serapis, " What sliip is that ? " was 
answered, " I can't hear you." Captain 
Pearson says the answer was, " The Prin- 
cess Royal." A second hail was answered 
by a thundering broadside from the bat- 
teries of the Richard, — a signal that in- 
dicated a hot and bloody encounter at 
hand, as the sequel soon proved. 

The American ship, it may here be re- 
marked, was much inferior to her antag- 
onist, being, in fact, an old vessel, clumsy, 
and unmanageable. She carried six 
eighteen-pounders on the lower gun deck, 
fourteen twelve-pounders and fourteen 
nine-pounders on the middle gun deck, 
two six-pounders on the quarter-gun 
deck, two six-pounders o-ii the spar deck, 
one six-pounder in each gangway, and two 
six-pounders on the forecastle. She was 
manned by three hundred and eighty 
men and boys. The Serapis, on the other 
hand, was a new ship, built in the best 
manner, and with a much heavier arma- 
ment. She mounted twenty eighteen- 
pounders on her lower gun deck, twenty 
nine-pounders on her upper gun deck, six 
six-pounders on her quarter deck, four 
six-pounders on the forecastle ; and she 
had a crew of some three hundred and 
twenty men. 

Captain Cottineau, of the Pallas, en- 
gaged the Scarborough, and took her, after 
an hour's action, while the Bon Homme 
Richard engaged the Serapis. 

In the earlier jsarc of the action, the 
superior sailing qualities of the Serapis 
enabled her to take several advantageous 
positions, which the seamanship of Paul 
Jones, hampered by the unmanageable 
character of his craft, did not enable hini 
to prevent. Thus he attempted to lay his 
ship athwart the enemy's bows, but the 
bowsprit of the Serapis sweeping over the 
Richard's poop, was grappled and lashed, 
and her stern swung round to the bow of the 
Bon Homme Richard by the action of the 



wind ; the vessels lay yard-arm and yar J- 
arm, the muzzles on either side actually 
touching the enemy. But long before this, 
many of the eighteen-pound shot of the 
Serapis had entered the Richard's hull be- 
low the water-mark, and she leaked in a 
threatening manner. Just before they 
closed. Commodore Pearson hailed his ad- 
versary : " Has your ship struck ? " "I 
haven't begun to firjlit yet ! " thundered 
forth the brave Jones, in rejily. 

A novelty in naval combats was now 
presented to many witnesses, but few ad- 
mirers, — says Lieutenant Dale, who par- 
ticipated in the conflict, — the rammers 
being run into the respective shijis to en- 
able the men to load after the lower ports 
of the Serapis had been blown away, to 





make room for running out their guns, 
and in this situation the ships remained 
until between ten and t\yelve o'clock, 
P. M. From the commencement to the 
termination of the action, there was not a 
man on board the Richard who was igno- 
rant of the superiority of the Serapis, both 
in weight of metal, and in the qualities of 
the crew. The crew of that ship were 
picked seamen, and the ship itself had 
been only a few months off the stocks; 
whereas the crew of the Richard consisted 
of part Americans, English and French, 
and a part of Maltese,Portuguese, and Ma- 
lays, these latter contributing bj' their 
want of naval skill and knowledge of the 
English language, to depress rather than 
encourage any reasonable hope of success 
in a combat under such circumstances. 



FIRST AMEEICAX NAVAL VICTORY— 1779. 



75 







■■i'^imm' 



I 



riiO-M COLOXY TO AVOKLD PO^YER. 



One of the most disheartening facts in 
the early part of the action, was the silenc- 
ing of the battery of twelve-pounders, on 
which Jones had placed his principal de- 
pendence. 

Brave and dauntless sailor as he was, 
Jones stuck to his little battery, and stimu- 
lated his men with word and example. 
While one of the nine-pounders vomited 
double-headed .shot against the mainmast 
of the Serapis, the two others swept her 
decks with grape and canister. The fire 
was so hot from the nine-pound battery and 
the tops, that not a man could live on the 
deck of the English ship. But all this 
while, her lower battery of eighteen-pound- 
ers was making an awful ruin of the Rich- 
ard. The terror of the scene was al.so soon 
heightened beyond the power of language 
to depict, by both vessels taking fire, which 
required almost superhuman exertion to 
subdue, and, in the midst of all, Jones and 
his heroic men were horror stricken to see 
their consort, the Alliance, commanded by 
Captain Landais, come up and pour a full 
broadside into the Richard's stern ! The 
evidence is regarded as most conclusive, 
that Captain L.'s conduct on this occasion 
was not due to any mistake on his part in 
supposing the Richard to be the Serapis, 
but to his personal hostility to Jones. 
With jealousy and treason in his heart, his 
plan was to kill Jones, and, capturing the 
Serapis, claim the victory as his. But the 
black-hearted Frenchman failed in his plot. 
A quantity of cartridges on board the Ser- 
apis was set fire to by a grenade from 
Jones's ship, and blew up, killing or wound- 
ing all the officers and men abaft the main- 
mast. But long after this the fight went 
on with fury. 

At last, the mainmast of the Serapis be- 
gan to totter to its fall — her fire slackened, 
and, about half-past ten o'clock, the British 
flag was struck, and Commodore Pearson 
surrendered his sword to his really weaker 
foe. In going through the formalities of 
this scene, Pearson displayed much irrita- 
bility, and, addressing Jones as one who 
fought under no recognized flag, said: 

" It is painful to deliver up my sword to 



a man who has fought with a halter around 
his neck." 

" Sir," replied Jones, good humoredly, 
as he handed back the weapon, "3'ou have 
fought like a hero, and I make no doubt 
but your sovereign will reward j-ou in the 
most ample manner." 

True enough, the gallant Pearson soon 
received from King George the dignity of 
knighthood as an acknowledgment of his 
bravery in this unparalleled battle, — hear- 
ing of which honor, Jones is said to have 
dryly remarked : " Well, he deserved it ; 
and should I have the good fortune to 
meet with him again, I will make a Io)yI 
of him ! " 

Another episode occurred in connection 
with a medical officer, — the surgeon of the 
Richard, — who ran up from the cock-pit, 
in great fright and trepidation, and hur- 
riedly accosting the caj)tain, said : "Are you 
not going to strike the colors ? Is not the 
ship fast sfMA-i'/^r/."" "What! doctor," re- 
plied Jones, " would j'ou have me strike to 
a drop of water ? Here, help me get this 
gun over ! '' The doctor, as though answer- 
ing a sudden professional call, was soon 
retracing his steps to the cock-pit. 

So terribly was the Richard cut to pieces 
(being an old ship), that it was found im- 
possible, after the fight, to get her into 
port, and, the wounded being removed, she 
soon after sank. 

Jones took his prizes to Holland, and it 
is no exaggeration to say that the whole 
world stood astonished at his bravery and 
success. 

A most interesting account of this cele- 
brated battle between the Serapis and 
Richard was given, soon after its occur- 
rence, by Commodore Jones himself, a 
portion of which, describing in his own 
dramatic style, the principal scenes during 
the engagement, is given below: 

On the morning of that day, September 
twenty-third, the brig from Holland not be- 
ing in sight, we chased abrigantine that ap- 
peared laying to, to windward. About 
noon, we saw and chased a large ship that 
appeared comin g round Flamborough Head 
from the northward, and at the same time 



FIRST AMERICAN NAVAL VICTORY— 1779. 



a 



I manned and armed one of the pilot boats 
to send in pursuit of tlie brigantine, wliich 
now appeared to be the vessel that I had 
forced ashore. Soon after this, a fleet of 
forty-one sail appeared off Flamborough 
Head, hearing N". N. E. This induced me 
to abandon the single ship which had then 
anchored in Burlington Bay ; I also called 
back the pilot boat, and hoisted a signal 
for a general chase. When the fleet dis- 
covered lis bearing down, all the merchant 
ships crowded sail toward the shore. The 
two ships-of-war that protected the fleet at 
the same time steered from the land, and 
made the disposition for battle. In ap- 
proacliing the enemy, I crowded every pos- 
sible sail, and made the signal for the line 
of battle, to which the Alliance paid no at- 
tention. Earnest as I was for the action, 
I could not reach the commodore's ship 
until seven in the evening, being then 
within pistol-shot, when he hailed the Bon 
Homme Richard. We answered him by 
firing a whole broadside. 

The battle being thus begun, was con- 
tinued with unremitting furj-. Every 
method was practiced on both sides to gain 
an advantage and rake each other ; and I 
must confess that the enemy's ship, being 
much more manageable than the Bon 
Homme Richard, gained thereby several 
times an advantageous situation, in spite 
of my best endeavors to prevent it. As I 
had to deal with an enemy of greatly su- 
perior force, I was under the necessity of 
closing with him, to prevent the advantage 
which he had over me in point of ma- 
neuver. It was my intention to lay the 
Bon Homme Richard athwart the enemy's 
bow ; but as that operation required great 
dexterity in the management of both sails 
and helm, and some of our braces being 
shot away, it did not exactly succeed to my 
wish. The enemy's bowsprit, however, 
came over the Bon Homme Richard's poop, 
by the mizzenmast, and I made both ships 
fast together in that situation, which by 
the action of the wind on the ene^ny's sails, 
forced her stern close to the Bon Homme 
Richard's bow, so that the ships lay square 
alongside of each other, the yards being 



all entangled, and the cannon of each ship 
touching the opponent's. 

I directed the fire of one of the three 
cannon against the mainmast, with dou- 
ble-headed shot, while the other two were 
exceedingljf well served with grape and 
canister shot, to silence the enemy's mus- 
ketry and clear her decks, which was at 
last effected. The enemy were, as I have 
since understood, on the instant of calling 
for quarter, when the cowardice or treach- 
ery of three of my under-ofiicers induced 
them to call to the enemj'. The English 
commodore asked me if I demanded quar- 
ter, and I, having answered him in the 
most determined negative, they renewed 
the battle with double fury. They were 
unable to stand the deck ; but the fire of 
their cannon, especially the lower battery, 
which was entirely formed of ten-pound- 
ers, was incessant ; both ships were set on 
fire in various places, and the scene was 
dreadful beyond the reach of language. 
To account for the timidity of my three 
under-officers, I mean the gunner, the car- 
penter, and the master-at-arms, I must 
observe, that the two first were slightly 
wounded, and, as the ship had received 
various shots under the water, and one of 
the pumps being shot away, the carpenter 
expressed his fears that she would sink, 
and the other two concluded that she was 
sinking, which occasioned the gunner to 
run aft on the poop, without my knowl- 
edge, to strike the colors. Fortunately for 
me, a cannon-ball had done that before, by 
carrying away the ensign-staff; he was 
therefore reduced to the necessitj' of sink- 
ing, as he supposed, or of calling for quar- 
ter, and he preferred the latter. 

All this time the Bon Homme Richard 
had sustained the action alone, and the 
enemy, though much superior in force, 
would have been very glad to have got 
clear, as appears by their own acknowledg- 
ments, and by their having let go an an- 
chor the instant that I laid them on board, 
b}' which means they would have escaped, 
had I not made them fast to the Bon 
Homme Richard. 

At last, at half-past nine o'clock, the Al. 



FEOil COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



liance appeared, and I now thought the 
battle at an end ; but, to my utter aston- 
islimeut, lie discharged a broadside full 
into the stern of the Bon Homme Richard. 
We called to him for God's sake to forbear 
firing into the Bon Homme Richard; yet 
they passed along the off side of the ship, 
and continued firing. There was no pos- 
sibility of his mistaking the enemy's ship 
for the Bon Homme Richard, tliere being 
the most essential difference in their ap- 
pearance and construction. Besides, it was 
then full moonlight. The Bon Homme 
Richard received various shots under wa- 
ter from the Alliance; the leak gained on 
the pumps, and the fire increased much on 
board both ships. Some officers persuaded 



me 
sense 



to strike, of whose courage and good 
I entertain a high opinion. My 
treacherous master-at-arms let loose all my 
prisoners without my knowledge, and my 
j)rospects became gloomy indeed. I would 
not, however, give up the point. The ene- 
my's mainmast began to shake, their firing 
decreased fast, ours rather increased, and 
the British colors were struck at half an 
hour past ten o'clock. 

This prize proved to be the British ship- 
of-war, the Serapis, a new ship of forty- 
four guns, built on the most approved con- 
struction, with two complete batteries, one 
of them of eighteen-pounders, and com- 
manded by the brave Commodore Richard 
Pearson. 



IV. 

THE WONDERFUL DARK DAY.— 1780. 



The Northern States wrapt in a Dense Black Atmosphere for Fifteen Hours. — The Day of JiulKnient 
Supposed to have Come — Cessation of Labor. — Rehgious Devotions Resorted to. — The Herds 
Retire to their Stalls, the Fowls to their Roosts, and the Birds Sing their Evening Songs at Noonday.— 
Science at Loss to Account for the Mysterious Phenomenon.— One of Nature's Marvels — Redness of 
the Sun and Moon —Approach of a Thick Vapor.— Loud Peals of Thunder.— Sudden and Strange 
Darkness.— Alarm of the Inhabitants— End of the World Looked For.— Dismay of the Briite Crea- 
tion. — An Intensely Deep Gloom. — Difficulty in Attending to Business. — Lights Burning in the 
Houses, — Vast E.\tent of the Occurrence — Condition of the Barometer. — Change in the Color of 
I tbjects. —Quick Motion of the Clouds —Birds Suffocate and Die.— The Sun's Disc Seen in Some 
Places. — Oily Deposit on the Waters. — Impenetrable Darkness at Night. — Incidents and Anecdotes. — 
Ignorant Whims and Conjectures — An Unsolved Mystery. 



" The Dark Day in nortKern America waa one ot those wonderful |ihenoniena of nature which wiU always be read of with interest, but 
which philosophy is at a loss to explain." — tlLKQCHKL. 




DIFFICULTY OF Tli.iVELING. 






LMOST, if not altogether alone, as tlie most 
I niy.sterious and as yet unexplained plienome- 
non of its kind, in nature's diversified range of 
events, during the last century, stands the 
Darli Day of May Nineteenth, 1780, — a most 
unaccountable darkening of the whole visible 
heavens and atmosphere in New England, — 
which brought intense alarm and distress to 
multitudes of minds, as well as dismay to the 
brute creation, the fowls fleeing, bewildered, to 
their roosts, and the birds to their nests, and 
the cattle returning to their stalls. Indeed, 
thousands of the good people of that day be- 
came fully convinced that the end of all things 
terrestrial had come ; many gave up, for the 
time, tlieir secular pursuits, and betook them- 
selves to religious devotions ; while many others regarded 
the darkness as not only a token of God"s indignation 
against the various iniquities and abominations of the age, 
but also as an omen of some future destruction that might 
overwhelm the land — as in the case of the countries men- 
tioned in biblical hi.story, — unless speedy repentance and 



80 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



reformation took place. The ignorant in- 
dul"-ed iu vague and wild conjectures as 
to the cause of tlie phenomenon; and 
those profounder minds, even, that could 
"gauge the heavens and tell tiie stars," 
were about equally at loss for any rational 
explanation of the event. It is related 
that the Connecticut legislature was in 
.ses>ion at this time, and that, so great was 
the darkness, the members became terri- 
fied, and thought that the day of judg- 
ment had come ; a motion was conse- 
quently made to adjourn. At this, Mr. 
Davenport arose and >aid: "j\lr. Speaker, 
— It is either the day of judgment, or it 
is nut. If it is not, there is no need of 
adjourning. If it is, I desire to be found 
doing my duty. I move that candles be 
brought, and that we proceed to business." 
The time of the commencement of this 
extraordinary darkness was between the 
hours of ten aud eleven iu the forenoon of 
Friday, of the date already named; aud it 
continued until the middle of the follow- 
ing night, but with different appearances 
at different places. As to the manner of 
its approach, it seemed to appear first of 
all iu the south-west. Tiie wind came 
from that quarter, and the darkness ap- 
peared to come on with the clouds that 
came in that direction. Tlie degree to 
which the darkness arose varied in differ- 
ent localities. In most parts, it became so 
dense, that people were unable to read 
common print distinctly, or accurately de- 
termine the time of day by their clocks or 
watches, or dine, or manage their domes- 
tic affairs conveniently, without the light 
of candles. In some places, the degree of 
darkness was just about equal to prevent- 
ing persons seeing to read ordinary print 
in the open air, for several hours togetiier. 
The extent of this darkness was also very 
remarkable. It was observed at the most 
easterly regions of New England; west- 
ward, to the furthest parts of Connecticut, 
aud at Albany ; to the southward, it was 
observed all along the sea coasts ; and to 
the north, as far as the American settle- 
ments extended. It probably far exceeded 
these boundaries, but the exact limits were 



never positively known. With regard to 
its duration, it continued in the neiglibor- 
hood of Boston for at least fourteen or Hf- 
teen hours ; but it was doubtless longer or 
shorter in some other places. The appear- 
ance and effects were such as tended to 
make the prospect extremely dull, gloomy, 
and unnatural. Candles were lighted up 
in the houses; the birds, in the midst 
of their blithesome forenoon enjoyments, 
stopped suddenly, and, singing their even- 
ing songs, disappeared, and became si- 
lent; the fowls retired to their roosts; the 
cocks were crowing in their accustomed 
manner at the break of day ; objects could 
not be distinguished at a comparatively 
slight distance ; and ever^'thing bore the 
aspect and gloom of night, — to sa3' noth- 
ing of the effect ujion the minds of the 
people, which, indeed, was quite inde- 
scribable. 

The above general facts concerning this 
strange phenomenon were ascertained, 
after much painstaking inquiry, soon 
after its occurrence, by Prof. AVilliams, of 
Harvard College, who also collected to- 
gether some of the more particular ob- 
servations made in different parts of the 
countrv, relative to the remarkable event. 
From these data it appears that, with re- 
gard to the state of the atmosphere pre- 
ceding this uncommon darkness, it was 
noticed in manv sections, for several days 
before, that the air seemed to be of a 
smoky and vaporous character. The sun 
and the moon exhibited an unusual red- 
ness in their color, and divested of their 
usual brightness and lucid aspect ; and 
this obscuration increased as they ap- 
proached nearer to the horizon. This 
was ascertained to have been the case in 
almost all parts of the New England 
states, for four or five days preceding the 
nineteenth of May. The winds had been 
variable, but chiefly from the south-west 
and north-east. The thermometer indi- 
cated from forty to fifty-five degrees. The 
barometer showed a somewhat higher range 
than usual. The weather had been fair 
and cool for the season. 

As to the state of the atmosphere when 



THE WONDERFUL DARK DAY — 17S0. 



81 



the darkness came on, it was observable 
that the weight or gravity of it was grad- 
ually decreasing, the greater part of the 
day. According to the observations made 
at Cambridge, Mass., the mercury in the 
barometer was found, at twelve o'clock, to 
stand at twenty-nine inches, seventy; in 
half an hour after, the mercury had fallen 
the one-hundredth part of an inch ; at one 
o'clock, it was twenty-nine inches, sixty- 
seven ; at three o'clock, it was at twenty- 
nine inches, sixty-five ; at eight minutes 
past eight, it was at twenty-nine inches, 
sixt\'-four. A similar course of barometri- 
cal observations made, at the same time, 
in another part of the state, showed as fol- 
lows : at six o'clock in the morning, the 
mercury in the barometer was found to bo 
at twenty-nine inches, eighty-two ; as soon 
as the darkness began to appear uncom- 
mon, that is, at ten minutes past ten, the 
mercury was found at twent3'-nine inches, 
sixty-eight ; at quarter before eleven — the 
time of the greatest degree of darkness in 
that part of the country — the mercury was 
at twenty-nine inches, sixty-seven, the 
darkness continuing in the same degree 
for an hour and a half; at fifteen minutes 
past twelve, the mercury had fallen to 
twent^'-nine inches, sixty-five, and, in a 
few minutes after this, the darkness began 
to abate ; the mercury remained in this 
state during the whole evening, without 
any sensible alteration. At half-past 
eight, it seemed to have fallen a little, but 
so small was the alteration, that it was at- 
tended with some uncertainty, nor did it 
appear to stand any lower tliree hours 
later. 

From these observations, it is certain 
that, on the day when the darkness took 
place, the weight or gravity of the atmos- 
phere was gradually decreasing through 
the whole day. Both of the barometers 
in use were instruments of superior work- 
manship, and consequently to be depended 
on as to the accuracy of their indications. 

The color of objects that day, is another 

point of interest. It is mentioned, in the 

record of observations made with reference 

to this feature of the phenomenon, that 

6 



the complexion of the clouds was com- 
pounded of a faint red, yellow and brown, 
— that, during tlie darkness, objects which 
commonly appear green, were of the deep- 
est green, verging to blue, — and that those 
which appear white, were highly tinged 
with yellow. This was the character of 
the observations, as given by almost every 
one who made any record of the day's ap- 
pearance. But Prof. Williams states that, 
to him, almost every object appeared tinged 
with yellow, rather than with any other 
color; and this, whether the thing was 
near, or remote from the eye. 

Another element of peculiarity, in this 
remarkable scene, was the nature and ap- 
pearance of the vapors that were then in 
the atmosphere. Early in the morning, 
the weather was cloudy ; the sun was but 
just visible through the clouds, and ap- 
peared of a deep red, as it had for several 
days before. In most places thunder was 
heard a number of times in the morning. 
The clouds soon began to rise from the 
south-west, with a gentle breeze, and there 
were several small showers before eight 
o'clock ; in some places there were showers 
at other hours, throughout the day. The 
water that fell was found to have an un- 
usual character, being thick, dark, and 
sooty. One observer, in the eastern part 
of Massachusetts, states, in this connec- 
tion, that the strange appearance and 
smell of the rain-water which people had 
saved in tubs, was the subject of universal 
and wondering remark. On examining 
the water, there was found a light scum 
upon it, which, on being rubbed between 
the thumb and finger, seemed to resemble 
the black ashes of burnt leaves ; the water 
also gave the same strong, sooty smell, 
which characterized the air. A similar 
appearance, in this respect, manifested 
itself in other localities; it was especially 
exhibited on the Merrimac river, large 
quantities of black scum being seen float- 
ing upon the surface of that stream, dur- 
ing the day. In the night, the wind 
veered round to the north-east, and drove 
this substance towards the south shore ; 
when the tide fell, the matter lay for 



«9 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



many miles along the shore, the width of 
the deposit being some four or five inches. 
An examination of a considerable quantity 
of this substance, in several places, failed 
to show anything of a sulphurous nature, 
either in its taste, color, or smell. Prof. 
Williams states that, being apprehensive 
as to whether there was not some uncom- 
mon ingredient in the air that day, he put 
out several sheets of clean paper in the air 
and rain. When they had been out four or 
five Lours, he dried them by the fire. They 
were much sullied, and became dark in 
their color, and felt as if they had been 
rubbed with oil or grease ; but, iipon burn- 
ing them, there could not be detected any 
sulphurous or nitrous jsarticles. 

The motion and situation of the cur- 
rents or bodies of vapor in the atmosphere 
likewise exhibited some striking peculiar- 
ities. In most places, it was very evident 
that the vapors were descending from the 
higher parts of the atmosj)here towards 
the surface of the earth. A gentleman 
who made some special observations bear- 
ing upon this point, mentions a very curi- 
ous circumstance, as to their ascent and 
situation, namely, that at about nine 
o'clock in the morning, after a shower, 
tlie vapors rose from the springs in the 
low lands, in great abundance. Notice 
was taken of one large column that as- 
cended, with great rapidity, to a consid- 
erable heiglit above the highest hills, and 
soon spread into a large cloud, then moved 
off a little to the westward. A second 
cloud was formed in the same manner, 
from the same springs, but did not ascend 
so high as the first; and a third was 
formed from the same places, in less than 
a, quarter of an hour after the second. 
About three-quarters of an hour after 
nine o'clock, these clouds exhibited a very 
striking appearance. The upper cloud 
wore a peculiar reddish hue; the second 
showed in some places or parts a green, in 
others a blue, and in others an indigo 
color; while the surface of the third cloud 
was almost white. 

Of a somewhat singular nature, also, is 
the fact, as related by another, that, while 



tlie darkness continued, the clouds were in 
quick motion, interrupted, skirted one over 
another, so as to form — at least to the eye 
of the beholder — a considerable number of 
strata, the lower stratum being of an uni- 
form height as far as visible; but this height 
was conceived to be very slight, from the 
small extent of the horizon that could be 
seen, and from this circumstance observed 
in the evening. A lighted torch, held by 
a person passing along the street, occa- 
sioned a reflection of a faint red or copper- 
tinged light — similar to a faint aurora 
borealis, — the apparent height at which 
tlie reflection was made, being some twenty 
to thirty feet. And it was generally re- 
marked, that the hills might be seen at a 
distance in some directions, while the in- 
termediate spaces were greatly obscured 
or darkened. 

It would thus appear, from the state- 
ments now cited, as if the vapors, in some 
places, were ascending ; in most, descend- 
ing; and, in all, very near to the surface 
of the earth. To this it may be added, 
that, during the darkness, objects seem- 
ingly cast a shade in every direction, and, 
in many instances, there were various 
appearances or corruscations in the atmos- 
phere, not unlike the aurora borealis, — 
though it is not stated that any uncom- 
mon exhibitions of the electric fire were 
witnessed during the day. In some ac- 
counts, however, it is mentioned that a 
number of small birds were found suffo- 
cated by the vajjor ; some were found dead, 
and some flew affrighted, or stupefied, into 
the houses. 

In New Haven, Conn., there was a 
shower of rain, with some lightning and 
thunder, about daybreak in the morning, 
the rain continuing, with intervals, until 
after sunrise. The morning was cloudy 
and darkish ; and the sun, rising towards 
the zenith, gave no increase of light, as 
usual, but, on Ihe contrary, the darkness 
continued to increase until between eleven 
and twelve o'clock, at which time there 
was the greatest obscurity in that place. 
What little motion of the air there was 
just at this period, was nearly from the 



THE WOXDEEFUL DAEK DAY — 1780. 



83 



south ; though tlit> atmospliere was as calm 
as the blandest summer morning. There 
was sonietliing more of a luminous appear- 
ance in the horizon, than in the hemi- 
sphere in general ; also, a most marked 
liveliness of tint to the grass and other 
green vegetation; and a very noticealile 
yellowness in the atmosphere, which made 
clean silver nearly resemble the color of 
brass. At about twelve o'clock, noon, the 
singular obscuration ceased ; the greatest 
darkness, at any particular time, was at 
least as dense as vhat is commonly called 
' candlelighting,' in the evening. In the 
town of Hartford, and the neighboring 
villages, the phenomenon was observed 
with all its distinctive peculiarities ; and, 
by some persons, the disc of the sun was 
seen, at the time of the greatest deficiency 
of light 



such buildings. At twelve, the darkness 
was greatest, and a little rain fell ; in the 
street, the aspect was like that at the be- 
ginning of evening, as lights were seen 
burning in all the houses. The clouds 
were thinnest at the north; at tlie north- 
east, the clouds were very thick, and so 
low that hills could not be seen at the dis- 
tance of half a mile ; south-westerly, hills 
might be clearly seen at the distance of 
twenty miles, though the intermediate 
space was so shaded that it was impossi- 
ble to distinguish woodland from pasture. 
At half-past twelve, the clouds, having 
been hitherto detached, began to concen- 
trate at such an height, that all the hills 
became visible, and the country around 
exhibited a most beautiful tinted verdure ; 
at one, the clouds became uniformly 
spread, and tlje darkness wa- not greater 




CHASGE OF SCEKE AITER THE DARK DAY. 



In Middlesex county, Mass., the peals 
of thunder were loud and frequent at six 
o'clock in the morning, attended with 
heavy rain; at seven o'clock, the rain and 
thunder had ceased, but the sky contin- 
ued cloudy. Between nine and ten o'clock, 
the clouds were observed to thiclcen, and 
to receive continual accessions from the 
low lands. Before ten, the darkness had 
sensibly increased, till it became difficult 
to read an almanac in a room having two 
windows ; at eleven o'clock, candles were 
lighted, and at h.ilf-past eleven the dark- 
ness was so great in the meeting-house, 
where a court was then sitting, that it 
was difficult to distinguish countenances 
at the smallest distance, notwithstanding 
the large number of windows usual in 



The same 
the whole 



than is usual on a cloudy day 
weather continued through 
afternoon, except that the sun was seen 
for a few minutes, in some places, about 
three o'cloi'k. At eight in the evening, 
the darkness was so impenetrably thick, 
as to render traveli'ng positively imprac- 
ticable ; and, altliough the moon rose 
nearly full about nine o'clock, yet it did 
not give light enough to enable a person 
to distinguish between the heavens and 
the earth. 

In the account of this phenomenon given 
by Dr. Tenney, of New Hampshire, an in- 
telligi'ut observer and writer, are some 
interesting details, gathered by him while 
on a journey to Pennsylvania, from the 
east. He repeats and confirms tiie state- 



84 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER.. 



ment made by others, that, previously to 
the commencement of the darkness, the 
sky was overcast with the common kind 
of clouds, from wliicli there was, in some 
places, a moderate fall of rain. Between 
these and the earth, there intervened an- 
other stratum, apparently of great thick- 
ness ; as this stratum advanced, the dark- 
ness commenced, and increased witli its 
progress till it came to its lieight, which 
did not take place till the hemisphere 
was a second time overspread — the uncom- 
mon thickness of this second stratum be- 
ing probably occasioned by two strong cur- 
rents of wind from the southward and 
westward, condensing the vapors and 
drawing them to the north-east. 

The result of Dr. Tenney's journey, — 
during which he made tiie best use of his 
opportunities for information, — was, that 
the darkness appeared to be most gross in 
Essex county, Massachusetts, the lower 
part of the state of New Hampshire, and 
in portions of what was then the province 
of Maine. In Rhode Island and Connect- 
icut it was not so great, and still less in 
New York ; in New Jersey, tlie second 
stratum of clouds was observed, but it was 
not of any great thickness, nor was the 
darkness very uncommon ; in the lower 
parts of Pennsylvania, no extraordinary 
scene was noticed. 

Through the whole extent of country 
referred to, tlie lower cloud-stratum had 
an uncommon brassy hue, while the eartli 
and trees were adorned with so enchant- 
ing a verdure as could not escapj notice, 
even amidst the unusual atmospheric 
gloom that accompanied it. The dark- 
ness of the following evening was proba- 
bly as deep and dense as ever had been ob- 
served since the Almighty fiat gave birth 
to light ; it wanted only palpability to ren- 
der it as extraordinary as that wliich over- 
spread the land of Egypt, in tlie days of 
Moses. If every luminous body in the 
universe had been slirouded in impenetra- 
ble shades, or struck out of existence, it 
was thought the darkness could not have 
been more complete. A sheet of white 
paper, held witiiin a few inches of tlie 



eyes, was equally invisible with the black- 
est velvet. And, considering the small 
quantity of light that was transmitted 
by tlie clouds, during the day, it is not 
surprising that, at night, a sufficient quan- 
tity of rays should not be able to penetrate 
the same strata, brought back by the shift- 
ing of the winds, to afford the most ob- 
scure jjrospect even of the best reflecting 
bodies. The denseness of this evening 
darkness was a fact universally^ observed 
and recorded. 

In view of all the information contained 
in the various accounts of this daj', it ap- 
pears very certain that the atmosphere 
was charged with an unjjrecedented quan- 
tity of vapor, — from what primary cause 
has never been satisfactorily determined; 
and as the weather had been clear, the air 
heavy, and the winds small and variable 
for many days, the vapors, instead of dis- 
persing, must have been constantly rising 
and collecting in the air, until the atmos- 
phere became highly charged with them. 

A large quantity of the vapors, thus 
collected in the atniosjihere, on tlie day in 
question, was floating near the surface of 
the earth. Wheresoever the specific grav- 
ity- of any vapor is less than the specific 
gravity of the air, such a vapor will, by 
the law of fluids, ascend in the air ; wiiere 
the speciflc gravity of a vapor, in the at- 
mosphere, is greater than that of the air, 
such a vapor will descend ; and where the 
specific gravity of the vapor and air are 
the same, the vapor will then be at rest, — 
floating or swimming in the atmosphere, 
without ascending or descending. From 
the barometrical observations, it appears 
that the weight or gravity of the atmos- 
phere was gradually growing less, from 
the morning of the nineteenth of May, 
until the evening; and hence the vapors, 
in most places, were descending from the 
higher parts of the atmosphere, towards 
the surface of the earth. According to 
one of the observations cited, the vapors 
were noticed to a-^cend, until they rose to 
a height where the air was of the same 
specific gravity — a height not much above 
the ailjacent hills, — and here the}' in- 



THE WONDERFUL DAEK DAY — 1780. 



85 



stantly spread, and floated in the atmos- 
phere. From tlie5e data, the conclusion 
is drawn, that tlie place where the vapors 
were balanced must have been very near 
the surface of the earth. 

Reasoning from the premises thus set 
forth. Prof. Williams was of the opinion 
that such a large quantity of vapor, float- 
ing in the atmosphere, near tlie earth's 
surface, might be sufiScient to produce all 
the phenomena tliat made the nineteenth 
of May, 1780, so memorable. Thus, the 
direction in which the darkness came on 
would be determined by the direction of 
the wind, and this was known to be from 
the south-west; the degree of the dark- 
ne s would depend on the density, color, 
and situation of the clouds and vapor, and 
the manner in which they would transmit, 
reflect, refract, or absorb the rays of light; 
the extent of the darkness would be as 
great as the extent of the vapor; and the 
duration of it would continue until the 
gravity of the air became so altered that 
the vapors would change tiieir situation, 
by an ascent or descent; — all of which 
particulars, it is claimed, agree with the 
observations that have been mentioned. 
Nor does the effect of the vapor.s, in dark- 
ening terrestrial objects, when they lay 
near the surface of the earth, appear to 
have been greater than it was in darken- 
ing the sun and moon, when their situa- 
tion was higher in the atmosphere. 

It being thus evident that the atmos- 
phere was, from some peculiar cause (per- 
haps great fires in distant woods) charged, 
in a high degree, with vapors, and that 
these vapors were of different densities 
and occupied different heights, — the de- 
duction is, tliat by this means the rays of 
light falling on them must have suffered a 
variety of refractions and reflections, and 
thereby become weakened, absorbed, or so 
reflected, as not to fall upon objects on the 
earth in the usual manner ; and as the 
different vapors were adapted by their 
nature, situation, or density, to absorb or 
transmit the different kind of rays, so the 
colors of objects would appear to be af- 
fected by the mixture or prevalency of 



those rays which were transmitted through 
so uncommon a medium. This was the 
explanation suggested by Prof. Williams, 
tiiough not to the exclusion of other the- 
ories. 

But there were not wanting those — and 
a large number they were too — who gave 
play, in their minds, to the most strange 
opinions concerning the cause of so mar- 
velous an appearance. It was imagined 
by some persons, that an eclipse of the 
sun, produced of course by an interposition 
of the moon, was the cause of the darkness 
— others attributed it to a transit of Venus 
or Mercury upon the disc of the sun — 
others imputed it to a blaziug star, which 
they thought came between the earth and 
the sun. So whimsical, indeed, were some 
of the opinions which possessed men's 
minds at this time, that even so bare a 
vagary as that a great mountain obstructed 
the rays of the sun's light during that 
day, obtained advocates ! Whether they 
thought that a new mountain was created 
and placed between the earth and the sun, 
or that a mountain from this globe had 
taken flight and perched upon that great 
luminary, does not appear. 

That this darkness was not caused by 
an eclipse, is manifest by the various posi- 
tions of the planetary bodies at that time, 
for the moon was more than one hundred 
and fifty degrees from the sun all that 
day, and, according to the accurate calcu- 
lations made by the most celebrated as- 
tronomers, there couid not, in the order of 
nature, be any transit of the planet Venus 
or Mercury upon the disc of the sun that 
year ; nor could it be a blazing star — much 
less a mountain, — that darkened the at- 
mosphere, for this would still leave unex- 
plained the deep darkness of the following 
night. Nor would such excessive noc- 
turnal darkness follow an eclipse of the 
sun ; and as to the moon, she was at that 
time more than forty hours' motion past 
her opposition. 

One of the theories, looking to a solution 
of the mysterious occurrence, which found 
defenders, was as follows : The heat of the 
sun causes an ascent of numerous particles 



b6 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 




THE WONDERFUL DAEK DAY — 17S0. 



87 



which consist of different qualities, such as 
aqueous, sulphurous, bituminous, salinous, 
otc. ; hence the waters of the seas, rivers, 
and ponds ; the fumes of burning volca- 
noes, caused by subterraneous veins of 
liquid fire ; all the other kinds of smoke — 
fat, combustibles, oily matter from various 
kinds of earth, the juice of trees, plants 
and herbs ; salinous and nitrous particles 
from salt, snow water, and kindred sources ; 
— these are exhaled into the regions of the 
air, where their positions are subject to 
various mutations or changes by reason of 
the motion and compression of the air, 
causing them to be sometimes rarefied and 
sometimes condensed. It was (according 
to this theory,) a vast collection of such 
particles that caused the day of darkness ; 
that is, the particles, after being exhaled, 
were driven together by certain winds 
from opposite points of the compass, and 
condensed to such a degree by the weight 
of the earth's atmosphere, that they ob- 
structed the appearance of the rays of the 
sun by day, and thr se of the moon by 
night. 

Having thus presented the facts and 
circumstances pertaining to this notable 
day in the history of the New England or 
nortlierii states, it may not be amiss to 
add, tluit a similar day of mysterious dark- 
ness occurred on October 21, 1716; the 
day was so dark, that people were forced 
to light candles to dine by, — a darkness 
which could not proceed from any eclipse, 
a solar eclipse having taken place on the 
fourth of that month. There was also a 
remarkable darkness at Detroit and vicin- 
ity, October 19, 1762, being almost total for 
the greater part of the day. It was dark 
at day-break, and this continued until nine 
o'clock, when it cleared up a little, and, for 
the space of about a quarter of an hour, 
the body of the sun was visible, it appear- 
ing as red as blood, and more than three 



times as large as usual. The air, all this 
time, was of a dingy yellowish color. At 
half-past one o'clock, it was so dark as to 
necessitate the lighting of candles, in 
order to attend to domestic duties. At 
about three in the afternoon, the darkness 
became more dense, increasing in intensity 
until half-past three, when the wind 
breezed up from the southwest and brought 
on a slight fall of rain, accompanied with 
a profuse quantity of fine black particles, 
in appearance much like sulphur, both in 
smell and quality. A sheet of clean paper, 
held out in this rain, was rendered quite 
black wherever the drops fell upon it ; but, 
when held near the fire, it turned to a yel- 
low color, and, when burned, it fizzed on 
the paper, like wet powder. So black did 
these powdery particles turn everything 
upon which they fell, that even the river 
was covered with a black froth, which, 
when skimmed off the surface, resembled 
the lather of soap, with this difference, that 
it was more greasy, and its color as black 
as ink. At seven, in the evening, the air 
was more clear. This phenomenon was 
observed throughout a vast region of coun- 
try ; and, though various conjectures were 
indulged in, as to the cause of so extraor- 
dinary an occurrence, the same degree of 
mystery attaches to it as to tliat of 1780, — 
confounding the wisdom even of the most 
learned philosophers and men of science. 

It may easily be imagined, that, as the 
deep and mysterious darkness which cov- 
ered the land on the memorable nineteenth 
of May filled all hearts with wonder — and 
multitudes with fear, — so, the return, at 
last, of that brightness and beauty charac- 
teristic of the month and of the season, 
brought gladness again to the faces of the 
young, and composure to the hearts of the 
aged ; for never before did nature appear 
clothed in so charming an attire of sun- 
shine, sky and verdure. 



V. 
WASHINGTON'S FAEEWELI. TO THE AEMY.— 1783. 



Affecting Interviews and Parting Words between tlie Great Chieftain and His Conirades-in-Arms. — 
Solemn Farewell Audience with Congress — In Its Presence He Voluntarily Divests Himself of His 
Supreme Authority, Returns His Victorious Sword, and Becomes a Private Citizen, — History of the 
Election of a Military Leader. — America's Destiny in His Hands — Appointment of George Wash- 
ington — The Army at Cambridge, Mass. — He Immediately Takes Command — Is Enthusiastically 
Greeted. — Leads Its Fortunes Seven Years. — Record of His Generalship. — Ends the War in Tri- 
umph. — Scheme to Malte Him King. — Indignantly Rebukes the Proposal — Last Review of His 
Troops. — His Strong Attachment for Them. — Intention to Leave Public Life — Congress Informed of 
this Fact. — Embarkation from New York. — Homage Paid Him Everywhere — Arrival at Annapo- 
lis — Proceeds to the Halls of Congress. — Impressive Ceremonial There — Rare Event in Human 

History. 

■•■» 

" Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the theater of action, and, bidding an affectionate farewell to this auguit body 
under whose orders 1 have bo long acted, 1 here offer my commission, and take my leave of all the employmenta of public life." — Washiwo- 
Toif's Retireuent as Reyoli^tionaby Leadeb. 




WASHIXGTOS 

in regard 
era, and 



HAT momentous object for which the War of Independence was for 
seven long years waged, under the supreme leadership of General 
. Wasliington, having been achieved by the tmconditional acknowledg- 
ment of that independence on the part of Great Britain, a cessation 
of hostilities was formally announced by congress to a rejoicing 
people. Washington's military course having thus honorably and 
successfully terminated, he, Cincinnatus-like, sheathed his sword, 
and .stirrendered his high commission to that power which had in- 
vested him with its authority. It will, therefore, not only be apprc>- 
priate, but of peculiar interest, to link together, in one narrative, the 
circumstances attending his appointment to the responsible office of 
commander-in-chief of the revolutionary army, and that last great 
act — the Return of his Commission — in the stupendous drama of 
which he was the central figure. 

To that sterling old patriot, John Adams, the credit of the wisdom 
of selecting Washington as military chieftain principallj' belongs. 
It was a question, on the decision of which hung the fate of the rev- 
olutionary cause ; and in all parts of the country, among the people 
at large as well as in the more immediate circles of congress, by 
whom the great question was finally to be determined, the discussion 
as to who should be chosen as the nation's leader in the councils of 
's SWORD, war and on the battle-field, was universal. Mr. Adams states that 
to this election, there was in congress a southern party against a north- 
a jealousy against a New England army under the command of a 



WASHINGTON'S FARF.WELL TO THE ARMY — 1783. 



89 



New England general ; but whether this 
jealousy was sincere, or whether it was 
mere pride and ambition — the ambition of 
furnishing a southern general to omr'and 
the northern army, — was a matter of 
doubt. The intention, however, was very 
visible that Colonel Washington was their 
object. 

The military ability which had been dis- 
played, on different occasions, by Colonel 
Washington, were well understood, and, 
from the conspicuous positions in which 
he had thus been placed, and the saga- 
cious judgment which was known to have 
characterized him in important emergen- 
cies, he had, for a long time past, enjoyed 
a fine reputation throughout the colonies, 
as a gallant and successful officer. He was 
only in a moderate sense a partisan, in 
the difficulties and discussions which had 
arisen between his own and the mother 
country ; but, from the very first, he ex- 
hibited sufficient repugnance to any atti- 
tude of vassalage, on the part of his coun- 
trymen, to show that he would be no will- 
ing subject of coercion, should the preten- 
sions of the British be attempted to be car- 
ried out by threats, or by recourse to arms. 

When congress had assembled, Mr. 
Jolin Adams arose in his place, and in as 
short a speech as the subject would admit 
represented the state of the colonies, the 
uncertainty in the minds of the people, 
their great expectation and anxiety, the 
distresses of the army, the danger of its 
dissolution, the difficulty of collecting an- 
other ; and the probability that the Brit- 
ish army would take advantage of these 
delays, march out of Boston, and spread 
desolation as far as they could go. He 
concluded with a motion, in form, that 
congress would adopt the army at Cam- 
bridge, and appoint a general ; that though 
this was not the proper time to nominate a 
general, yet as there existed reasons for 
believing this to be the greatest difficulty, 
he had no hesitation to declare tliat there 
was but one gentleman in liis mind for 
that important office, and that was a gen- 
tleman from Virginia — one of their own 
number, and well knoAvn to them all, — a 



gentleman whose skill and experience as an 
officer, whose independent fortune, great 
talents, and excellent general character, 
would command the approbation of all 
America, and unite the cordial exertions 
of all the colonies better than any other 
person in the Union. 

Mr. Washington, who liappened to sit 
near the door, as soon as he heard this al- 
lusion to himself, with his usual modesty, 
darted into the library room. 

The subject came under debate, and 
several gentlemen declared themselves 
against the appointment of Mr. Washing- 
ton, not on account of any jjersonal objec- 
tion against liim, but because the army 
were all from New England, had a general 
of their own, appeared to be satisfied with 
him, and had proved themselves able to 
imprison the British army in Boston. 
Mr. Pendleton, of Virginia, and Mr. 
Sherman, of Connecticut, were very ex- 
plicit in declaring this opinion. Mr. 
Cushing and others more faintly expressed 
their opposition, and their fears of discon- 
tent in the army and in New England. 
Mr. Paine expressed a great opinion of 
General Ward, and a strong friendship 
for him, having been his classmate at col- 
lege, or, at least, his contemjjorary ; but 
gave no opinion on the question. The 
subject was postponed to a future day. In 
the meantime, pains were taken out of 
doors to obtain a unanimity, and the voices 
were generally so clearly in favor of Wash- 
ington, that the dissenting members were 
persuaded to withdraw their opposition, 
and Mr. Washington was nominated by 
Mr. Thomas Johnson, of Maryland, unan- 
imously elected, and the army adopted. 

His official commission was at once 
drawn up and presented to him ; a copy of 
which most interestiiig document is given 
below : — 

" In, Congress. AVe the delegates of the 
United Colonies of New Hampshire, Mas- 
sachusetts Bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, 
New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, 
New Castle, Kent, and Sussex on Dela^ 
ware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, 
and South Carolina, 



90 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



To George Washington, Esquire : 

We, reposing special trust and coua- 
dence in your patriotism, conduct, and 
fidelity, do by these presents constitute and 
appoint you to be Gexekal and Com- 
maxder-ix-Chief of the army of the 
United Colonies, and of all the forces 
raised or to be raised by them, and of all 
others who shall voluntarily offer their 
services and join the said army for the de- 
fense of American liberty, and for repelling 
every hostile invasion thereof. And you 
are hereby invested with full power and 
authority to act as you shall think for the 
good and welfare of the service. 

And we do hereby strictly charge and 
require all officers and soldiers under your 
command to be obedient to your orders, 
and diligent in the exercise of their several 
duties. 

And we do also enjoin and require you 
to be careful in executing the great trust 
reijosed in j'ou, by causing strict discipline 
and order to be observed in the army, and 
that the soldiers are duly exercised and 
provided with all convenient necessaries. 

And you are to regulate your conduct in 
every respect by the rules and discipline 
of war, (as herewith given you,) and punc- 
tually to observe and follow such direc- 
tions, from time to time, as you shall re- 
ceive from this or a future Congress of the 
said United Colonies, or a Committee of 
Congress for that purpose appointed. 

This commission to continue in force till 
revoked by this or a future Congress. 
By order of Congress. 

John Haxcock, President. 
Dated, Philadelphia, June 19, 1775. 
Attest, Charles Thomsox, Secretary." 

On the second day of July, 1775, Wash- 
ington arrived in Ci>mbridge, Massachu- 
setts, accompanied by Major-General Lee, 
his next in command, and other officer.s, 
establishing his head-quarters at the man- 
sion subsequently occupied by Longfellow, 
the elegant scholar and poet. At about 
nine o'clock on the morning of the next 
day, Washington, attended by a suitable 
escort, proceeded from his head-quarters to 
a great elm tree — one of the majestic na- 



tives of the forest, — near Harvard College, 
and where the continental forces were 
drawn up in military order. Under the 
shadow of that wide-spreading tree, Wash- 
ington, moving forward a few paces, drew 
his sword as commander-in-chief of the 
American army, declaring that it should 




THE W.lSaiNGTON ELM, CAMBBIDGE, MASS. 

never be sheatlied until tlie liberties of his 
country were established. The record of 
his services is the history of the whole 
war. Joining the army in July, 1775, he 
com])elled the British to evacuate Boston 
in March, 1776 ; he then followed the 
British to New York, fighting the battle 
of Loug Island on the twenty-seventh of 
August, and that of WHiite Plains on the 
twenty-eighth of October. On the twenty- 
fifth of December he made the memorable 
passage of the Delaware, and soon gained 
the victories of Trenton and Princeton. 
The battle of Brandywine was fought on 
the eleventh of September, 1777, and that 
of Germantown, October fourth. Febru- 
ary twenty-eighth, 1778, witnessed his 
" glorious and happy day," as he himself 
termed it, at Monmouth. In 1779 and 
1780 he conducted the military operations 
in the vicinitj- of New York ; after which, 
in 1781, he marched to Virginia to watch 
the movements of Lord Cornwallis, whom 
he forced to surrender at Yorktown, in 
October, liy which great achievement he 
put an end to the active operations of the 
revolutionary struggle, and secured peace 
and independence to his country. 

W'ith the return of peace, and the 
achievement of independent nationality, 



WASPIINGTON'S FAREWELL TO THE ARMY — 1783. 



91 



the wisdom and patriotism of Wusliington 
were to be severely tested, and in a most 
unexpected manner, in connection with the 
form of government to be adopted by the 
United States. The English government 
was regarded by many of the strongest 
American minds as, in most respects, a 
model one ; and Ijy manj' persons the En- 
glisii form of a constitutional monarchy 
was decided, especially by some of the 
army officers, to be the most promising, 
and thus far the most successful, experi- 
ment in government, and the one most 



this scheme called a secret meeting, and 
finally determined on the title of King, 
and Washington was informed of the fact. 
He spurned the gilded bribe of a king's 
crown, and promptly and sternlj' rebuked 
the abettors of the scheme in the following 
letter addressed to their leader : 

" Sir, — With a mixture of great sur- 
prise and astonishment, I have read with 
attention the sentiments you have sub- 
mitted to my perusal. Be assured, sir, 
no occurrence in the course of this war has 
given me more painful sensations than 




WA.SHINGTUN : 



likely to be adopted liy America upon due 
deliberation. Universal dissatisfaction was 
felt with the proceedings and conduct of 
congress as a governing jiower, and there- 
fore some agency superior to that, and of 
controlling prerogative, was jircposed, — a 
head, like the English sovei'eign, with 
proper safeguards against usurpation. 
Circumstances, of course, indicated Wash- 
ington as that head, and the next ques- 
tion naturally arose — under what official 
title should such a head rule ? The officers 
around Newburgh who were associated in 



RESIGNATION. 

your information of there being such ideas 
existing in the army as you have expressed, 
and which I must view with abhorrence 
and reprehend with severity. For the 
jaresent, the communication of them wil' 
rest in my own bosom, unless some further 
agitation of the matter shall make a dis- 
closure necessary. I am much at a loss to 
conceive what part of my conduct could 
have given encouragement to an address 
which to me seems big with the greatest 
mischiefs that can befall my country. If 
I am not deceived in the knowledge of 



1)2 



FEO.M COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



myself, you coula iiot have found a person 
to whom your schemes are more disagree- 
able. At tlie same time, in justice to my 
own feelings, I must add, that no man 
possesses a more serious wish to see ample 
justice done to the army than I do ; and, 
as far as my power and influence, in a con- 
stitutional waj', extend, they shall bo em- 
ployed to the utmost of my abilities to 
effect it, should there be any occasion. 
Let me conjure you, then, if j'ou have any 
regard for j'our country, concern for your- 
self or posterity, or respect for me, to 
banish these thoughts from your mind, and 
never communicate, as from yourself or 
any one else, a sentiment of the like na- 
ture." 

In perfect keeping with the spirit in 
which Washington ti-eated the dazzling 
offer thus so unexpectedly set before him, 
was the simplicity of his conduct in bid- 
ding adieu to his comrades-in-arms, and 
then presenting himself befoi'e congress, 
there to deliver up his sword, and volunta- 
rily divest himself of the supreme com- 
mand ; — in the serene and thoughtful 
phraseology of his own words, " to address 
himself once more, and that for the last 
time, to the armies of the United States, 
however widely dispersed the individuals 
who compose them may be, and to bid them 
an affectionate and a long farewell." 

For the last time, he assembled them at 
Newburgh, when he rode out on the field, 
and gave them one of those paternal ad- 
dresses which so eminently characterized 
his relationship with his army. To the 
tune of " Roslin Castle," — the soldier's 
dirge, — his brave comrades passed slowly 
by their great leader, and filed away to their 
respective homes. It was a thrilling scene. 
There were gray-headed soldiers, who had 
grown old by hardships and exposures, and 
too old to begin life anew ; tears coursed 
freely the furrowed cheeks of these veter- 
ans. Among the thousands passing in 
review before him were those, also, vfho 
had done valorous service when the destiny 
of the country hung tremblingly in the 
balance. As Washington looked upon 
them for the last time, he said, " I am 



growing old in my country's service, and 
losing my sight ; but I never doubted its 
justice or gratitude." Even on the rudest 
and roughest of the soldiery, the effect of 
his parting language was irresistible. 

On the fourth of December, 1783, by 
Washington's request, his officers in full 
luiiform, assembled in Fraunces's tavern. 
New York, to take a final leave of their 
commander-in-chief. On entering the 
room, and finding himself surrounded by 
his old companions-in-arms, who had 
shared with him so many scenes of hard- 
ship, difficulty, and danger, his agitated 
feelings overcame his usual self-command. 
Every man arose with eyes turned towards 
him. Filling a glass of wine, and lifting it 
to his lip.s, he rested his benignant but sad- 
dened countenance upon them, and said, — 

" With a heart full of love and grati- 
tude, I now take leave of you. I most de- 
voutly wish that your latter days maj' be 
as prosperous as your former ones have 
been honorable and glorious." Having 
drunk, he added, " I cannot come to each 
of you to take my leave, but shall be 
obliged to you. if each of jou will come 
and take me bj' the hand." A profound 
silence followed, as each officer gazed on 
the countenance of their leader, while the 
eyes of all were wet with tears. He then 
expressed again his desire that each of 
them should come and take him by the 
hand. The first, being nearest to him, 
was General Knox, who grasped his hand 
in silence, and both embraced each other 
without uttering a word. One after an- 
other followed, receiving and returning the 
affectionate adieu of their commander, 
after which he left the room in silence, 
followed by his officers in procession, to 
embarlv in the barge that was to convey 
him to Paulus's Hook, now Jersey City. 
As he was passing through the light in- 
fantry drawn up on either side to receive 
him. an old soldier, who was by his side 
on the terrible night of his march to 
Trenton, stepped out from the ranks, and 
reaching out his arms, exclaimed, "Fare- 
well, my dear general, fareiuell! " Wash- 
ington seized his hand most heartily, when 



WASHINGTON'S TAREWELL TO THE ARMY — 1783. 



93 



the soldiers forgot all discipline, rushed 
towards their chief, and bathed him with 
their tears. The scene was like tliat of a 
good patriarch taking leave of his children, 
and going on a long journey, from whence 
he might return no more. 

Having entered the barge, he turned to 
the weeping company upon the wharf, and 
waving his hat, bade them a silent adieu. 
They stood with heads uncovered, until 
the barge was hidden from their view, 
when, in silent and solemn procession, they 
returned to the place where they had as- 
sembled. Congress was at this time in 
session at Annapolis, Maryland, to which 
place Washington now proceeded, greeted 
along his whole route with enthusiastic 
homage, for the j)urpose of formally resign- 
ing his commission. He arrived on the 
nineteenth of December, 1783, and the 
next day he informed congress of the pur- 
pose for which he had come, and requested 
to know whether it would be their pleas- 
ure that he should offer his resignation in 
writing, or at an audience. A committee 
was appointed by congress, and it was de- 
cided that on Tuesday, December twenty- 
third, the ceremonial should take place as 
follows : — 

The president and members are to be 
seated and covered, and the secretary to 
be standing by the side of the president ; 
the arrival of the general to be announced 
by the messenger to the secretary, who is 
thereuj)on to introduce the general, at- 
tended by his aids, into the hall of con- 
gress ; the general, being conducted to a 
chair by the secretary, is to be seated, with 
an aid on each side standing, and the 
secretary is to resume his place. After a 
proper time for the arrangement of spec- 
tators, silence is to be ordered by the sec- 
retary, if necessary, and the president is to 
address the general in the following 
words : " Sir, — The United States in con- 
gress assembled are prepared to receive your 
communications." Whereupon the gen- 
eral is to arise and address congress ; after 
which he is to deliver his commission and 
a copy of his address to the president. 
The general having resumed his place, the 



president is to deliver the answer of con- 
gress, which the general is to receive 
standing ; the president having finished, 
the secretary is to deliver the general a 
copy of the answer, and the general is then 
to take his leave. When the general rises 
to make his address, and also when he 
retires, he is to bow to congress, which 
thej' are to return by uncovering without 
bowing. 

When the hour arrived, the president, 
General Mifflin, informed him that tliat 
body was prepared to receive his commu- 
nications. With a native dignity, height- 
ened by the solemnity of the occasion, the 
general rose. In a brief and appropriate 
speech he offered his congratulations on 
the termination of the war, and having 
alluded to his object in appearing thus in 
that presence, — that he might resign into 
the hands of congress the trust committed 
to him, and claim the indulgence of retir- 
ing from the public service, — he concluded 
with those affecting words, which drew 
tears from the eyes of all in that vast as- 
sembl}' : 

" I consider it an indisjjensable duty to 
close this last act of my official life, by 
commending the interests of our dearest 
country to the protection of Almighty 
God, and those who have the superintend- 
ence of them, to his holy keeping. Having 
now finished the work assigned me, I 
retire from the theater of action, and, 
bidding an affectionate farewell to this 
august body, under whose orders I have so 
long acted, I here offer my commission, 
and take my leave of all the em2)loyments 
of public life." 

After advancing to the chair, and deliv- 
ering his commission to the president, he 
returned to his place, and remained stand- 
ing, while General Mifflin replied, review- 
ing the great career thus brought to a 
close, and saying, in conclusion : 

" The glory of your virtues will not ter- 
minate with your military command; it 
will continue to animate the remotest ages. 
We join with j'ou in commending the in- 
terests of our country to Almighty God, 
beseeching Him to dispose the hearts and 



94 



FEOAI cDLONY to AVOKLD POWER. 



miiuls of its citizens to improve the op- 
portunity afforded them of becoming 
a happy and respectable nation. And 
for you, we address to Him our warm- 
est prayers, that a life so beloved may 



be fostered with all His care, that your 
days may be as hajipy as they have been 
illustrious, and that He will finally give 
you that reward which this world cannot 
bestow." 



VT. 

APPOINTMENT OF THE FIRST MINISTER PLENIPOTEN- 
TIARY, FROM THE NEW REPUBLIC TO THE 
ENGLISH COURT.— 1785. 



John Aflaras, America's Sturdiest Patriot, and tlie Foremost Knemy of British Tj'ranny, Fills this 
High Office — Interview between Him and King George, His Late Sovereign —Tlieir Addresses, 
Temper, Personal Bearinsr, and Humorous Conversation. — The Two Men Kightly Matclied Against 
Each Otiier. — Old Animosities Unhealed — Mutual Cliargesof False Dealing. — Settlement Demanded 
by the United States. — What Adams's Mission Involved — Dismemberment of the British Realm. — 
Loss of the Fairest Possession — Bitter Pill for the King. — His Obstinacy Forced to Yield — Humilia- 
tion of the Proud Monarch. — All Europe Watches the Event. — Mr. Adams Presented at Court.— Pa- 
triot and King Face to Face. — Official Address by the Minister. — Reply of King George. — His Visi- 
ible Agitation. — Adams's Presence of Mind. — Pays His Homage to the Queen — Her Majesty's Re- 
sponse. — Civilities by the Royal Family. — Results of this Embassy. — Pitiable Position of George the 
Third. — Fatal Error of Great Britain. 



' I must avow to your majesty, 1 hQV€ no attachment but to my own country."— Johs Adams to Kino Geoboe. 
*' An honest man will have no other."— Tub Kino's Ixstant Retlv. 




SE — ^ O deep-seatecl and festering were 
the old aniinosities between Amer- 
ica and the mother countrjr, that, 
scarcely had the war of the revo- 
lution terminated, when the two 
nations reciprocally charged each 
other with violating the treaty of 
peace. The United States were 
accused of having infringed those 
articles which contained agree- 
.^^ ^^^,,,^^ ments respecting the payment of 

AMiTv BETWEEM ENGLAND AND AMERICA. dcbts, tlic confiscation of property, 

and prosecution of individuals for the part taken by them during the war. On the 
other hand, the English were charged with violating that article which stipulated 
against the destruction or carrying away of any description of American property; 
the king was also complained of, for still retaining possession of the posts on the 
American side of the great lakes, thus influencing the Indian tribes to hostility; 
and, above all other sources and causes of complaint, in the conduct of Great Britain, 
was her rigorous and restrictive commercial system. 

These growing misunderstandings between the two countries, discussed with such 
angry vehemence on both sides, threatened such serious consequences should their adjust- 
ment be much longer delayed, that congress determined upon the important step of 



96 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



appointing, after the manner of independ- 
ent nations, a Minister Pleni2^otentiary to 
the court of Great Britain ! 

In February, 1785, John Adams was 
duly accredited ambassador, to represent 
the United States at that court. 

That George the Third was as obstinate 
a man as ever ruled a kingdom, no histo- 
rian has ever questioned. Having struck 
at the rights and liberties of America, in 
order to add to the riches of his coffers, 
nothing could turn him from his determin- 




ation to rule, or to ruin and destroy. To 
the suggestion that the king's rule over 
the colonies might be slightly softened or 
modified, Lord North despairingly replied : 
"It is to no purpose the making objec- 
tions, for the king will have it so." But 
in no more forcible phrase could the king's 
arbitrary temper concerning his colonies 
be shown, that in that which fell from his 
own lips, in the presence of the new en- 
vo}-, namely, "/ was the last man in the 
kingdom, sir, to consent to the independ- 
ence of America." 

Of all the opponents of Briti-sh misrule, 
in the western world, John Adams was 
the earliest, ablest, most intrepid and un- 
tiring. It was John Adams, who, in 



1775, in the memorable continental con- 
gress, at Philadelphia, suggested George 
Washington as comnumder-in-chief of the 
army that was to wage war against Great 
Britain — and, even before this crowning 
act, had sent across the Atlantic, ringing 
into the ears of the haughty monarch, the 
epithets ti/rant and usurper. 

The kingly ceremony of acknowledging 
the colonies independent took place, in con- 
formity with previous arrangements, on 
the fifth of December, 1782, in the house 
of lords. The scene was one which 
drew together an immense and won- 
dering crowd of spectators, conspicu- 
ous among whom was the celebrated 
admiral Lord Howe, who had just re- 
turned from a successful relief of 
Gibraltar, and who had now elbowed 
himself exactlj' in front of the throne, 
to listen, sadly, to his country's hu- 
miliation. The ladies of the nobility 
occupied the lords' seats on the wool- 
sacks, so called, as an emblem of the 
power and wealth of old England, 
because it had been mainly derived 
from wool. The lords were standing 
here and there promiscuously. It 
was a dark and foggy day, and the 
windows being elevated and con- 
structed in the antiquated stj-le, with 
leaden bars to contain the diamond- 
cut panes of glass, augmented the 
gloom. The walls were also hung 
with dark tapestrj', representing the de- 
feat of the great Spanish armada. The 
celebrated American painters, West and 
Coplej', were in the throng, with some 
American ladies, also a number of dejected- 
looking American royalists. After a 
tedious suspense of nearly two hours, the 
approach of the king was announced by a 
tremendous roar of artillery. He entered 
by a small door on the left of the throne, 
and immediately seated himself in the chair 
of state, in a graceful attitude, with his 
right foot resting on a stool. He was 
clothed in the magnificent robes of British 
majesty. Evidently agitated, he drew 
slowly from his pocket a scroll containing 
his humbling speech. The commons were 



FIRST MINISTER TO THE ENGLISH COURT — 1785. 



91 



summoned, and, after the bustle of their 
entrance had subsided, the thrilling mo- 
ment arrived, when the speech was to be 
read. After some general remarks, usual 
on public occasions, he said : 

" I lost no time in giving the necessary 
orders to prohibit the further prosecution 
of offensive vrar upon the continent of 
North America. Adopting, as my inclin- 
ation will always lead me to do, with de- 
cision and effect, whatever I collect to be 
the sense of my parliament and my people, 
I have pointed all my views and measures, 
in Europe, as in North America, to an 
entire and cordial reconciliation with the 
colonies. Finding it indispensable to the 
attainment of this object, I did not hesi- 
tate to go to the full length of the power 
vested in me, and therefore I now declare 
them " — here he paused, in evident agita- 
tion, either embarrassed in reading his 
speech, by the darkness of the room, or 
affected by a very natural emotion, but, 
recovering himself in a moment by a 
Ktrong convulsive movement, he added — 
"/ree and independetit states. In thus 
admitting their separation from the crown 
of this kingdom, I have sacrificed every 
consideration of my own, to the wishes and 
opinions of my people. I make it my 
humble and ardent prayer to Almighty 
God, that Great Britain may not feel the 
evils which might result from so great a 
dismemberment of the empire, and that 
America may be free from the calamities 
which have formerly proved, in the mother 
country, how essential monarchy is to the 
enjoj-ment of constitutional liberty. Re- 
ligion, language, interests, and affection 
may, and I hope will, yet prove a bond of 
permanent union between the two coun- 
tries." 

It was universally remarked of King 
George, that, though celebrated for read- 
ing his speeches in a distinct, composed, 
and impressive manner, he was on this 
occasion painfully lacking in his usual 
self-possession ; he hesitated, choked, and 
executed the high but humbling duties of 
the occasion, in a manner which showed 
that he was deeply mortified. 



Mr. Adams was at Paris when he re- 
ceived information of his appointment, in 
1785, to confront his late king and royal 
master. In an account given by Mr. 
Adams himself, of his movements at this 
time, he says : At Versailles, the Count 
de Vergennes said he had many felicita- 
tions to give me upon mj^ appointment to 
England. I answered that I did not 
know but it merited compassion more than 
felicitation. "Ay, why?" "Because, as 
you know, it is a species of degradation, in 
the eyes of Europe, after having been ac- 
credited to the king of France, to be sent 
to any other court." 

" But permit me to say," replies the 
count, "it is a great thin// to be the first 
ambassador from your country to tlie 
country you sprany from. It is a mark." 

One of the foreign ambassadors said to 
me — 

" You have been often in England." 

" Never, but once in November and De- 
cember, 1783." 

" You have relations in England, no 
doubt." 

" None at all." 

" None, how can that be ? j'ou are of 
English extraction." 

" Neither my father or mother, grand- 
father or grandmother, great grandfather 
or great grandmother, nor any other rela- 
tion that I know of, or care a farthing for, 
has been in England these one hundred 
and fifty years ; so that you see I have not 
one drop of blood in my veins but what is 
American." 

" Ay, we have seen proof enough of 
that." 

In the month of May, Mr. Adams trans- 
ferred himself and family to the other side 
of the channel, prepared to undertake the 
new duties to which he had been aj)- 
pointed. The first thing to be done was 
to go through the ceremony of presenta- 
tion to the sovereign ; to stand face to face 
with the man whom he had for the first 
forty years of his life habitually regarded 
as his master, and who never ceased to 
regard him, and the rest of his country- 
men, as no better than successful rebels 



98 



FROM COLONY TO AYOELD TOWER. 



against his legitimate authority. In his 
dispatch to Mi\ Jay, then American secre- 
tary of foreign affairs, Mr. Ailams gave 
the following very interesting account of 
this meeting : — 

At one o'clock on AVerlnesday, the first 
of June, 1785, the master of I'eremonies 
called at mj' house, and went with me to the 
secretary of state's office, in Cleveland Row, 
where the Marquis of Carmarthen received 
and introduced me to Mr. Frazier, his 
imder secretary, who had lieeu, as his 



attended by the master of ceremonies, tho 
room was very full of ministers of state, 
bishops, and all other sorts of courtiers, as 
well as the next room, which is the king's 
bed-chamber. You may well suppose I 
was the focus of all eyes. I was relieved, 
however, from the embarrassment of it, by 
the Swedish and Dutch ministers, who 
came to me and entertained me with a very 
agreeable conversation during the whole 
time. Some other gentlemen, whom I 
had seen before, came to make their com- 




FIRST MINISTLIl Ti.) 1..M.LAMJ. laALlilw^ ..l' J.tU.N ADA.MS. 



lordship said, uninterruptedly in that office, 
through all the changes in administration, 
for thirty years. After a short conversa- 
tion, Lord Carmarthen invited me to go 
with him in his coach to court. When we 
arrived in the ante-chamber, the master of 
ceremonies introduced him, and attended 
me while the secretary of state went to 
take the commands of the king. While I 
stood in this place, where it seems all min- 
isters stand ujjon such occasions, always 



{jlimcnts to me, until the Marquis of Car- 
marthen returned and desired me to go with 
him to his majestJ^ I went with his 
lordship through the levee room into the 
king's closet. The door was shut, and I 
was left with his majesty and the secretary 
of state alone. I made the three rever- 
ences : one at the door, another about half- 
way, and another before the presence, 
according to the usage established at this 
and all the northern courts of Europe, aiid 



FIEST MINISTER TO THE ENGLISH COUET — 1785. 



99 



then I addressed myself to his majesty in 
the following words : 

"Siue: The United IStates have ap- 
pointed me minister plenipotentiary to 
your majesty, and have directed nie to 
deliver to j'our majesty this letter, which 
contains the evidence of it. It is in obe- 




J-ff^m Ma^m^ 



dience to their express commands, that I 
have the honor to assure your majesty of 
their unanimous disposition and desire to 
cultivate the most friendly and liberal in- 
tercourse between _your majesty's subjects 
and their citizens, and of their best wishes 
for your majesty's health and happiness, 
and for that of your family. 

The appointment of a minister from the 
United States to your majesty's court will 
form an epoch in the history of England 
and America. I think myself more fortu- 
nate than all my fellow-citizens, in having 
the distinguished honor to be the first to 
stand in your majesty's royal presence in 
a diplomatic character, and I shall esteem 
myself the happiest of men, if I can be 
instrumental in recommending my country 
more and more to your majesty's royal 
benevolence, and of restoring an entire 
esteem, confidence, and affection ; or, in 
better w^ords, ' the old good nature and the 
good old humor,' between people who, 
though separated by an ocean, and under 
different governments, have the same lan- 
guage, a similar religion, a kindred blood. 
I beg your majesty's permission to add, 



that, although I have sometimes before 
been instructed by mj' country, it was 
never in my whole life in a manner so 
agreeable to myself.'' 

The king listened to every word I said, 
with dignity, it is true, but with apparent 
emotion. Whether it was my visible agi- 
tation, for I felt more than I could ex- 
press, that touched him, I cannot say; 
but he was much affected, and answered 
me with more tremor than I had spoken 
with, and said — 

"Sir: The circumstances of this audi- 
ence are so extraordinarj-, the language 
you have now held is so extrenielj- proper, 
and the feelings you have discovered sn 
justly adapted to the occasion, that I not 
only receive with pleasure the assurance 
of the friendly disposition of the United 
States, but I am glad the choice has fallen 
upon you to be their minister. I wish 3'ou. 
sir, to believe, that it may be understood 
in America, that I have done nothing iu 
the late contest hut what I thought myself 
indispensably bound to do, by the duty 
which 1 owed my peojile. I will be frank 
with you. I was the last to conform to 
the separation ; but the separation having 
become inevitable, I have always said, as I 
now say, that I would be the first to jneet 
the friendship of the United States as an 
independent power. The moment I see 
such sentiments and language as yours pre- 
vail, and a disposition to give this country 
the preference, that moment I shall say, let 
the circumstances of language, religion, 
and blood, have their natural, full effect." 

The king then asked me whether I came 
last from France; upon my answering in the 
affirmative, he put on an air of familiarity, 
and, smiling, or rather laughing, said — 

" There is an opinion among some people 
that you are not the most attached of all 
your countrymen to the manners of 
France." 

" That opinion, sir, is not mistaken ; 7 
must avow to your majesty, I have no at- 
tachment but to my own country." 

The king replied as quick as lightning — 

"An honest man ivUl have no other." 

The king then said a word or two to the 



100 



FKOil COLONY TO WOKLD FOWEK. 



secretary of state, which, being between 
them, I did not hear, and then turned 
round and bowed to me, as is customary 
with all kings and princes when they give 
the signal to retire. I retreated, stepping 
backwards, as is the etiquette, and making 
mj' last reverence at the door of the chamber. 

Mr. Adams was yet to pay liis first 
court of homage to the queen. He was 
presented to her on the ninth of June, by 
Lord Allesbury, her lord-chamberlain, — 
having first been attended to his lordship 
and introduced to him by the master of 
the ceremonies. The queen was accompa- 
nied by her ladies-in-waiting, and Mr. 
Adams made his compliments to her maj- 
esty in the following words : 

"Madam, — Among the many circum- 
stances which have rendered my mission 
to his majesty desirable to me, I have ever 
considered it a principal one, that I sliould 
have an opportunity of paying my court 
to a great queen, whose royal virtues and 
talents have ever been acknowledged and 
admired in America, as well as in all the 
nations of Europe, as an example to prin- 
cesses and the glory of her sex. 

Permit me, madam, to recommend to 
your majesty's royal goodness a rising em- 
pire and an infant virgin world. 

Another Europe, madam, is rising in 
America. To a philosophical mind, like 
your majesty's, there cannot be a more 
pleasing contemplation, than the prospect 
of doubling the human species, and aug- 
menting, at the same time, their jirosperity 
and happiness. It will, in future ages, be 
the glory of these kingdoms to have peo- 
pled that country, and to have sown there 
those seeds of science, of liberty, of virtue, 
and permit me, madam, to add, of piety, 
which alone constitute the prosperity of na- 
tions and the happiness of the human race. 

After venturing upon such high insinu- 
ations to your majesty, it seems to be de- 
scending too far, to ask, as I do, your 
majesty's royal indulgence to a person who 
is indeed unqualified for courts, and who 
owes his elevation to this distinguished 
honor of standing before your majesty, not 
to any circumstances of illustrious birth. 



fortune, or abilities, but merely to an 
ardent devotion to his native country, and 
some little industry and perseverance in 
her service." 

To this address of Mr. Adams, the 
queen answered, in the accustomed royal 
brevitj', as follows : 

" I thank you, sir, for your civilities to 
me and my family, and am glad to see 
you in this country." 

The queen then asked Mr. Adams if he 
had provided himself with a house, to 
which question answer was made that he 
had agreed for one that morning. She 
then made her courtesy, and the envoy 
made his reverence, retiring at once into 
the drawing-room, where the king, queen, 
princess royal, and the j'ounger princess, 
her sister, all spoke to the new minister 
very courteously. 

But, notwithstanding the memorable 
historical bearings of this mission of the 
great American statesman, as first ambas- 
sador of the new-born republic, to his late 
august sovereign, — a mission which riveted 
the attention of the civilized world, — and 
although George the Third had submitted 
with dignity to the painful necessity of such 
a meeting, the embassy was attended with 
no jiermanently favoi'able result either to 
America or to Mr. Adams. Indeed, of the 
many humiliations which befell the un- 
happy George, jierhaps few were felt so 
bitterly as this almost compulsory inter- 
view with the representative of a people, 
once his subjects, afterwards rebels, and 
now free. Well and truthfully has the 
historian said, that, in the conduct of the 
king, on this occasion, the obvious wisdom 
of conciliating the J'oung and rising nation 
on the western side of the Atlantic was 
forgotten, and the error of supercilious 
neglect was preferred. Throughout the 
whole political history of Great Britain 
this marked fault may be traced in its 
relations with foreign nations, but it never 
showed itself in more striking colors than 
during the first half century after the in- 
dependence of the United States. The 
effects of the mistake then committed have 
been perceptible ever since. 



VII. 



FIKST ORGANIZED REBELLION IN THE UNITED 

STATES.— 1786. 



Daniel Sliays, at the Head of an Armed and Desperate Force, Boldly Dtfjcs tlie Slate and Federal 
Laws in Massachusetts. — " Taxation and Tyranny" the Alleged Grievances — Alarming Disaffection 
Throughout all New England. — Bad Leaders and Furious Mobs. — Rout of the Insurgents, hy General 
Lincoln, in the Dead of Winter. — Patriotic Old Massachusetts in a Ferment. — Causes of Public Dis- 
content. — Total Exhaustion of Credit. — Prostration of Trade. — Ruinous Debts, Heavy Taxation. — 
Weakness of the Government. — An Excited Populace. — Turbulence and Lawlessness. — All Authority 

Spurned. — A Bloody Conflict Invited — Courts of Justice 
Broken Up. — Indignation of Washington. — Heroism on 
the Bench. — The National Forces Augmented. — Fears 
of a General Civil War — Unscrupulousness of Shays. — 
Intention to Seize the Capital. — Governor Bowdoin's De- 
fenses. — General Lincoln in Command. — Active Move- 
ment of His Troops. — A Terrible Snow-Storm. — Hard- 
ships of Shays's Army. — Federal Bayonets Triumphant. 




" sirs. I Bhall sit here as a judee. or die here ae a penerall"— Replt op 
General Cobb, a Massacuusetts Judge, to a Scmkoks to Dissolve 
HIS Court. 



SCENE IN SHAYS'S KEBELLIO.N. 



NE of the most noteworthy facts in the history 
of the early period — the first decade — of the 
American Republic, is, that in the state of Mas- 
sachusetts, the state which had been foremost in 
ilie war of independence against Great Britain, 
occurred the first instance of armed and organ- 
iz(-d rebellion against the situation and conduct 
of public affairs consequent upon the changed character of the government and its 
administrators. It will be necessary, however, not only in behalf of the consistency 
of popular government, but as vindicating the patriotic old commonwealth in question 
from any imputation of lawless proclivities, to narrate, first, some of the peculiar cir- 
cumstances which brought distress to a large class of citizens, and provoked political 
discontent, finally culminating in bloody sedition. 

For a considerable period after the people of the United States had secured peace, 
through British acknowledgment of their independence, was the exhausting effect felt 
by them, of their exertions in so hard-fought and prolonged a contest. The popular 
enthusiasm, excited by a victorious termination of the struggle, began to subside, and 
the sacrifices of the revolution soon became known and felt. The claims of those who 
toiled, and fought, and suffered in the arduous contest, were strongly urged, and the 
government had neither resources nor power to satisfy or to silence them. The wealth 



102 



YROll COI,ONY TO AVOKLD TOWER. 



of the country liad been totally exhausted 
during the revolution, and, worse than all, 
the public credit had become so shaken 
and jjrostrated as to be a mere by-word, 
at home and abroad, no matter what might 
be the pledges of security proffered. Taxes 
could not be collected, because — even if for 
no other reason, — there was no money to 
represent the value of the little personal 
property which had not been, and the land 
which could not be, destroj'ed; and com- 
merce, though preparing to burst from its 
thraldom, had not yet had time to restore 
to the annual produce of the country its ex- 
changeable value. The states owed each a 
heavy debt for local services rendered 
during the revolution, for which it was 
bound to provide, and each had its own 
domestic government to support. 

The causes of discontent which thus ex- 
isted after the restoration of peace, in 
every part of the Union, were perhaps no- 
where more operative than in New En- 
gland, growing out of the following circum- 
stances : The great exertions which had 
been put forth by those states in the course 
of the war, had accumulated a mass of 
debt, the taxes for the payment of which 
were felt as peculiarly burdensome, be- 
cause the fisheries of this people had be- 
come so unproductive. This important 
branch of industry, which, before the revo- 
lutionary war, had in some measure com- 
pensated for the want of those rich staples 
that were possessed by the middle and 
southern colonies, had been unavoidably 
neglected during the struggle for inde- 
pendence ; and, as a consequence of that 
independence, had not only been deprived 
of the encouragements under which it had 
flourished, but its produce was excluded 
from markets which had formerly been 
opened to it. The restlessness produced 
by the uneasy situation of individuals, to 
gether with lax notions concerning public 
and private faith, and erroneous opinions, 
tended to confound liberty with an exemj)- 
tion from legal conti'ol. 

This turbulent spirit was carried out 
and encouraged, with great effect upon the 
minds of the populace, by puljlic conven- 



tions, which, after voting their own con- 
stitutionality, and assuming the name and 
authority of the people, arrayed themselves 
against the regular legislative power, and 
declared in the most exciting language the 
grievances by which they alleged them- 
selves to be oppressed. 

Eeckless and desperate, a body of mal- 
contents entered the legislative chamber 
at Exeter, New Hampshire, and deliber- 
ately overpowered and made prisoners the 
general assembly of the state ; the citizens, 
however, rose and crushed the movement 
in a few hours. 

But the center of this s2)irit of lawless 
violence throughout New England, culmin- 
ated in 1786, in the state of Massachu- 
setts, where, on account of the calamitous 
interruption of the regular trades and oc- 
cupations, on land and sea, a vast number 
of the male population, principally young 
men, became impoverished, and wei'e 
thrown upon society. The general court, 
or legislature, of Massachusetts, had found 
it necessary- to impose taxes which, perhaps, 
in any case would have been ill-received, 
but which, in the existing state of feeling 
and social disorganization, led to general 
resistance and open rebellion. The dis- 
contented, led on by ambitious and un- 
principled leaders, provided themselves 
with arms of every description ; they had 
seen the country free itself from the tyr- 
anny of Britain by these means, and now 
they were about to try the same against 
what they considered the tyranny of their 
own government. Things continued to go 
on in this way for some time, when, the 
number of the malcontents becoming so 
large and formidable, the militia were 
called out to protect the sittings of the 
courts, which it was the object of the in- 
surgents to prevent ; and so conciliatory 
and considerate was the government, that 
their grievances were made the subject of 
repeated and anxious counsel, and as much 
as possible redressed. Bills were passed 
for diminishing legal costs, law charges 
being at that time enormous ; and for al- 
lowing the payment of taxes and private 
debts in specific articles instead of coin, 



FIKST ORGANIZED EEBELLIOX — ITSG. 



10c 




of whicli latter there was scarce- 
ly any in circulation ; as well as 
for applying certain revenues, 
formerly devoted to other pur- 
poses, to the payment of govern- 
mental dues. So far were con- '"""= 
cessions made ; still the agitation contin- 
ued, and the habeas corpus act was sus- 
pended for eight months. Nevertheless, 
though every preparation was thus made to 
secure jJrotection to the government, full 
pardon for past offenses was promised to 
all, if they would cease from their illegal 
agitations. 

Doubtless, but for the daring and des- 
peration of one man, Daniel Shaj's, order 
would have been restored. 

Great anxiety filled the minds of the 
patriotic statesmen throughout the coun- 
try, at this state of anarchy ; and from 
the bosom of Washington, in especial, 
there went forth utterances of profound 
indignation and alarm. "Eor God's sake 
tell me," said he in a letter to Colonel 
Humphreys, '• what is the cause of all 
these commotions ? do they proceed from 
licentiousness, British influence dissemin- 
ated by the tories, or real grievances 
which admit of redress ? if the latter, why 
was redress delayed until the public mind 
had become so much agitated ? if the 



former, why 

are not the 

powers of F^'t 

government %s= 

tried atonce? ^^^ 

it is as well eS--,.- 

to be with- '" IP" 

out, as not to bhays's forces in Massachusetts. 

exercise them. Commotions of this sort, 
like snowballs, gather strength as they 
roll, if there is no opposition in the way to 
divide and crumble them.'' Such was 
Washington's horror of this Massachusetts 
tumult. 

Colonel Humphrej-s, while acknowledg- 
ing his inability to give any adequate ex- 
planation of the cause and origin of the 
difficulties, yet gave it as his opinion that 
they were attributable to all the three 
causes which Washington had suggested 
— that, in Massachusetts j^articularl}', 
there were a few real grievances, and also 
.some wicked agents or emissaries who 
made it their business to magnify every 
existing evil, and to foment causeless jeal- 



iU-t 



TEOM COLONY TO WORLD TOWEE. 



ousies and commotions. Under the influ- 
ence of such examples, it was plain to see 
that there had become prevalent among 
many of the people a licentious spirit, a 
leveling principle, a desire of change, and 
a wish to annihilate all debts, both public 
and private. 

The force of this part\f throughout New 
England was computed at twelve or fifteen 
thousand men, chiefly of the .young and 
active part of the community, who were 
more easily collected than kept together. 
Many of these were despei'ate and unprin- 
cipled, opposed to all good government and 
legal discipline, and consequently ready, 
when any demagogue should light the 
spark of violence, to commit overt acts of 
treason and bring on a bloody civil war. 
This state of things alarmed greatly the 
friends of law and order, and made them 
firm in the conviction that there needed to 
he established, above all things, a govern- 





ment for the people of tlie United States, 
wbiili should have the power to protect 
■licm in their lawful pursuits, and which 
would be efficient in cases of internal 
commotions, or foreign invasions, — a gov- 
ernment resting upon liberty, and regu- 
hitcd by laws firmly administered. 

Tlie mob spirit grew more and more 
rampant in jMassachusetts, and, in spite 
of the vigilance which the authorities now 
put forth, generally succeeded in its demon- 
strations of violence, and in thwarting the 
plans of that faithful and energetic chief 
magistrate, Governor Bowdoin. In one 



instance, however, at least, their proceed- 
ings in this respect were summarily 
brought to a stand. This was in the town 
of Taunton, where Judge Cobb, formerly 
an ofiicer under Washington, and still one 
of the state-militia generals, was holding 
a court session at the time. On the ar- 
rival of the insurgents at the court-house. 
General Cobb jn-omjjtly confronted them, 
and, after exhorting them to render that 
obedience to the laws which is binding 
on every citizen, emphatically declared to 
them, "Sirs! I shall sit here tis a judge, 
or die here as a general ! " Knowing him 
to be £. man who knew his rights and 
WKuld maintain them at anv cost, the mob, 
though more numerous than the force that 
General Cobb could summon, concluded 
that the safest course for them to pursue 
was to disperse. 

Ostensibly on account of the danger 
which threatened the frontiers, but really, 
it would seem, with a view to the sit- 
uation of affairs in Massachusetts, 
congress had agreed to augment the 
military establishment to a much 
larger and more effective standard, 
and had detached the secretary of 
war, General Knox, to the eastward, 
with directions to concert measures 
with the government of the state for 
the safety of the public arsenals. So 
unfavorable, indeed, was the aspect of 
affairs, that fears were seriously en- 
tertained that the torch of civil dis- 
cord, about to be lighted ujj in ]\Iassa- 
chusetts, would communicate its flame 
to all New England, and perhajis spread 
the conflagration throughout the Union. 

A few of the agitators having, at length, 
been seized and lodged in Boston jail, — 
the details of which will be found more 
particularly narrated on a subsequent page, 
— the exasperation of their associates was 
greatly increased, and in a short time they 
organized themselves as an armed force, 
under tlie command of Daniel Shays, Luke 
Day, and Eli Parsons ; but some little 
time elapsed before the state was full}' 
prepared to show its military power, 
though the riotous interference with the 



FIEST OEGANIZED EEBELLION — 1786. 



105 



courts ot justice was repeatedly enacted. 
In the account of these proceedings given 
bj' that excellent and most reliable histo- 
rian, Mr. Lossing, it is stated that, while 
the legislature was in session, early in 
November, there were indications that an 
attempt would be made to interfere with 
the sittings of the supreme court about to 
be held in Middlesex county. General 
Brooks, a gallant officer of the revolution, 
in command of the militia of that district, 
was ordered to have a strong foi'ce in 
readiness to march to Cambridge if neces- 
sary. Among those summoned, and held 
in readiness, were three regiments and 
four artillery comjaanies of Middlesex 
county, and one comjiany of infantry and 
one of artillery, in Boston. This formida- 
ble display made the Middlesex malcon- 
tents invisible and silent at that time. 
Brooks was a fine officer, and had showed 
himself a gallant adherent of the com- 
mander-in-chief during the consjjiracy or 
mutiny which took place in Newburgh 
camp at the close of the revolutionary war. 
Washington requested him to keep his 
officers within quarters, that they might 
not attend the insurgent meeting, his reply 
was — 

" Sir, I have anticijmted your wishes, 
and mj' orders are given." 

" Colonel Brooks, this is just what I ex- 
pected from you," was the reply of the 
chieftain, as he took the gallant colonel by 
the hand. 

The legislature adjourned after a session 
of six weeks. Their dispersion was the 
signal for greater activity on the jaart of 
the insurgents. They held several meet- 
ings in the western counties, and severelj' 
censured the measures recently adopted by 
the legislature. They resolved, by acclam- 
ation, to resist the execution of the laws 
of the state ; and everywhere, among un- 
principled men, the most lawless and 
alarming spirit was manifested. The len- 
iency of the governor was called cowardice. 
The acts of the legislature were denounced 
as instruments of tyranny. The people 
were excited by inflammatory appeals. 
They were incited to acts of violence, and 



the courts of justice were again interfered 
with. Toward the close of November, the 
sitting of the general court of sessions at 
Worcester was prevented by an armed 
mob, who, taught by demagogues, and be- 
lieving that they owed no other obedience 
to government but in so far as they might 
approve its measures, declared that they 
had the right, if they chose, to dispense 
with all laws which were obnoxious to 
tliem, and that they intended to set the 
state authorities at defiance. In Hamp- 
shire and Middlesex counties, similar bold 
demonstrations were made. Governor 
Bowdoin perceived that the time for ar- 
gument and persuasion was at an end, and 
that the safety of the commonwealth, now 
really in danger, must be secured by ener- 
getic measures. He accordingly issued a 
general order for the major-generals 
throughout the state to see that the mili- 
tia, under their respective commands, were 
equipped, and ready to respond to anj' 
sudden demand for their services. This 
order inflamed the leaders of the malcon- 
tents and their deluded followers, and the 
insurrection now began to assume the 
alarming form of a rebellion. The leaders, 
expecting severe punishment in the event 
of failure, became desperate, and were 
ready to employ desperate measures for 
the accomplishment of their wicked 
scheme. They also hoped to secure a suf- 
ficient number of adherents or defenders 
to procure the governor's pardon in the 
event of their failure. They were doomed 
to be disappointed. 

In December, a large number of the in- 
surgents assembled at Concord, expecting 
to be joined by others from Bristol, Wor- 
cester, and Hampshire counties. Their 
object was to prevent the sitting of the 
court at Cambridge, the dictation of meas- 
ures to the governor, and the suspen- 
sion, for a time at least, of the usual proc- 
esses of law. It is evident, that, while 
these objects were acknowledged, they in- 
tended, if possible, to seize the capital, 
take possession of the archives, and pro- 
claim a provisional government. But the 
project failed, an<^ three of the leading 



106 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



traitors of Middlesex soon found them- 
selves within the walls of a Boston jail. 
The sheriff, in the execution of his war- 
rant for their arrest, was accompanied by 
a number of influential gentlemen and a 
company of Boston cavalry, who volun- 
teered their services. 

Shays and his followers, desperate but 
determined, — for success or utter ruin was 
the alternative presented, — turned their 
faces westward, and marched upon Spring- 
field for the purpose of interfering with 
the sitting of the court appointed for the 
twenty-sixth of December, and, if strong 
enougli, to seize the continental arsenal at 
that place. They arrived there on the 
twenty-fifth, took possession of tlie court- 
house, and presented to the judges a writ- 
ten declaration that the court should not 
transact business. The powerless judges 
were compelled to submit. 

Finding that the lenient measures whicli 
had thus far been taken by the legislature 
to subdue the violence of the insurgents 
only enlarged their demands, — -that the 
pardon proffered to those who would re- 
turn to their duty was rejected with scorn, 
— that the conciliating efforts of govern- 
ment only increased their audacity, — and 
tliat tliey were proceeding with more and 
more energy to marshal their military 
forces for an aggres.^ive movement, — Gov- 
ernor Bowdoin, who had probably been 
restrained by the temper of the house of 
representatives from an earlier resort to 
the final extremity, at length determined, 
with the advice of council, on a vigorous 
exertion of all the powers he possessed, 
for the protection and defense of the com- 
monwealth. Upwards of four thousand 
militia were ordered into service, and were 
placed under the command of the veteran 
General Lincoln, whose gallant military 
reputation, and well-balanced judgment, 
rendered liim doubly capacitated for so 
critical and important a trust. 

It was in the depth of an unusually se- 
vere winter, and which caused bitter suf- 
fering, that the troops thus raised in the 
eastern jiart of the state assembled near 
Boston, and 'iiarched towards the scene of 



action. Those from the western counties 
met in arms under General Shepard, an 
officer who had served with honor during 
the war of the revolution, and took close 
possession of the federal arsenal at Spring- 




'^^^^rP2^:^^Z^ 



field. Before the arrival of Lincoln, a party 
of the insurgents presented themselves 
before the arsenal and demanded its sur- 
render. Attempting to carry out their 
demand, General ' Shepard, after warning 
and entreating them to retire, fired upon 
them. The first discharge was over their 
heads ; they took no notice of it. The sec- 
ond was into the ranks ; a cry of '' Mur- 
der ! " arose, and all fled in confusion, 
leaving three men dead on tlie field and 
one wounded. Urging his march with the 
utmost celerity, Lincoln soon came up, and 
pressing the insurgent army, endeavored 
by a succession of rapid movements, in 
which the ardor of his troops triumphed 
over the extreme severity of the season, to 
disperse or bring it to action. But the 
insurgents fled to Pelham, where they 
posted themselves upon two hills, rendered 
almost inaccessible by the great fall of 
snow. They used all their address to pro- 
duce a suspension of hostilities until an 
accommodation might be negotiated with 
the legi-slature, — believing, as they did, 
that, if they could keep up their influence 
until another choice of legislature and gov- 
ernor came around, matters might be 
molded to their liking. Shays now of- 
fered to lay down his arms on condition of 
general pardon, which Lincoln, however, 
was not empowered to grant. At length, 



FIRST OEGANIZED REBELLION — 1786. 



107 



sorely pressed for food, a sudden retreat 
was made to Petersham. Discovering 
this, Lincoln set off at six in the evening, 
and marching all night, forty miles, 
through intense cold and a di'iviug storm. 



reached Petersham by daybreak, to the 
astonishment of the rebels, who had not 
the least idea of this movement, and ac- 
cordingly fled in dismay or were taken 
prisoners. 



VIII. 



FORMATION AND ADOPTION OF THE FEDERAL CONSTI- 
TUTION.— 1 787. 



The United States no Longer a People Witliout a Government. — Establisluneut of the Republic on a 
Permanent Foundation of Unity, Organic Law and National Polity. — Dignity, Learning, and Elo- 
quence of the Delegates. — Sublime Scene on Signing the Instrument. — Extraordinary Character of 
ihe Whole Transaction. — State of Things After the War — Financial Embarrassment — Despondency 
of the People. — Grave Crisis in Public Atiairs. — A Grand Movement Initiated — Plan of Government 
to be Framed. — All the States in Convention — Washington Chosen to Preside. — Statesmen and Sages 
in Council. — The Old Compact Abrogated. — New Basis of Union Proposed. — Various Schemes Dis- 
cussed. — Jealousy of the Smaller States. — Angry Debates, Sectional Threats — Bad Prospects of the 
Convention. — Its Dissolution Imminent — Franklin's Impressive Appeal. — Compromise and Concilia- 
tion. — Final System Agreed Upon. — Patriotism Rules all Hearts. — Ratification by the States. — Na- 
tional Joy at the Decision. 



" Should the states reject ttiis excellent Constitution, the probability is that an opportunity will never njrnin be ofTered to cancel another in 
peace— the nest will be drawn in blood." — Remark of Washington on Signing the Constiti'tion. 




EXnOLLIXG THE COXSTITUTIOX. 



HOUGH the close of the 
war of independence 
resulted in tlie establish- 
ment of a free national- 
ity, it nevertheless 
brought an.xious solici- 
tude to every jDatriot's 
mind, and this state of 
aiipi-ohension and disqui- 
etude increased with each 
succeeding j'ear. The 
state debts which had 
licen incurred in anticipation of prosperous times, operated severely, after a while, on 
all classes in the community ; to meet the paj'ment of these debts, at maturity, was 
impossible, and every relief-act only added to the difficulty. This, and kindred 
troubles, financial and governmental, impressed the people with the gloomy conviction 
that the great work of independence, as contemplated in the revolutionary struggle, 
was only half done. It was felt tliat, above all things, a definite and organic form 
of government — reflecting the will of the people — should be fi.xed upon, to give energy 
to national power, and success to individual and public enterprise. So portentous a 
crisis as this formed another epoch for the displaj^ of the intellectual and political 
attainments of American statesmen, and the ordeal was one through wliich they passed 
with the highest honor, and with ever-enduring fame, at home and abroad. New men 
appeared on the stage of legislative council and action, and it was found that the quan- 



ADOPTION OF THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION — 1787. 



109 



tity of talent and information necessary in 
the formation period of a new republic 
had greatly increased in the various states. 
But, in especial, the great minds that 
achieved the revolution beheld with deep 
concern their country impoverished and 
distracted at home, and of no considera- 
tion among the family of nations. 

A change was now to be wrought, the 
grandeur of which would be acknowledged 
throughout all lands, and its importance 
reach forward to the setting of the sun of 
time. The same hall which had resounded 
with words of patriotic defiance that shook 
the throne of King George and proclaimed 
to an astonished world the Declaration of 
Independence, — that same hall in which 
congress had continued to sit during the 
greater part of the momentous period in- 
tervening, — in the state house at Phila- 
delphia, was soon to witness the assem- 
bling of such a body of men as, in point of 
intellectual talent, personal integrity, and 
lofty purpose, had perhaps never before 
been brought together. The curious stu- 
dent of this page in modern history has 
sometimes plausibly but speciously attrib- 
uted to mere chance — instead of to that 
Providence which rules in the affairs of 
men — this timely and grand event. Thus, 
General Washington, having contemplated 
with great interest a plan for uniting the 
Potomac and the Ohio rivers, and by this 
means connecting the eastern and western 
waters, made a journey of six hundred and 
eighty miles on horseback, taking minute 
notes of everything which could be subserv- 
ient to this project. His influence, and 
the real importance pf the design, induced 
the legislatures of Virginia and Maryland 
to send commissioners to Alexandria to 
deliberate on the subject. They met in 
March, 1785, and having spent some time 
at Mount Vernon, determined to recom- 
mend another commission, which might 
establish a general tariff on imports. The 
Virginia legislature not only agreed, but 
invited the other states to send deputies 
to meet at Annapolis. In September, 
1786, they had arrived from five only, and 
with too limited powers. A number of 



able statesmen, however, were thus assem- 
bled, who, feeling deeply the depressed 
and distracted state of the countrj^, became 
sensible that something on a much greater 
scale was necessary to raise her to pros- 
perity, and give her a due place among 
the nations. They therefore drew up a 
report and address to all the states, 
strongly representing the inefficiency of 
the present federal government, and earn- 
estly urging them to send delegates to 
meet at Philadelphia in May, 1787. Con- 
gress responded to this proceeding in Feb- 
ruary, by the passage of resolutions rec- 
ommending the proposed measure, — but of 
which, perhaps, they did not then contem- 
plate all the momentous results. 

On the day appointed for the meeting 
of the convention. May fourteenth, 1787, 
only a small number of the delegates had 
arrived in Philadelphia. The delibera- 
tions did not commence, therefore, until 
May twenty-fifth, when there were pres- 
ent twenty-nine members, representing 
nine states. Others soon after came in, 
till the whole number amounted to fifty- 
five. Never, perhaps, had any body of 
men combined for so great a purpose — td 
form a constitution which was to rule so 
numerous a people, and probably during 
so many genei'ations. The members, con- 
sisting of the very ablest men in America, 
were not unworthy of, nor unequal to, so 
high a trust. 

Towering above all these men of might, 
in his world-wide fame and in the genius 
of his personal ascendency, was Washing- 
ton, intrusted by the commonwealth of 
Virginia with the work of cementing to- 
gether the sisterhood of states in one in- 
dissoluble bond of mutual interest, co-ope- 
ration, and renown. And there was Rufus 
King, from Massachusetts, young in years, 
but mature in wisdom and brilliant in ora- 
tory ; Langdon, from New Hampshire, 
strong in his understanding and readily 
mastering the most intricate details ; EIt 
bridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, exhibiting 
the utmost zeal and fidelity in the per- 
formance of his official duties; Caleb 
Strong, from the same state, plain in his 



110 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



r" 









ii"ii»k,„ 



CONVENTION AT PHILADELPHIA, 1787. 



apiieanaiice, Inifccalni, firm, intelligent, and 
well-balanced ; Ellsworth, from Connecti- 
cut, elegant in his manners, and distin- 
guished for his energy of mind, clear 
reasoning powers, and effective eloquence; 
Sherman, his colleague, a statesman and 
jurist whose fame has extended far beyond 
the western world; Hamilton, from New 
York, spare and fragile in jjerson, but 
keen, active, laborious, transcendent in 
his abilities and of unsullied integrity; 
Livingston, from New Jersey, of scholarly 
tastes, uncompromisingly republican in his 
politics, and fearless in the expression of 
his opinions; Franklin, from Pennsylvania, 
one of the profoundest philosophers in the 
world, and, though now rising of four- 
score years, capable of grasjiing and throw- 
ing light upon the most recondite ques- 
tions relating to the science of govern- 
ment ; Robert Morris, from Pennsylvania, 
the great financier, of whom it has been 
said, and with much truth, that 'the 
Americans owed, and still owe, as much 
acknowledgment to the financial operations 
of Robert Morris, as to the negotiations of 



Benjamin Franklin, or even to the arms 
of George Washington ; ' Gouverneur 
Morris, from the same state, conspicuous 
for his accomplishments in learning, his 
fluent conversation, and sterling abilities 
in debate ; Clymer, distinguished among 
the sons of Pennsylvania, as one of the 
first to raise a defiant voice against the 
arbitrary acts of the mother country; 
Mifflin, another delegate from the land of 
Penn, ardent almost beyond discretion, in 
zeal for his countr3''s rights and liberties; 
Dickinson, from New Jersey, a patriot, 
who, though the onlj- member of the con- 
tinental congress opposed to the Declara- 
tion of Independence, on the ground of its 
being premature, was nevertheless the only 
member of that body who immediately 
shouldered his musket and went forth to 
face the enemy ; Wythe, from Virginia, 
wise, grave, deeply versed in the law, and 
undaunted in the defense of liberty- for the 
the jieople; Madison, also from Virginia, 
talented, thoughtful, penetrating, one of 
the brightest ornaments of his state and 
nation; Martin, from Maryland, a jurist 



ADOPTION OF THE FEDEEAL CONSTITUTION — ITsT. 



Ill 



of vast attainments and commanding 
powers ; Davie, from North Carolina, of 
splendid physique, one of tlie master-minds 
of tlie country ; Rutledge, from South Car- 
olina, pronounced by Washington to be 
the finest orator in the continental con- 
gress ; Pinckne y, from the same state, 
a soldier and lawyer of unrivaled abili- 
ties; — and thus the record might go on, 
until it embraced all the names of this 
eminent assemblage of America's noblest 
patriots and most illustrious historic char- 
acters, " all, all, honorable men." 

On proceeding with the organization of 
the convention, George Washington was 
nominated by Robert ]\Iorris to jjreside 
over its deliberations, and was unanimously 
"lected. The standing rules were then 
adopted, one of these being that nothing 
spoken in the house be printed or other- 
wise published, or made known in any 
manner, without special permission. And 
in this connection, the following little epi- 
sode, which has come to light, will doubt- 
less be read as a refreshing reminiscence 
of the "secret" doings among those grave 
old worthies : 

One of the members of the Georgia del- 
egation was Mr. -, a gentleman, the 

zeal of whose legislative mind and efforts 
sometimes quite ate up his attention to 
mere extraneous matters. Like all the 
rest of his associates in the assembly, he 
had been furnished with a schedule of the 
principal points of debate, or subjects of 
consideration, which were to be brought 
before the convention as constituting its 
business, and, in accordance with the par- 
liamentary' usage of secrecy, this pro- 
gramme of the convention's duties and 
deliberations was with especial care to be 
kept from disclosure during the period of 
its sittings. It happened, however, that 
one of the delegates unfortunately lost his 
copy of this official schedule or orders of 
the day. General Mifflin, one of the del- 
egates from Pennsylvania, by good chance 
discovered the stray document, and, ex- 
plaining the circumstances to Washing- 
ton, placed it in the latter's hands, who, 
in silence and gravitj-, deposited it among 



his own papers. At the close of that day's 
proceedings, and just previously to the 
convention's rising, Washington, as pre- 
siding officer, called the attention of the 
assemblj- to the matter in question, in the 
following characteristic remarks : 

" Gentlemen, I am sorry to find that 
some one member of this body has been so 
neglectful of the secrets of this convention, 
as to drop in the state house a copy of 
tlieir proceedings — which, by accident, was 
picked up and delivered to me this morn- 
ing. I must entreat gentlemen to be 
more careful, lest our transactions get into 
the newspapers, and disturb the public 
repose by premature speculations. I know 
not whose paper it is, but there it is 
(throwing it down on the table) ; let him 
who owns it take it." 

But to proceed with the historical 
sketch of this most august body of modern 
legislators. 

They had been appointed merely with a 
view to the revision or improvement of the 
old articles of confederation, which still 
held them precariously together as a na- 
tion ; yet they had not deliberated long, 
when they determined tliat the existing 
compact or system of government must be 
swept away. The question, however, as to 
what should be substituted in its place, was 
one of extreme difficulty. Mr. Randolph, of 
Virginia, opened the great discussion by a 
speech in which he laid bare the defects of 
the confederation, and then submitted a 
series of resolutions embodying the sub- 
stance of a plan of government — the same, 
in character, as that contained in letters 
written by Mr. Madison to Mr. Jefferson, 
Mr. Randolph, and General Washington, 
a few months previous. 

The plan in question proposed the form- 
ation of a general government, consti- 
tuted as follows : The national legislature 
to consist of two branches — the members 
of the first branch to be elected by the 
people of the several states, and the 
members of the second branch to be elected 
by the first branch, out of a proper number 
nominated by the state legislatures ; the 
national legislature to have a negative on 



Ill 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



all tlie state laws contravening the articles 
of union, and to have power to legislate in 
all cases where the states were incompe- 
tent ; the right of suffrage in the legisla- 
ture to be proportioned to the quota of 
contribution, or to the number of free in- 
habitants ; a national executive to be 
chosen by the national legislature ; a na- 
tional judiciar}', to consist of one or more 
supreme tribunals and inferior ones, the 
judges to be chosen by the national legis- 
lature; the executive, and a convenient 
number of the national judiciary, to com- 




KUA.NKLl.S ^■LEADI^G FOK PACIFICATION. 

pose a council of revision to examine every 
act of the national legislature before it 
should operate, and evei\y act of a particu- 
lar legislature before a negative thereon 
should be final ; provision to be made for 
the admission of new states to the Union ; 
a republican form of government to be 
administered in each state; provision to 
be made for amendments to the articles of 
union; the legislative, executive, and judi- 
ciary powers, or officials, of the several 
states, to be bound by oath to support the 
articles of union. 



A good degree of f.ivor was shown to 
Mr. Randolph's plan, but not sufficient to 
prevent other projects, conspicuous among 
these being one by Mr. Patterson, of New 
Jersey, and another by Alexander Hamil- 
ton, from being brought forward and urged 
by their respective friends, — all of these 
being republican in their general features, 
but differing in their details. 

For some daj'S, angry debates occurred 
wliich, but for the timebj and liealing 
wisdom, of Dr. Fninldin, the Mentor of 
the convention, would have ended in the 
breaking up of the body. As soon 
as there was an opening for him to 
speak, the doctor rose, and in a most 
impressive manner, said, among 
other things : 

'' It is to be feared that the mem- 
bers of this convention are not in a 
temper, at this moment, to approach 
the subject on which we differ, in 
candid spirit. I would therefore 
ropose, Mr. President, that, without 
proceeding further in this business 
at this time, the convention sliall 
adjourn for three days, in order to let 
the present ferment pass off, and to 
afford time for a more full, free, and 
dispassionate investigation of the 
subject; and I would earnestly rec- 
ommend to the members of this con- 
vention, that they spend the time of 
this recess, not in associating with 
their own party, and devising new 
arguments to fortify themselves in 
their old opinions, but that they mix 
with members of opposite senti- 
ments, lend a patient ear to their reason- 
ings, and candidly allow them all the 
weight to which they may be entitled ; 
and when we assemble again, I hope it will 
be with a determination to form a consti- 
tution ; if not such an one as we can indi- 
vidually, and in all respects, approve, yet 
the best which, under existing circum- 
stances, can be obtained." (Here the 
countenance of Wa-shington brightened, 
and a cheering ray seemed to break in 
upon the gloom of the assembly.) The 
doctor continued : 



ADOPTION OF THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION — 1787. 



113 



"Before I sit down, jMr. President, I 
will suggest another matter; and I am 
really surprised that it has not been pro- 
posed bj- some other member, at an earlier 
period of our deliberations. I will sug- 
gest, Mr. President, the propriety of nom- 
inating and appointing, before we separate, 
a chaplain to this convention, whose duty 
it shall be uniformly to assemble with us, 
and introduce the business of each daj' by 
imploring the assistance of Heaven, and 
its blessing upon our deliberations." 

The doctor sat down, and never did a 
countenance appear at once so dignified 
and so delighted as that of Washington, 
at the close of this address. The motion 
for appointing a chaplain was instantly 
seconded and carried. The convention 
also chose a committee, by ballot, consist- 
ing of one from each state, to sit during the 
recess, and then adjournetl for three days. 

The three days were spent in the 
manner advised by Doctor Franklin. On 
re-assembling, the chaplain appeared and 
led the devotions of the assembly, and the 
minutes of the last sitting were read. All 
eyes were now turned to the venerable 
doctor. He rose, and in a iew words 
stated, that during the recess he had list- 
ened attentively to all the arguments, pro 
and fan, which had been urged by both 
sides of the house ; that he had himself 
said much, and thought more, on the sub- 
ject; he saw difficulties and objections, 
which might be urged by individual states, 
against every scheme which had been pro- 
posed ; and he was now, more than ever, 
convinced that the constitution wliich they 
were about to form, in order to be just and 
equal, must be formed on the basis of 
compromise and mutual concession. With 
such views and feelings, he would now^ 
move a reconsideration of the vote last 
taken on the organization of the senate. 
The motion was seconded, the vote carried, 
the former vote rescinded, and by a suc- 
cessive motion and resolution, the senate 
was organized on the present plan. 

On the seventeenth of September, the 
final debate closed, the last amendment was 
adopted, and the result of the convention's 
S 



labors was the formation of a constitution 
establishing a national government on the 
following prescribed principles : That the 
affairs of the people of the United States 
were thenceforth to be administered, not 
by a confederacy, or mere league of friend- 
ship between the sovereign states, but by 
a government, distributed into the three 
great departments — legislative, judicial, 
and executive ; that the powers of govern- 
ment should be limited to concerns per- 
taining to the whole people, leaving the 
internal administration of each state, in 
time of peace, to its own constitution and 
laws, provided that they should be repub- 
lican, and interfering with them as little 
as possible in c ise of war ; that the legis- 
lative power of this government should be 
divided between the two assemblies, one 
representing directly the people of the 
separate states, and the other their legisla- 
tures ; that the executive power of this 
government should be vested in one person 
chosen for four years, with certain quali- 
fications of age and nativitj-^, and invested 
with a qualified negative upon the enact- 
ment of the laws; and that the judicial 
power should consist of tribunals inferior 
and supreme, to be instituted and organ- 
ized by congress, the judges removable 
on'" by impeachment. 

Thus, finally amended, the constitution 
was signed by all the members present, 
except by Messrs. Randolph and Mason, of 
Virginia, and Gerry, of Massachusetts. 
The scene is described as one of historic 
solemnity, rising almost to the sublime. 
When Washington, whose turn came first, 
was about to sign the instrument ordained 
to be henceforth — if ratified by the several 
states — the palladium of his country's na- 
tional existence, and the formation of 
which he had watched over with such 
anxious solicitude, he rose from his seat, 
and holding the pen in his hand, after a 
short pause, jironounced these words : 

" Should the states reject this excellent 
Constitution, the prohability is that an op- 
portunity tvill never again be offered to 
cancel another in peace — the next will he 
drawn in blood." 



114 



IKOAl CULOAY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



And when, following the example of 
their illustrious leader, the other members 
of the convention appended their signa- 
tures, Doctor Franklin, with his eye fixed 
ujion the presiding officer's seat, in tlie 
rear of which was the picture of a halo or 
sun, made the characteristic remark : 

" I have often and often, in the course 
of the session, and in tlie vicissitudes of 
my hopes and fears as to its issue, looked 
at that sun behind the jJresident, without 
being able to tell whether it was rising or 
sinking; at length I have the hajipiness 
to know it is a rising and not a setting 
sun." 

The convention, however, which framed 
the constitution, was not clothed with leg- 
islative power, nor was the congress of the 
confederation competent to accept it or 
reject the new form of government. It 
was referred by them to the several states, 



represented by conventions of the people ; 
and it was provided in the instrument it- 
self, that it should become the supreme 
law of the land, when adopted by nine 
states. It was not till the summer of 
1788 that the ratification of nine states 
was obtained, beginning with Delaware, 
some by large, and some by very small 
majorities. The violence of the opposition 
part}' was in some sections very great, re- 
sulting, in New York, in tumultuous riots. 
Of the thirteen original states, Rhode 
Island was the last to accept the constitu- 
tion, which she did in Maj', 1790. 

The j'ear of suspense, while the Ameri- 
can people were debating the great question 
whether to accept or reject the constitu- 
tion offered them by Washington and his 
associate compatriots, was, on the an- 
nouncement of the result, succeeded by a 
national jubilee. 



IX. 



FIRST ELECTION AND INAUGURATION OF A PRESIDENT 

OF THE UNITED STATES— 1789. 



Washington, " First in War, First in Peace, and First in the Hearts of his Countrymen," the Nation's 
Spontaneous, Unanimous Choice — His Triumphal Progress from Home, and Solemn Induction into 
Office — Jubilee tlirougliout tlie Republic, over the August Event— Auspicious Commencement of 
the National Executive Government — Requirements of the Constitution — A Piesident to be Chosen. 
— Four Years the Term of Service — All Eyes Fixed Upon Washington. — His Reluctance to Accept. 
— Reasons Given for this Course. — Urgent Appeals to Him — The Result of the Election — One 
Voice and One Mind — He Bows to the People's Will — Joy Produced by His Decision. — Departs at 
Once from Mount Vernon. — Farewell Visits to His Mother. - Inauguration Appointed for .March 
Fourth. — Postponement to April Thirtieth. — Order of Ceremonies — New Spectacle in the Western 
World — Distinguished Celebrities Present — Washington's Elegant Appearance. — Dignity when 
Taking the Oath — Reverentially Kisses the Bible. — Curious Customs Initiated. 




"Where ehall the eye rest, weary of frazing on the great, 
where find a glory that is not criminal a pomp that ie not con- 
templihie;' Yes. there is a man, the first, the last, the best or 
oil. the Cineinnatus of the West, whom envy itself does not 
hate. The name of Washington is bequeathed to us to make 
humanity blush that such a man is alone in Iiistory ' — Loud 
IJriiON. 



CCORDING to the terms of the new 
federal constitution, whicli had now 
been assented to and ratified by the 
wASHiNGTox's INAUGURATION BIBLE. requisitc niimber of states, a President 

of the United States was required to be elected for a term of four years ; and, amidst 
all the discordances of political opinion respecting the merits of the constitution itself, 
there was but one sentiment throughout the country as to the man who should admin- 
ister the affairs of the government. All eyes were directed to Washington, and at an 
early period his correspondents endeavored to prepare his mind to gratify the expecta- 
tions of the people. Mr. Johnson, a distinguished patriot of Maryland, wrote him, 
"We can not do without you." Indeed, he alone was believed to till so pre-eminent a 
place in the public esteem, that he might be called to the head of the nation without 
exciting envy ; and he alone possessed in so unlimited a degree the confidence of the 
masses, that, under his auspices, the friends of the new political system might hope to 
see it introduced with a degree of firmness which would enable it to resist the open 
assaults and secret plots of its many enemies. 

By almost ail who were on terms of intimacy with W.ashington, fears were enter- 
tained that his earnest desire for private life and the improvement of his vast and long- 
neglected plantations, would prevail over the wishes of the public, — an acquiescence 
in which wishes was believed to be absolutely essential to the completion of that great 
work, the Constitution, on which tlie grandeur and happiness of America was deemed to 



116 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



depend. The struggk", on his part, be- 
tween ini-linatiiin and dnty, was long and 
severe, as is evident by the letters wliirh he 
wrote on the subject, in response to the ap- 
peals and importunities constantly made by 
his friends. (Aihmel Lee. then a distin- 
guished member of congress, conmiunicat- 
iug to Washington the measures which that 
body were adopting to introduce the govern- 
ment just ordained, tlui.s alludes to the 
presidency : '• Without j'ou, the govern- 
ment can have but little change of success ; 
and the people, of that happiness which 
its prosperity must yield." So, also, Mr. 
Gouverneur Morris, a patriot who had been 
one of the most valuable members of con- 
gress during a great part of the war, and 
who had performed a splendid part in the 
general convention, wrote: '"I have ever 
thought, and have ever said that you must 
be the president ; no other man can fill 
that office." The great Hamilton likewise 
urged him to accept the office, and thus 
yield to the general call of the country in 
relation to its new and untried govern- 
ment. '' You will permit me to saj-," 
wrote Hamilton, "' that it is indispensable 
you should lend yourself to its first opera- 
tions. It is to little purpose to have in- 
troduced a system, if the weightiest influ- 
ence is not given to its firm establishment 
at the outset." Such arguments and en- 
treaties as these poured in upon Washing- 
ton from all quarters of the broad land, 
that he .should consent to assume the pres- 
idential chair. 

But the election luid taken phu'e, in 
obedience to the fundamental law ; and at 
length, the votes for the president and 
vice-president of the United States were, 
as prescribed in the constitution, opened 
and counted in the senate. The result 
showed, that neither the animosity of i)ar- 
ties, nor the activity of the enemies of the 
newly-formed government, could deprive 
General AVashington of a single vote in 
the electoral college. By the voluntary 
and spontaneous voice of a great people, 
he was called to the chief magistracy of 
the nation. The second number of votes 
was given to i\L-. John Adams, of ^Nlassa- 



chusetts. George Washington and John 
Adams were therefore declared to be duly 
elected president and vice-president of the 
United States, to serve for four years from 
the fourtii of INLxrch, 1789. 

At jMount Vernon, on the fourteenth cf 
April, 1789, the appointment of General 
Washington as supreme executive of the 
republic was officially announced to him. 
This commission was performed by Mr. 
Charles Thomson, secretary of the late 
congress, who presented to him a certifi 
cate signed by John Langdon, president 
pro tcniport- of the senate, stating that he 
was unanimously elected. 

Accustomed to respect the wishes of his 
fellow-citizens, Washington did not think 
himself at liberty to decline an office con- 
ferred upon him bv the unsought suffrage 
of an entire peojile. His acceptance of it, 
and the expressions of gratitude he in- 
dulged in for this fresh proof of the esteem 
and confidence of his country, were min- 
gled with declarations of extreme diffidence 
in himself. •■ I wish," he said, " that there 
nuxj- not be reason for regretting the 
choice, for, indeed, all I can jDromise is, 
to accomplish that which can be done by 
an honest zeal." In this spirit of devoted 
self-sacrifice, and realizing that the ur- 
gency of public affairs must require the 
immediate attendance of the president at 
the seat of government, he hastened his 
departure ; on the sixteenth of April, 
therefore, — the second day after receiving 
the certificate of his election, — he bade 
adieu to Mount Vernon, to private life, 
and to domestic felicity, and, in company 
with j\Ir. Thomson and Colonel Hum- 
phreys, proceeded to New York, where 
congress was then in session, to assume 
the administration of the new government. 
But, notwithstanding the weight of anxi- 
ety upon his mind concerning the public 
business, he did not omit to pay a parting 
visit to his venerable mother. Embracing 
his mother, Washington bowed his head 
upon her shoulder and wx>pt, murmuring 
at the same time something of a hope that 
they should meet again. ••'No, George," 
she replied, '• this is our la^t parting; my 



FIEST ELECTION AND INAUGURATION OF A PRESIDENT — 1789. 117 



Jays to come are few. Bnt go, fulfill your I town, where the whole population turned 
high duties, and may God bless and keep out to do him honor. And thus it was, 
you." She was then afflicted with a I that, notwithstanding Washington wished 




cancer, of which she died in her eighty- [ to make a private journey, his desire could 

second year. not be gratified. The public feelings were 

Leaving Alexandria, he was aecompa- too strong to be suppressed. Crowds 

nied by a throng of citizens to George- tlocked around him enthusiastically wher- 



118 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



ever he stopped; and corps of militia, and 
processions of citizens, attended liim 
through their respective states. At Phil- 
" adelphia, he was received by a concourse 
of the most distinguished personages of 
the city and state, and followed by thou- 
sands of people to a grand banquet, pre- 
pared for the occasion, where addresses 
and sentiments were interchanged, while 
the air was filled with the shouts of popu- 
lar exultation, and with one universal 
acclaim, invoking blessings upon liim. As 
he crossed the S<'liu\-lkill. a civic crown of 
laurel was, iinperceived by him, let down 
upon his head by a youth who was con- 
cealed in the arch of evergreen wliich dec- 
orated the bridge. At night, the whole 
town was brilliantly illuminated, and all 
classes and ages spontaneously united in 
the happy festivities. 

The next da^', at Trenton, he was wel- 
comed in a manner exceedingly novel and 
touc^hing. In addition to the usual dem- 
onstrations of respect and attachment, 
which were given by the discharge of 
cannon, by military corps, and by private 
persons of distinction, the gentler sex pre- 
pared, in their own taste, a most unique 
tribute of their regard, indicative of the 
grateful recollection in which they held 
their deliverance twelve years before from 
an insulting enem^-. On the bridge ex- 
tending across the stream which passes 
through the town, — tlie place where Wash- 
ington, at one time, made so gallant a sur- 
prise on the enemy of his country, and at 
another, so important a stand, and a re- 
treat worth more than a victory, — a tri- 
umphal arch was erected, with evergreen 
and floral adornments, and supported bv 
thirteen pillars similarly enwreathed. On 
the front was inscribed, in large golden 
letters: 'The Defender of the Moth- 
ers WILL BE THE ProTECTOR OF THE 

Daughters.' Over this, in the center of 
the arch, above the inscription, was a 
dome or cupola of evergreens and flowers 
encircling the dates of two memorable 
events, one of these being the bold and 
judicious stand made by the American 
troops, by which the progress of the Brit- 



ish army was arrested on the evening pre- 
ceding the battle of Princeton; the other 
was the date of Washington's glorious 
victory at Trenton, when nine hundred 
Llessians were made prisoners, and the 
horizon of American affairs was illumined 
1)3' a radiance which never again wholly 
forsook it. On the summit of the arch a 
large sun-flower, as always pointing to the 
sun, was designed to express this )notto, — 
' To You Aloxe.' The ladies had ar- 
ranged themselves on the side of the 
.street, between the arch and the town, 
with their daughters in front, to a very 
considerable number, all dressed in white, 
and decorated with floral wreaths and 
chaplets. Six of these held baskets of 
flowers in their hands, and, as soon as the 
general had passed under the arch, the 
beautiful choristers advanced, singing a 
sonnet composed for the occasion ; as they 
sung the last lines they strewed the flowers 
before the general. 

At Brunswit-k, he was joined by Gov- 
ernor William Livingston, of New Jersey, 
who accompanied him to Elizabethtown 
Point. On the road, the committee of 
congress received and attended him with 
much military parade to the point where 
ho was to embark for New York. The 
embarkation took place in a magnificently- 
decorated barge, manned and rowed by 
thirteen branch 2)ilots, attired in white. 
There were also other barges, filled with 
eminent dignitaries from all parts of the 
land. 

Arriving at New York, the president 
was received by the governor of the state, 
and by an immense concourse of citizens, 
headed by the military. IMultitudes of his 
old and faithful officers and fellow-patriots 
pressed around him to offer their congrat- 
ulations, and to express the joy which 
glowed in their bosoms at seeing the man 
in whom all confided, at the head of the 
nation's affairs. 

Thus it appears that the president's first 
arrival at the seat of government was a 
national ovation which showed, by its 
spoutaneousness, enthusiasm, and unauim- 
itv, that all hearts and voices were united 



FIKST ELECTION AND INAUGURATIOX OF A PRESIDENT — 17^9. 119 



in his favor. It was an occasion which 
excited tlie great heart of the people be- 
yond all powers of description ; the hand 
of industry was suspended, and the various 
pleasures of the cajjital were centered in a 
single and universal enjoyment. Many 
aged patriots were heard to say that they 
should now die contented, having had a 
sight of the Father of his Country. 




PRESIDENTIAL MANSION, 1789. 

The fourth of Mareli was the day which 
had been appointed for the new national 
government to commence operations, but 
so many impediments occurred that it was 
not until the thirtieth of April that this 
took place. 

Vice-president Adams arrived in New 
York, escorted by a troop of horse, on the 
twenty-first of April, and, two daj's before 
Washington's arrival, took his seat as the 
constitutional presiding officer of the 
senate. On doing this, he addressed that 
body in a dignified speech adapted to the 
occasion, and warmly eulogistic of the 
new-born republic and its illustrious chief 
magistrate. 

On Thursday, the thirtieth of April, 
1789, the ceremonj' of Inaugurating the 
First President of the United States took 
place in New York, which at that time 
was the federal capital. Long before the 
hour arrived, the town swarmed with 
people; every tavern and boarding-house 
was full, and private residences teemed 
with guests and lodgers. Many persons 
are said to have slept in tents on 'the 
Common.' The Hudson was studded with 
boats bearing visitors, and long caravans 
of carts began to arrive before daybreak, 
from Westchester, Long Island, and the 
Jerseys. The ceremony of the day was 



ushered in by a salute fired from the bat- 
tery. This was about six o'clock in the 
morning, and, even at this earl}- hour, the 
streets were fast filling up. At nine, the 
church bells rang out a merry peal ; at ten 
they summoned the worshipers to church, 
each pastor devoting the occasion to im- 
ploring Heaven's blessing upon the nation 
and the first president. General Wash- 
ington had now been in the citj- a week, 
having arrived on the twenty-third. He 
was living in a private house, the prop- 
erty of Mr. Osgood, on the corner of 
Cherry street and Franklin square ; but 
his household arrangements had not yet 
been perfected, as Mrs. Washington did 
not arrive for some little time, remaining 
at Mount Vernon until affairs were in a 
state of readiness for her presence at the 
new presidential mansion. 

At eight o'clock, on this memorable 
morning, the sky was overcast, and the 
appearance was that of a gathering storm. 
Everybody noticed, however, that the mo- 
ment the bells began to ring the sky 
cleared, and by the close of divine service 
the weather was serene and beautiful. At 
noon, the procession that was to conduct 
the [iresident to Federal hall assembled 
in due stj'le oj)posite his residence in 
Cherry street. There were the usual mil- 
itary companies — a troop of horse, one or 
two companies of grenadiers, a company of 
Highlanders, in kilts, — all the chief mu- 
nici]i:il iiffii'i'i-;. till' i-iiii'^-vcs^iritinl cnniiuit- 




IHESIDEXTIAL MANSION, 18T0. 

tees, and the new cabinet, — multitudes of 
distinguished citizens bringing up the 
rear. By this assemblage the new presi- 
dent was escorted to Federal hall, which 
stood at the head of Broad street, in Wall, 



20 



JKOM COLONY TO WOiiLi) POWEK. 



where the custom-house was subsequently 
built. The old building had been put in 
repair at a considerable expense, but it 
was still so rickety that cautious persons 
looked forward to the ceremony with un- 
easiness. The procession having arrived, 
and the hall occupied according to the jn-o- 
gramme, nothing remained but to proceed 
with the solemn formalities ; and, when it 
is remembered that there was no precedent 
in history for the inauguration of a rejnib- 
lican president, one can not but admire the 
striking dignity whicli characterized the 
whole occasion. At the door of the senate 
chamber, to which the eyes of the whole 
vast multitude were intensely directed, the 
vice-president met General Washington, 
and with consummate but unaffected ease 
and grace of manner said — 

'' Sir, the senate and house of represent- 
atives of the United States are ready to 
attend you to take the oath required by 
the Constitution, which trill he adininis- 
tered to you by the chancellor of the state 
of New York." 

" I am ready to proceed," was Washing- 
ton's reply, made with liis accustomed 
elegant dignity. 

Tl)e vice-president now led the way to 
the outside gallery ; the ])resident fol- 
lowed, with as many of the high function- 
aries as could find room, and all were pres- 
ently gathered on the balcony fronting on 
Wall street. Of the group, perhaps the 
most striking person was Chancellor Liv- 
ingston, in a full suit of black, and, like 
Washington, one of the finest-looking men 
anywhere to be seen. Secretary Otis car- 
ried the Bible on a crimson cushion, and 
near him were Generals Knox and St. 
Clair, Roger Sherman, Hamilton, and 
other noted persons of revolutionary fame. 
At the proper moment, the chancellor ad- 
ministered the oath, with great delibera- 
tion and enipluisis, to Washington, who, 
bowing down, seized the book, kissed it, 
and exclaimed, with closed eyes and much 
emotion — 

" I sivear, so help 7ne God!" 

" It is done," the chancellor declared, 
and, turning to the crowd exclaimed. 



"Long lire George Washington, President 
of the United States!" 

This last-named declaration, on the part 
of the chancellor, was in imitation of mo- 
narchical custom. The error of this prac- 
tice was, however, soon exposed and 
abandoned ; but at this time, the crowd 
thought of nothing but the exciting solem- 
nity of the scene, and many who demon- 
stratively waved their hats were too 
overcome by emotion to join in the huzzas. 

Of course, Washington was the observed 
of all observers in that might}' crowd, and 
his grandly-commanding figure made this 
both natural and easy, and so too did the 
construction of the balcony, conspicuously 
fronting the edifice, where the remarkable 
ceremony was performed. He was dressed 
in a comjdetu suit of dark In-own broad- 
cloth, of American jJroduction, white silk 
long stockings, silver shoe-buckles upon 
his polished shoes, a steel-hilted dress 
sword, and his hair dressed and powdered 
according to the style then in vogue, and 
gathered up in a bag. This attire, it may 
be remarked, was Washington's personal 
choice. On the occasion of his second in- 
auguration, however, Washington was 
dressed precisely as Stuart has painted 
him in Lord Lansdowne's full-length por- 
trait — in a full suit of the richest black 
velvet, with diamond knee-buckles, and 
square silver buckles set upon shoes ja- 
panned with the most scrupulous neatness, 
black silk stockings, his shirt rufSed at the 
breast and wrists, a light dress-sword ; his 
hair profusely powdered, fully dressed, so 
as to project at the sides, and gathered be- 
hind in a silk bag, ornamented with a 
large rose of black ribbon. He held his 
cocked hat, which had a large black cock- 
ade on one side of it, in his hand, while 
standing, but laid it on the table when he 
sat down. 

Washington, on taking the oath, as ad- 
ministered by Cliancellor Livingston, is 
said to have laid his hand upon that page 
of the Bible containing the fiftieth chapter 
of Genesis, opposite to which were two 
illustrations of the text, one being a pic- 
ture of ' The Blessing of Zebulon,' and the 



FIKST ELECTION AND INAUGUEATION OF A PRESIDENT — 17S9. 121 



other of 'The Prophecy of Issachar.' That 
memorable volume, of such peculiar his- 
torical associatious, now belongs to one of 
the masonic lodges in New York. Upon 
each of the two outside surfaces of the vol- 
ume, there is engraved in golden letters a 
commemorative record of the interesting 
circumstances attaching to it ; and on the 
inside, beautifullj' written upon parch- 
ment, in ornamental stj'le, surmounted by 
an engraved portrait of Washington, is 
the following statement : 

' On this Sacred Volume, on the 30th day 
of April, 1789, in the city of New York, 
was administered to George Washixgtox 
the first President of the United States of 
America, the oath to support the Constitu- 
tion of the United States. This important 
ceremony was performed by the Most 
Worshipful Grand Master of Free and 
Accepted Masons of the state of New 
York, the Honorable Robert R. Livings- 
ton, Chancellor of the state.' 

The inaugural address delivered by 
Washington, and which, like all the early 
inaugurals, possessed the merit of brevity, 
was pronounced in the senate chamber. It 
was considered, in those days, a speech to 
congress and not to the people ; and both 
houses felt it incumbent on them — follow- 
ing the usage of monarchies, — to present 
replies to the president, at his residence. 

From the senate chamber, the president 
was escorted to St. Paul's church, where 
he heard an appropriate religious service, 
conducted by Dr. Prevost; and thence 
home to his house. In the evening the 
whole city was one blaze of illumination, 
all classes participating in this attractive 



feature of the general jubilee. Manj' of 
the illuminations were very beautiful — 
none more so than those of the French and 
Spanish minister.?, who both lived in 
Broadway, near the Bowling Green ; and 
the whole scene was unique, animated, and 
enchanting. General Washington him- 
self went ' down town,' that is to say, 
toward the Battery, to see the spectacle, of 
which ho expressed the warmest admira- 
tion ; returning about ten o'clock on foot, 
the crowd being too dense for a carriage 
to pass. 

As the supreme head of the nation. 
President Washington at once endeavored 
to acquaint himself fully with the state of 
public affairs, and for this purpose, he 
called upon those who had been the heads 
of departments under the confederation, to 
report to him the situation of their respec- 
tive concerns. He also, having consulted 
with his friends, adopted a sj'stem for the 
order of his own household, for the regu- 
lation of his hours of business, and of in- 
tercourse with those who, in a formal 
manner, visited him as the chief magis- 
trate of the nation. But he publicly an- 
nounced that neither visits of business nor 
of ceremony would be expected on Sunday, 
as he wished to reserve that daj^ sacredly 
to himself. One of the most important 
and delicate of the president's duties was 
to fill those departments which congress at 
an early day had established to aid the 
executive in the administration of the 
government. His judgment and prudence 
were consistentl3' exhibited in this respect, 
by his selecting such able men for his 
cabinet. 



WHITNEY'S EXTRAORDINARY COTTON-GIN INVEN- 
TION.— 1793. 



Amazing Impetus Given to the Culture, Uses and Consumption of Cotton. — Revolution in the In- 
dustrial Prospects and Political Power of the South. — How Cotton Became " King." — Its Relation to 
the Great Themes and Events in American History. — Ingratitude to Whitney. — His Brilliant Change 
of Fortune in Another Sphere — Whitney's Obscure Circumstances — His Early Mechanical Genius. 
— Determined to Get an Education. — Goes to tlie South as a Teacher. — Change of Pursuits — Be- 
friended by GeTieral Greene's Widow. — Amateur Inventive EfJbrts. — Low State of Southern In- 
dustry. — Objection to Cotton-Raising. — 
Mrs. Greene's Apt Suggestion — Whit- 
ney's Characteristic Resolve — Secret and 
Persevering Toil. — Exciting Rumors as 
to His Purpose. — Great Expectations En- 
tertained. — Triumphant Success. — En- 
thusiasm of the Cotton-Growers. — His 
Machine Stolen from Him. — Infringe- 
ments upon His Patent. — Law-Suits, but 
no Redress for Him. — His Pathetic Let- 
ter to Fulton. — He Invents a Valuable 
Firearm. — Southern Strides in Wealth. 




•' What Peter the Great did to make Russia dominant, 
Eli "Whitney's invention of the Colton-Gin has more than 
equaled in "its relation to the progress and power of the 
United States."— LuRi» Macallay. 



RESULTS OF THE COTTON-GIN. 



1|EY0ND all doubt oi- question, the 
^ invention of the cotton-gin, just at 
m\ the close of the eighteenth century, 
w.as an event which most "n'onder- 
full.v accelerated the higli career of 
the United States, in an industrial point of view, and, indeed, revolutionized, by an 
extraordinary impetus, the manufacture.s and commerce of the world. It may be re- 
garded, in a word, as the first key which was applied to the unlocking of those won- 
drous natural capabilities of the new-born repiiblic, the continued development of 
which has given her such a foremost place, in respect to material and political 
power, among the nations of the earth. So direct is its identity with the facts and 
causes which have led to the country's prodigious progress during the hundred years 
of its national history, that he who would trace to their primary source — with even 
ordinary philosophical acuteness of judgment — those momentous events, whether 
material, political, military, or social, which have distinguished the greater part of 
that century, may well pause longest and take his latitude at this point. Such, in- 
deed, is the great national consequence accorded by historians to this machine, that, of 



WHITNEY'S COTTON-GIN INVENTION — 1793. 



123 



the thousands upon thousands of inven- 
tions and discoveries recorded iu the 
patent office at Washington, many of 
them, of course, of almost incalculable 
value, only some half a dozen, or less, 
are comprised in the ' chronology of 
important dates,' in the New American 
Cyclopedia, — that marvelous portrayal of 
miin and civilization during the known 
ages. First among the triumphs of Amer- 
ican ingenuity thus made conspicuously 
historical, is the invention and introduc- 
tion of the cotton-gin, in 1793, which is 
the subject of this article. That it should 
have a place among the few of its kind 
capable of coming within the plan and 
scope of this volume, will be at once ap- 
parent. 

Before entering into the more elaborate 
details pertaining to this remarkable ma- 
chine and its bearing upon American 
industry and commerce, it may be useful 
to give, in the first place, a sketch in brief 
of the career of Eli Whitney, whose genius 
gave to his country, and to mankind, this 
great boon. At an early age, he gave in- 
dications of that mechanical and inventive 
talent, for which he was afterwards so 
greatly celebrated. His father was a 
farmer in Westborough, Massachusetts, a 
village where only the ordinary advantages 
of a common-school education were availa- 
ble. But Mr. Whitney was desirous of 
the benefits of a more complete course of 
instruction, and at the age of twenty-three 
entered the college in New Haven. He 
received the honors of this institution in 
1792, and soon after went to Georgia, in 
the expectation of opening a private 
school, and devoting himself to that profes- 
sion. In this expectation he was disaj)- 
pointed, for, on arriving at the place of his 
destination, he was informed that another 
tutor was already filling the station he ex- 
pected to occupy. 

Having traveled from the north, to Sa- 
vannah, in company with Mrs. Greene, the 
widow of the revolutionary general and 
hero of that name, he received from that 
lady a courteous invitation to make her 
house his home, while engaged in his 



course of studies preparatory to entering 
the legal profession. This most favorable 
offer, so timely in view of his shattered 
health and scanty means, he gratefully 
availed himself of. 

It was on the occasion of a social gath- 
ering of some neighbors and others, one 
afternoon, at the residence of Mrs. Greene, 
— a party including several planters of 
distinction, a few of whom had served as 
officers under General Greene's command, 
— that Whitney first resolved to rouse his 
genius to its utmost accomplishment. 
Among other remarks made by the gentle- 
men present, on the occasion referred to, 
was one in regard to the depressed condi- 
tion of the agricultural interests of Geor- 
gia, namely, that since all the lands in 
that region, not suitable for the cultivation 
of rice, were eminently favorable for the 
production of heavy cotton-crops, it was 
exceedingly to be regretted that no means 
existed of cleansing the green seed-cotton, 
or of separating it from its seed, in a 
manner sufficiently thorough to make it 
profitable, — it being almost useless, in the 
absence of such a method or contrivance, 
to undertake to grow cotton-crops for sale, 
because only a jiound of this green seed- 
cotton could be cleaned and made mer- 
chantable, per day, by a single laborer, 
and the price obtainable for it, when thug 
prepared, was but a few cents per pound. 

In response to these suggestions, Mrs. 
Greene, with true womanly perceptions, 
and knowing Whitney's ingenious turn of 
mind in the sphere of mechanics, naively 
remarked, " Well, gentlemen, apply to my 
young friend, Mr. Whitney, — he can make 
anything;" and, suiting the action to the 
word, she led them into the room where 
her tambour or embroidery-frame was 
kept, together with some other ingenious 
contrivances, and exhibited them to the 
company as evidences of Whitnej''s sin- 
gular skill. On being introduced to these 
gentlemen, and entering into conversation 
with them on the subject, Mr. Whitney 
was obliged to inform them that he had 
never seen cotton nor cotton-seed in his 
life ! 



WHITXEY'S COTTOX-GIN INVEXTIOX — 1793. 



12:) 



111 a few months, lie had advanced so 
far and so successfully witli his machine, 
as to leave no doubt of his having acliieved 
a conij)Iete triumph. In acknowledgment 
of Mrs. Greene's many and valued atten- 
tions to him during his labors, and her 
steadfast interest in his fortunes, the grat- 
ifying jirivilege was accorded her, on a 
day duly appointed, of exhibiting to an 
invited assembly of guests, principally 
planters, a model of the saw-gin that was 
to produce such a mighty change. Their 
astonishment was almost unbounded, 
when, on examining tlie principle and 
working of the instrument, the^' found 
that more cotton could Ije separated from 
the seed in one day by the labor of a single 
hand, than could be done, in the usual 
manner, in many niontlis. Enthusiasm 
over such a result, and in view of such a 
prospect, was very natural. 

The report of Mr. Whitney's invention 
spread very rapidly throughout the South, 
exciting intense interest, and the planters 
in especial were eager to see a machine 
that promised such incalculalile benetits to 
themselves and to the nation. For a time, 
however, Whitney declined showing the 
gin, as it was not entirely perfected, and 
because it might be imitated by others, 
and he be deprived in that way of his 
right to a patent. But, so great was the 
excitement to which the people had been 
wrought up, and so tempting was the 
chance which presented itself to the un- 
principled, to appropriate to themselves 
the fruits of other men's toils, that the 
building in which Whitney carried on his 
labors was actually broken into, one night, 
by a party of lawless individuals, and the 
instrument secretly carried off. Thus it 
was that several machines were constructed 
on the basis of Whitney's invention, and 
indeed varying but little from the original, 
though it was artfully attempted to have 
the deviation sufficiently obvious to escape 
the penalties of imitation. 

It may well be supposed that the vari- 
ous lawsuits growing out of the infringe- 
ments upon his rights, was an exhausting 
draft upon Mr. Whitney's funds. But, in 



addition to this drawback upon his enter- 
prise, there befell him the successive 
calamities of prolonged sickness, the 
destruction of his manufacturing estab- 
lishment bj' fire, and, worse than all, the 
assertion on the part of certain unfriendly 
jiersons, that the use of the machine ought 
to be abandoned, because it greatly in- 
jured the fiber of the cotton. The testi- 
mony of some of the British manufacturers 
was industriously circulated, to the effect 
that the old roller-gin, which ground the 
seed to impalpabilit}', was preferable to 
that which separated the seed from the 
staple, at the sacrifice of its qualit}' ! And 
here it may be of interest to state, that, in 
order to overcome the difficulty of separat- 
ing the seed from the wool by hand, a 
rude hand-mill, or roller-gin, was at an 
early period substituted, in some parts of 
India and China, by which from forty to 
sixt3'-five pounds could be cleaned in a 
daj'. After this, the cotton was further 
cleaned from dirt and knots by 'bowing.' 
A large liow lieing placed in a heap of 
cotton, the string was made to vibrate pow- 
erfully, thus dispersing and cleaning the 
heap. These means, employed from re- 
mote times in eastern countries, were also 
formerly used by American growers. 
Much of the sea-island cotton is still sepa- 
rated from its seeds by rollers constructed 
on a large scale, and worked by horses, 
steam, or water. These rollers are of 
wood, and revolve rapidly in contact with 
each other ; as they do so, a sort of comb 
with iron teeth acts on the cotton as it 
passes between them, and detaches the 
seeds, which fly off like sparks in all direc- 
tions. Particles of seeds which escape and 
pass through with the cotton, are removed 
by hand. The cotton is then whisked 
about in a light wheel, and, when well 
winnowed, it is conveyed to the packing- 
house, and forced into bags by means of 
screws, until each bag contains the requi- 
site number of pounds. But short-stapled 
cotton cannot be properly cleaned by this 
process ; the seeds are so firmly attached 
to the wool, that a more powerful machine 
is needed, — and here the utUty of the saw- 



126 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD I'OWER. 



qin over the roller-contrivance is -manifest. 
The cotton is put into a long and narrow 
hopper, one side of which is formed by a 
grating of strong parallel wires, one-eighth 
of an inch apart. Close to the hopper is a 
roller set with circular saws, an inch and a 
half apart. These, as they revolve, jiass 
within the grating of the hopper to a cer- 
tain depth, and seize by tlieir teeth on tlie 
locks of cotton, dragging them through the 
wires, which are not wide enough apart to 
allow the seeds to pass also. The cotton 
is afterwards swept from the saws by a 
revolving cylindrical brush. Thus the 
separation is effected in a cheap, easy, and 
rapid manner. At first, Whitney used 
bent wires or teeth, like those of the 
common card, but much larger and 
stronger, and these were placed in rows on 
a revolving cylinder. The cotton was 
separated from this cylinder by a frame of 
parallel wires; as the cylinder revolved, 
the teeth extending through the wire- 
frame caught the cotton and drew it 
througli the grating, but the seeds being 
too large to pass between the wires, were 
of course separated from the fiber. These 
teeth, however, being found too weak to 
pull the cotton from the seed without be- 
coming bent or broken, "Wliitney substi- 
tuted a circular saw in their place. The 
teeth of the saw being large, and shaped 
like the beak of a bird, had more strength 
and were equally effective. 

So serious an objection as that brought 
by the British manufacturers, namely, that 
the operation of this machine injured the 
quality of the cotton, was a most disheart- 
ening one to Mr. Whitney and his part- 
ner, Mr. Miller, for, on its truth or falsity, 
their fortune and fate depended. For a 
time, the process of patent ginning was 
quite at a stand ; and, indeed, little was 
heard of it by the originators, except the 
condolence of a few real friends, who ex- 
pressed their regret that so promising an 
invention had entirely failed. Of the in- 
ventor's state of mind, as well as the con- 
dition of his purse, at this time, some idea 
may be formed from a letter written by 
Whitney, in the autumn of 1797, in which 



he says : ' The extreme embarrassments 
which have for a long time been accumu- 
lating upon nie are now become so great 
that it will be impossible for me to strug- 
gle against them many d.aj's longer. It 
has required my utmost exertions to exist, 




without making the least progress in our 
business. I have labored hard against the 
strong current of disappointment, which 
has been threatening to carry us down the 
cataract ; but I have labored with a shat- 
tered oar, and struggled in vain, unless 
some speedy relief is obtained. Life is 
but short, at best, and six or seven years 
out of the midst of it is, to him who makes 
it, an immense sacrifice. My most unre- 
mitted attention has been directed to our 
business. I have sacrificed to it other 
objects, from which, before this time, I 
might certainly have gained twenty or 
thirty thousand dollars. My whole pros- 
pects have been embarked in it, with the 
expectation that I should, before this time, 
have realized something from it.' Against 
all opposition, the machine finally became 
appreciated according to its merits, and, 
though the country was flooded with imi- 
tations, — against the manufacturers of 
which, it seemed almost impossible to 
obtain any redress or protection in the 
courts of law, — a large demand set in, and 



WHITNEY'S COTTON-GIN INVENTION — 1793. 



127 



Wliitney's golden visions appeared likely 
to be realized. 

At the suggestion made to them by 
some of their business friends, Miller and 
Whitney were induced, in view of the 
public benefit that would accrue to the 
cotton-growing states, by the general and 
inexpensive introduction of the saw-gin, to 
offer the exclusive disposal of the machine 
in South Carolina to the legislature of 
that state, which offer was finally accepted; 
the sum paid to the inventors, for this 
privilege, being fifty thousand dollars. 
Though this sum was only one-half of that 
which had originally' been fixed upon by 
the patentees, it seems to have given quite 
a zest to Mr. Whitney's feelings and an- 
ticipations, for he wrote in relation to the 
new arrangement : ' The use of the machine 
here (in South Carolina) is amazingly ex- 
tensive, and the value of it beyond all 
calculation. It may, without exaggera- 
tion, be said to have raised the value of 
seven-eighths of all the three southern 
states from fifty to one hundred per cent. 
We get but a song for it in comparison 
with the worth of the thing ; but it is sr- 
curing something. It will enable Miller 
and Whitney to pay all their debts, and 
divide something between them. It es- 
tablishes a precedent that will be valuable 
as respects our collections in other states, 
and I think there is now a fair prospect 
that I shall in the event realize property 
enough to render me comfortable, and, in 
some measure, independent.' It was not, 
however, without much trouble and litiga- 
tion, that Wliitney realized the fulfillment 
of this contract. 

But the expense involved in numerous 
suits at law against the encroachers upon 
his patent, was more than the profits 
yielded by the sales, and these struggles 
and expenditures, and constantly-recurring 
discouragements, sent Mr. Miller to a pre- 
mature grave, at the close of 1803. In the 
year 1812, Mr. Whitney applied to con- 
gress for a renevjfal of his patent, in the 
hope of still receiving some substantial 
benefit from his invention. But the 
southern delegation generally — though 



with some honorable exceptions — were op- 
posed to it ; which was of course the more 
unexpected, as well as wounding, in view 
of the immense advantage of the machine 
to that part of the United States. In 
regard to this last-mentioned point, no tes- 
timony could be more weighty or emphatic 
in the affirmative than that by Judge 
Johnson, an eminent South Carolinian, 
and, at the time of speaking, a judge of 
the United States supreme court : — ' The 
whole interior of the southern states (these 
are the words of Judge Johnson, as judi- 
cially uttered) was languishing, and its 
inhabitants emigrating for want of some 
object to engage their attention, and em- 
ploy their industry, when the invention of 
this machine at once opened views to them 
which set the whole country in atjtive 
motion. From childhood to age, it has 
presented to us a lucrative employment. 
Individuals who were depressed with pov- 
erty, and sunk in idleness, have suddenly 
risen to wealth and respectability. Our 
debts have been paid off. Our capitals 
have increased, and our lands trebled 
themselves in value. We cannot express 
the weight of the obligation which the 
country owes to this invention. The ex- 
tent of it cannot now be seen. Some faint 
presentiment may be formed from the re- 
flection that cotton is rapidly supplanting 
wool, flax, silk, and even furs, in manufac- 
tures, and may one day profitably supply 
the use of specie in our East India trade. 
Our sister states also participate in the 
benefits of this invention ; for, beside af- 
fording the raw material for their manu- 
facturers, the bulkiness and quantity of 
the article afford a valuable employment 
for their shipping.' 

Such was the testimony borne by the 
highest possible authority, in regard to 
the wonderful value and effect of this in- 
vention. And yet, though full a dozen 
years had elapsed since Whitney had 
staked his all upon the machine, and was 
even now pleading for redress against the 
piracies committed upon his rights and 
property, he was actually a poor man, 
struggling against remorseless fate. Mr. 



VIS 



FKO.M COLONY TO WOIJLD POWEK. 



Wliitney, in a letter almost pathetic in its 
rehearsal of his wrongs, addressed to 
Robert Fulton, the inventor of the first 
successful steamboat, remarks, that ' the 
difficulties with which he had to contend 
originated, jwincipally, in the want of a 
disjjosition in mankind to do justice. The 
invention was new and distinct from every 
other ; it stood alone. It w-as not inter- 
woven with an3'thing before known; and 
it can seldom happen that an invention is 
so strongly marked, and can be so clearly 
and specificall3' identified ; and I have 
always believed that I should have had no 
difficulty in causing m^' rights to be re- 
spected, if it liad been less valuable, and 
been used only by a small portion of the 
community. But the use of this macliine 
being immensely profitable to almost ever3' 
planter in the cotton districts, all were in- 
terested in trespassing upon the patent 
right, and each kept the other in counte- 
nance. Demagogues made themselves 
popular by misrepresentation and un- 
t'ounded clamors, both against the right, 
and the law made for its protection. 
Hence there arose associations and combi- 
nations to oppose both. At one time, few 
men in Georgia dared to come into court 
and testify to the most simple facts within 
their knowledge, relative to the use of the 
machine. In one instance, I had great 



difficulty in proving that the machine had 
been used in Georgia, although, at the 
same moment, there were three separate 
sets of this machinery in motion within 
fifty yards of the buildinjj in which the 
court sat, and all so near that the rattling 
of the wheels was distinctly heard on the 
steps of the court-house.' Surely, few 
men of genius have rendered so great ben- 
efits to their country, by means of an in- 
vention, who have been so heartlessly 
treated and so poorly remunerated. De- 
spairing of ever realizing an adequate 
return, therefore, for his cotton-gin, Whit- 
ney ai)plied his inventive skill to the im- 
proved manufacture of firearms, in which 
he was very successful, and, having ob- 
tained valuable contracts from the govern- 
ment for his improved muskets, he 
ultimately acquired a fortune, — a strange 
but most deserved sequel to his hitherto 
checkered career. 

The progress and value of the cotton 
production in the United States, under the 
impetus given to it by Whitney's inven- 
tion, may be characterized as simply 
prodigious ; and, in the mind of the philo- 
sophic statesman and student, the storj' of 
the cotton-gin will forever weave itself, 
most intimately and wonderfully, with 
those great themes and events which make 
up the nation's histor}'. 



XI. 

FOUNDING AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE NATIONAL 

CAPITAL.— 1799. 



Bitter Sectional Contest in Deciding tlie Location. — First "Compromise" in Congress between tlie 
Nortli and tlie South. — Final Kemoval of the Government and its Archives to Washington — Official 
Observance of the Event. — Magnificent Site and Plan of the City. — Splendor of its Public Build- 
ings. — Congress FirstSits in Philadelphia. — Need of a Permanent Capital — National Dignity Involved. 
— Violent Agitation of the Subject. — Philadelphia and New York Proposed. — They are Objected to by 
the South — Northern Disunion Threats — Schemes of Conciliation. — How the Question was Settled. 
— Sweetening Two Bitter Pills. — Jefferson's Graphic Account. — General Washington's Preference. — 
His Site on the Potomac Adopted. — Some Rather Personal Anecdotes. — Work of Laying Out the City. 
— Its Original Aspect and Condition — Early Trials of the President's Wile. — Construction of the Cap- 
itol. — Its Corner-Stone Laid by Washington. — Congress in its New Halls. — Growth of the Metropolis. 
—The New Corner-Stone of 1851. 




•* Where peeped the hut the palace towers ; 
Where ekiuimed the hark the war-ehip lowera : 
Joy saily carols where was eilenee riiile ; 
And cultured thousandtt throiis; the Bulitude. 



.EXT in importance to the founding of a free and independent 
nationality, and the inauguration of a supreme legislative and 
executive government, was the act of establishing a permanent 
capital, — one on a scale, and of a character, commensurate with 
the dignity and prospects of the new republic. Indeed, from as early a period as June, 
1783, when congress was virtually driven from its halls in Philadelphia by the mutiny 
of a part of the Pennsj'lvania line, the necessity was very evident of some place being 
fixed upon where the government of the Union might at least be secure from violence 
and insult. As this remarkable and untoward circumstance was, perhajis, one of the 
most notable in its bearing upon subsequent events, in this connection, it may be worth 
while to recite some of its chief features. While the patriot army, encamped under 
the eye of Washington, bore their hardships and privations without flinching, and, at 
the close of the struggle, in 1783, returned quietly, though poor and unpaid, to their 
homes, some of the newly-recruited soldiers of Penns^ylvania, stationed at Lancaster, 
suddenly mutinied and set off in a body for Philadelphia, to demand redress of fancied 
grievances from the legislature of the state. Arriving at that city, they were joined 
by a force from the barracks, and proceeded on the second of June with beat of drum 
and fixed bayonets to the state house, where congress and the sujjreme executive council 
of Penn.sylvania were both holding their sessions. After placing sentinels at all the 
doors, they sent in a written message, threatening the president and the council of the 
state to let loose an enraged soldierj' upon them, if their demands were not acceded to 
in twenty minutes. Although the resentments of this banditti were not directed par- 
!) 



130 



FROM C'OLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



ticularly against congress, the government 
of the Union was grossly insulted, and 
those who administered it were blockaded 
for several hours in the discharge of their 
duties, by an armed band. Fearing lest 
the authorities of Pennsylvania might not 
be able to furnish adequate protection, it 
adjourned to meet witliin a few days at 
Princeton, — sending information, in the 
meantime, to Washington, of this outbreak. 
The latter immediately sent fifteen hun- 
dred men under General Howe to suppress 
the mutiny ; but before the detachment 
could reach Philadelphia, the mutiny was 
in a great degree subdued, and fortunately 
without bloodshed. 

When once the subject of definitely 
fixing upon a location for the seat of gov- 
ernment was before congress and the 
people, the question seemed to overshadow 
all others. Being in session at Princeton, 
under the circumstances above narrated, it 
was vesolved by congress that a building 
for the national legislature be erected near 
the Falls of the Delaware. 

The commissioners to lay out a town on 
the Delaware reported their proceedings 
to congress, but no further steps were 
taken to carry the resolution into effect. 
Some were very strenuous for New York, 
others proposed some convenient place on 
the banks of the Susquehanna. To the 
latter proposition, southern members, 
among whom was Mr. Madison, were un- 
alterably opposed. All admitted the im- 
portance of the step to lie taken, involving, 
perhaps, the perpetuity of the government 
itself. 

At length, a compact respecting the 
temporary and jiermanent seat of govern- 
ment was entered into between the friends 
of Philadeljihia, and the Potomac, whereby 
it was stipulated that congress should 
hold its sessions in Philadelphia, for ten 
years, during which time, buUdings for 
the accommodation of the government 
should be erected at some place, to be se- 
lected, on the Potomac, and which latter 
should become, on the expiration of the 
ten years, the permanent capital of the 
nation. This compromise having united 



the representatives of Pennsylvania and 
Delaware with the friends of the Potomac, 
in favor both of the temporary and perma- 
nent locality which had been mutually 
agreed on between them, a majority was 
thus finally secured in favor of the project, 
and a bill which was brought into the 
senate in conformitj- with this arrange- 
ment, passed both houses by small major- 
ities, though, according to Judge Marshall, 
these majorities would have been larger, 
if necessary. 

But, as the final compromise briefly re- 
corded above sliows, the die ivas cast, at 
last, to mutual satisfaction. How this was 
brought about, Jefferson's graphic, and, 
it may be, highly-colored portraiture of the 
closing hour and result of the struggle will 
give some idea : ' The eastern members 
particularly, who, with Smith from South 
Carolina, were the princijial gamblers in 
these scenes, threatened secession (ind dis- 
solution. Hamilton was in despair. As 
I was going to the president's, one day, I 
met him in the street. He walked me 
backwards and forwards before the presi- 
dent's door for half an hour. He painted 
patheticall}' the temper into which the 
legislature had been wrought ; the disgust 
of those who were called the creditor 
states ; the danger of the secession of their 
members, and the i^eparation of the states. 
He observed that the members of the ad- 
ministration ought to act in concert; that 
though this question was not of my de- 
partment, yet a common duty should make 
it a common concern ; that the i)resident 
was the center on which all administration 
questions ultimately rested, and that all of 
us should rally around him, and support, 
with joint efforts, measures approved by 
him ; and that the question having been 
lost by a small majority only, it was prob- 
able that an appeal from me to the judg- 
ment and discretion of some of ray friends, 
might effect a change in the vote, and the 
machine of government, now suspended, 
might be again set into motion. I told him 
that I was really a stranger to the whole 
subject ; that not having j'et informed my- 
self of the system of finance adopted, I 



FOUNDING OF THE NATIONAL CAPITAL — 1799. 



ir^i 



knew not how far tliis was a necessary se- 
quence ; that undoubtedly, if its rejection 
endangered a dissohition of our Union at 
this incipient stage, I should deem that 
the most unfortunate of all consequences, 
to avert which all partial and temporary 
evils should be yielded. I proposed to 
him, however, to dine with me the next 
day, and I would invite another friend or 
two, bring them into conference together, 
and I thought it impossible that reasona- 
ble men, consulting together coolly, could 
fail, by some mutual sacrifices of opinion, 
to form a compromise which was to save 
the Union. The discussion took place. I 
could take no part in it but an exhortatory 
one, because I was a stranger to the cir- 
cumstances which should govern it. But 
it was finally agreed, that whatever im- 
portance had been attached to the rejection 
of this proposition, the preservation of the 
Union and of concord among the states, 
was more important, and that, therefore, 
it would be better that the vote of rejec- 
tion should be rescinded, to effect which 
some members should change their votes. 
But it was observed that this pill would be 
peculiarly hitter to the southern states, 
and that some concomitant measure should 
be adopted to sweefeti it a little to them. 
There had before been projects to fix the 
seat of government either at Philadelphia, 
or at Georgetown on the Potomac ; and it 
was thought that, by giving it to Phila- 
delphia for ten years, and to Georgetown 
permanently afterwards, this might, as an 
anodyne, calm in some degree the ferment 
which might be excited by the other meas- 
ure alone. So two of the Potomac mem- 
bers (White and Lee, but White with a 
revulsion of stomach almost convulsive) 
agreed to change their votes, and Hamilton 
undertook to carry the other point. In 
doing this, the influence he had established 
over the eastern members, with the agency 
of Eobert Morris with those of the middle 
states, effected his side of the engagement.' 
Thus it was that the assumption-bill was 
passed, and thus it was that the far more 
important measure was enacted, which 
provided — 



" That a district of territory on the 
river Potomac, at some place between the 
mouths of the eastern branch and the 
Connogocheague, be, and the same is 
hereby, accepted, for the permanent seat 
of the government of the United States." 
In enduring honor of the father of his 
country, the name given to the projected 
city was Washington. 

From the beginning. General Washing- 
ton advocated the site which was finally 
fixed upon, and its establishment there 
was due in a large measure to his counsels 
and influence. It is related, though some- 
what questionable, that during the hot and 
angry discussion on the subject, in con- 
gress, pending the determination of a 
locality, a person who was in company 
with Washington remarked, one day, — 

" I know very well where the federal 
city ought to be." 

" Where then would you put it, sir ? " 
was the serene inquii-y of Washington. 

" It ought to be located in Philadelphia," 
was the reply. 

" Why are you sure it should be there ? " 

" For the most satisfactory of all rea- 
sons," was the sinister answer; "because 
nearly the whole of my property lies there 
and in the neighborhood." 

In stern silence did Washington fasten 
his eye upon ths man who thus dared the 
insolent insinuation that the president 
favored the location of the capital in its 
present site because it was near his Mount 
Vernon estates ; and the offender soon 
vanished out of sight. 

Another little anecdote in this connec- 
tion will be here given, as showing that 
" no sea is free from ripples." It w^as for 
many years traditional in the federal capi- 
tal, that one man was found not awed by 
the presence of the great founder of that 
city. Wliile the president was procuring 
the ground which was to be the seat of 
government, he had but little difficulty in 
obtaining the necessary releases, except in 
one instance. Mr. James BjTnes was the 
owner of a lot or tract which it was advis- 
able should be included in the plan. The 
general had various conferences with Mr. 



.132 



FROil COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



Byrnes, wlio was especially obstinate, and, 
highly prizing, as he did, tiie tract in ques- 
tion, flatly resisted all the reasonings and 
persuasions of the great man. Unused to 
opposition, Washington at last turned 
upon him and said, as only he could say 

it — 

"Mr. James IJyrues ! what would your 
land have been worth if I had not placed 
this city on the Potomac ? " 

Byrnes was not at all crushed b3' this 
peculiar flanking argument on the part of 
the general ; but, undismayed, coolly 
turned to him and said, — • 

"George Wasliington, wliat would i/du 
have been worth if 3'ou had not married 
the widow Cnstis?" 

It will not do to judge of the nation's 
metropolis at that day by what it is now. 
At that time it was desolate in the ex- 
treme, with its long unimproved avenues 
and streets, its deep morasses, and its vast 
area covered with trees instead of houses. 
Mrs. Adams, the wife of Pi-osident John 
Adams, who first occupied the White 
House, in writing to a friend regarding 
the city and the presidential mansion at 
that period, says: ' In the city are build- 
ings enough, if they were compact and 
finished, to accommodate congress and 
those attached to it, but as they are, I see 
no great comfort in them. The river, 
which runs up to Alexandria, is in full 
view of my window, and I can see the 
vessels as they pass and re-pass. The 
house is upon a grand and superb scale, 
requiring about thirty servants to attend 
and keep the apartments in [uoper order, 
and perform the ordinary business of the 
house and stables ; an establishment very 
well proportioned to the president's salary. 
The lighting the apartments, from the 
kitchen to the parlors and chambers, is a 
tax indeed; and the fires we are obliged 
to keep, to secure us fi-om daily agues, is 
another very cheering comfort. To assist 
us in this great castle, and render less at- 
tendance necessary, bells are wholly want- 
ing, not one being hung through the 
whole house, and promises are all we can 
obtain. This is so great an inconvenience 



that I know not what to do, or how to do. 
If they will put me up some bells, and let 
me have wood enough to keep fires, I de- 
sign to be pleased. I could content my- 
self anywhere three months, but sur- 
rounded by forests, can you believe that 
wood is not to be liad, because people can 
not be found to cut and cart it ? Briesler 
entered into a contract with a man to 
supply him with wood. A small part, a 
few cords only, has he been able to get. 
Most of that was expended to dry the walls 
of the house before we came in, and yes- 
terday the man told him it was impossible 
for him to procure it to be cut and carted. 
He has had recourse to coals; but we can 
not get grates made and set. We have 
indeed come into a new countrj.' These 
and kindred inconveniences were naturally 
incident to the new order of things ; they 
were only temporary. 

As has already appeared, it was reserved 
to Washington's immediate successor in 
the presidential office, to be the first occu- 
pant of the executive mansion. Neverthe- 
less, the superintending mind and hand of 
Washington are broadly identified with 
the conception not only of that elegant 
building, but of the capitol and other gov- 
ernment structures. On the fifteenth day 
of April, 1791, the Hon. Daniel Carroll 
and Dr. David Stewart superintended the 
fixing of the first corner-stone of the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, at Jones's Point, near 
Alexandria; it was laid with all the usual 
masonic ceremonies, an address being also 
delivered on the occasion by Rev. James 
Muir. " Maj' this stone," said the orator, 
" long commemorate the goodness of God 
in those uncommon events which have 
given America a name among nations. 
Under this stone may jealousy and selfish- 
ness be forever buried. From this stone 
may a superstructure arise whose glory, 
whose magnificence, whose stability, shall 
astonish the world." The south-east 
corner-stone of the capitol was laid by 
President Washington, September eight- 
eenth, 1793, with appropriate services, 
principal among which was the act of the 
commissioners, in their oflBcial capacity', 



FOUXDi:sG OF TUE :N'AT10JS'AL CAPITAL — ITUy. 




^^:-- 



WASniNGTOX, D. C, IX 1876. 



when they delivered to President Wash- 
ington, who deposited it in the stone, a 
silver plate, inscribed as follows: — 

"This soutli-east corner-stone of the 
Capitol of the United States of America, 
in the city of Washington, was laid on the 
18th day of September. 1793, in the eight- 
eenth year of American Independence, in 
the first year of the second term of the 
presidency of George Washington, whose 
virtues in the civil admin i.stration of his 
country have been as conspicuous and 
beneficial as his military valor and pru- 
dence have been useful in establishing her 
liberties, and in the year of Masonry 5793, 
by the President of the United States, in 
concert with the Grand Lodge of Mary- 
land, several lodges under its jurisdiction, 
and Lodge No. 22 from Alexandria, Vir- 
ginia." 

In the summer of 1800, the archives of 
the government were removed from Pliila- 
dolphia to Washington, and, the ensuing 
November, the north wing of the capitol 
was ready for the first sitting of congress 
in the new metropolis. John Cotton 



Smith, a distinguished member of this con- 
gress from Connecticut, speaking of the 
new city on his arrival there, says: 'I 
can not sufficiently express my admiration 
of its local position.' 

It was at this session that formal recog- 
nition was made of the great national 
event of the founding and establishment 
of the national capital, bj' mutual congrat- 
ulatory addresses between the chief mag- 
istrate of the republic on the one jiart, and 
the senate and house of representatives on 
the other. 

A more beautiful site for a large city 
could scarcely have been selected. On a 
level plain some three miles in length, and 
varying from a quarter to two miles wide, 
and extending from the banks of the 
Potomac to a range of hills bounding 
the plain on the east, the new city was 
laid out. The idea of General Washington 
was that the capitol should be the center 
of the city, and that avenues should radi- 
ate from it at equi-distant points. To 
complete his plan, the metropolis should 
have a million of inhabitants, instead of 



134 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



its present very moderate fraction of that 
number. Tiiougli not a seven-hilled city, 
Washington has, as well as Rome, its Ca- 
pitoline Hill, commanding views scarcely 











NATIONAL v?APITOL IN 1876. 



less striking than those of the Eternal 
City. The general altitude of the city- 
plot is forty feet above the river, but this 
is diversified by irregular elevations, which 
serve to give variety and commanding 
sites for the public buildings. The plot is 
slightly ainphitheatrical, the president's 
house on the west standing on one of 
the sides, and tlie eapitol on the other, 
while the space between verges towards a 
point near the river. The president's 
house and the eapitol stand centrally with 
regard to the whole, though situated at 
the distance of one mile from each other, 
the former forty-four feet above the Poto- 
mac, and the latter seventy-two feet. All 
the public buildings are on a scale of mag- 
nificence worthy of a great nation ; and 
the munificence of congress in this respect, 
as well as in regard to all that pertains to 
the city, as the seat of government of the 
United States, is evident on every side. 
This is as it should be, and betokens the 
destined splendor, in point of architecture, 
avenues and parks, institutions of art, 
science and education, of the federal cap- 
ital. 

Starting from the eapitol, the streets 
run from north to south and from east to 
west, their width varying from ninety to 
one hundred and ten feet. There are be- 
side twenty avenues, named after the 



older states of the Union, which cross the 
streets at various angles and connect the 
most important points of the city, forming 
at their intersection with the streets and 
with each other numerous open 
— -^ sjjaces. These grand avenues are 
from one hundred and thirty to 
one hundred and sixty feet uni- 
form width ; the principal of these 
is called in honor of the state of 
Pennsylvania, and extends from 
Georgetown to the Anacostia, a 
distance of four miles. It forms 
the main avenue of communication 
between the eapitol and the presi- 

J dent's house and the chief offices 
-_ of government. The eapitol oom- 
mands Maryland, Delaware, New 
Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maine, and 
Missouri avenues ; the president's house, 
Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, and 
Connecticut avenues. The effect of this 
arrangement, taken in connection with 
the natural advantages of the site, is 
exceedingly fine — one of the finest in 
the world, for a city. From the hill, in 
especial, on which stands the eapitol, the 




SVMBOLU- biAlUi; or AMERICA SUKMOUNTING 
THE U. S. CAPITOL. 

most noble view presents itself to the ej-e 
of the beholder that the imagination can 
conceive. On the fourth of July, 1851, 



FOUNDING OF THE NATIONAL CAPITAL — 1799. 



135 



the corner-stone of that magnificent ex- 
tension of the capitol which lias rendered 
it the most sujjerb structure of its kind in 
the world, was laid with splendid ceremo- 
nial, including a commemorative oration 
by President Fillmore, assisted by Daniel 
Webster, secretary of state. In the stone 
\^as also deposited a record of the event, 
with the following impressive statement 
and invocation : — 

"If, therefore, it shall be hereafter the 
will of God that this structure shall fall 
from its base, that its foundation be up- 
turned, and this deposit brought to the 
eyes of men, be it then known that on 
this day the union of the United States of 
America stands firm, that their Constitu- 



tion still exists unimpaired and with all 
its original usefulness and glory, growing 
every day stronger and stronger in the 
affections of the great body of the Amer- 
ican people, and attracting more and more 
the admiration of the world. And all 
here assembled, whether belonging to 
public life or to private life, with hearts 
devoutly thankful to Almighty God for 
tlie preservation of the liberty and happi- 
ness of the country, unite in sincere and 
fervent praj'er that this deposit, and the 
walls and arches, the domes and towers, 
the columns and entablatures, now to 
be erected over it, may endure forever ! 
God Save the United States op 
Ameuica ! " 



XIT. 
DEATH OF GEORGE AYASHINGTON.— 1799. 



His Sutiilen and Brief Illness, Last Hours, and Dying Words — Fortitude and Serenity Through all 
His Sufferings. — He Calmly Announces His Approaching Dissolution Without a Murmur — The 
Whole World Does Honor, by Eulogy and Lamentations, to His Exalted Worth and Immortal Fame. 
— He Anticipated an Early Death. — His Invariably Good Health — Exposure in a Snow-Storm — 
Takes a Fatal Cold. — Last Letter Written by His Hand. — Reads the Papers in the Evening — Char- 
acteristic Reply to His Wife. — Passes a Restless Night — Alarming Condition the Next Day. — Medi- 
cal Treatment of no Avail — Calls for His Two Wills, Burns One. — Affecting Scene at His Bedside. 

—Last Words, '"Tis Well!"— Only One Day's Sickness. 
=---j^:. '-'- — Acute Laryngitis His Disease — Burial in the Old Family 

Vault — Tidings of His Death — Tributes from Peoples and 
Kings — A Man Without a Parallel — Last Page in His 
Journal. — Re-entombment in 1837 — Appearance of His 
Remains. 




'•I'opterity will talk of Wnchinutdn with tovercncc. up the founder of a grva, 
empire, when my name ehall t)e lost in the vortex of ieTotutioii."-NAroLEOH Bo- 

N APAJITE. 



ASIIIXf;T(JX is ile.ad!" were the appalling words which, with the 
fading out of the eighteenth century, brought home to every American heart the solemn 
lesson of the flight of time, and that " all men are mortal." Totally unprepared as 
was his idolizing country for such an event, — no intelligence of the slightest illness of 
the great chieftain having preceded the bald announcement of his death and burial, — 
the tidings moved the nation's heart to profound amazement and sorrow, and deep an- 
swered unto deep, in the universal wail of a liereaved and stricken republic. If a 
nation's prayers could have prevailed, Washington — Columbia's most honored, venerated, 
and renowned son, — would have been immortal on earth. But the ordinance of divine 
wisdom is, that tlie great boon of immortality shall be attained by man only through 
the portals of the grave, and to this decree the illustrious and the humble are alike sub- 
ject. Thus it was that Washington, the great Christian warrior and statesman — the 
greatest of good men and the best of great men — paid the debt of nature when he had 
scarcely reached the allotted period of three-score years and ten. 

The last end of so illustrious a personage as Washington, is fraught with an interest 
so profound and memorable, as never to lose its freshness and value to successive 
generations. It appeared to be the will of heaven that, so soon as the circum- 
stances of his country enabled it to dispense with the services of the man who, above 
all others, was its founder and leading head, he shoidd be summoned away from 
the scenes of earth. That he was one who was accustomed to consider the brevity of 
life and the 'uncertainty of human affairs, is evident from the tenor of his conduct 
and conversation, and from occasional passages in his correspondence. Thtis, to the 
Hon. James M'Henry, secretary of war, he wrote, but a few months prior to his 
decease : " My greatest anxiety is to have all these concerns in such a clear and distinct 



DEATH OF GEORGE WASHINGTON — 1799. 



10- 
01 



form, that no reproach may attach itself to 
me when I have taken my departure for 
the land of spirits." He had also been 
making arrangements, just before tlie at- 
tack of illness which terminated in his 
death, for the construction of an improved 
family tomb, and in speaking of his plans 
to a relative at his side, he remarked, 
"This change, I shall make the first of all, 
for I may require it before the rest." He 
had also been heard to say, " I am of a 
short-lived family, and cannot expect to 
remain very long upon the earth." 

The month of December, 1799, found 
him in the enjoyment of excellent health. 
Indeed, Major Lewis, his nephew, writing 
of him as he appeared to himself and a 
friend at that time, says, " The clear and 
healthy flush on his cheek and his 
sprightly manner brought the remark from 
both of us, that we had never seen the 
general look so well." On the tenth of 
December, he completed the draught of an 
elaborate plan for the management of his 
lands, laying down the rotation of the 
crops for a succession of years in advance. 
The morning of that day was clear and 
calm, but the afternoon was lowering. 
The next day, the eleventh, was bluster- 
ing and rainy ; and at night, as Washing- 
ton recorded in his diary, "there was a 
large circle round the moon." The morn- 
ing of the twelfth was overcast. Wash- 
ington's last letter was written tliat 
morning — it was to Hamilton, and princi- 
pally on the subject of a military academy. 
The events of that day, and of the two 
days following, are most minutely narrated 
by an eye-witness — Mr. Tobias Lear, — 
who was Washington's private secretary 
as well as valued friend ; and with Mr. 
Lear's statement, are incorporated some 
facts from the pen of Washington's favor- 
ite kinsman, Mr. Custis : — 

On Thursday, December twelfth, the 
general rode out to his farms about ten 
o'clock, and did not return home till past 
three. Soon after he went out, the weather 
became very bad, rain, hail, snow falling 
alternately, with a cold wind. When he 
came in, I carried some letters to him to 



frank, intending to send them to the post- 
office in the evening. He franked the 
letters, but said the weather was too bad 
to send a servant to the office that even- 
ing. I observed to him, that I was afraid 
he had got wet. He said. No, his great 
coat had kept him dry. But his neck ap- 
peared to be wet, and the snow was 
hanging upon his hair. He came to din- 
ner, which had been waiting for him, 
without changing his dress. In the even- 
ing he appeared as well as usual. 

A heavy fall of snow took jjlace on 
Friday, which prevented the general from 
riding out as usual. He had taken cold, 
undoubtedly from being so much exjiosed 
the day before, and complained of a sore 
throat. He, however, went out in the 
afternoon into the ground between the 
house and the river to mark some trees, 
which were to be cut down in the improve- 
ment of that spot. As was usual with 
him, he carried his own compass, noted 
his observations, and marked the ground. 
He had a hoarseness, which increased in 
the evening, but he made light of it. 

Between two and three o'clock, on Sat- 
urday morning, December fourteenth, he 
awoke Mrs. Washington, and told her that 
he was very unwell, and had had an ague. 
She observed that he could scarcely speak, 




and breathed with difficulty, and would 
have got up to call a servant. But ho 
would not permit her, lest she should take 
a cold. As soon as the day appeared, the 



1?,8 



FROAI COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



woman (Caroline) went into tlie room to 
make a fire, and Mrs. Washington sent 
her immediatel}' to call me. I got up, 
put on my clothes as quickly as possible, 
and went to his cliamber. Mrs. Washing- 
ton was then up, and related to me his 
being ill as before stated. I found the 
general breathing with difficult}', and 
hardly able to utter a word intelligibly. 
He desired Mr. Rawlins (one of the over- 
seers) might be sent for, to bleed him be- 
fore the doctor could arrive. I dispatched 
a servant instantly for Rawlins, and an- 
other for Dr. Craik, and returned again to 
the general's chamber, where I found him 
in the same situation as I had left him. 

A mixture of molasses, vinegar, and 
butter, was prepared, to try its effects in 
the throat ; but he could not swallow a 
drop. Whenever he attempted it, he ap- 
peared to be distressed, convulsed, and al- 
most suffocated. Rawlins came in soon 
after sunrise, and jn-epared to bleed him. 
When the arm was ready, the general, ob- 
serving that Rawlins appeared to be agi- 
tated, said, as well as he could speak, 
" Don't be afraid.'' And when the incision 
was made, he observed, " The orifice is not 
large enough." However, the blood ran 
pretty freely. Mrs. Washington, not 
knowing whether bleeding was proper or 
not in the general's situation, begged tliat 
much might not be taken from him, lest it 
should be injurious, and desired me to 
stop it; but, when I was about to untie 
the string, the general put uj) liis hand to 
prevent it, and, as soon as he could speak, 
he said, " More, more." Mrs. Washing- 
ton being still very uneasy, lest too much 
blood should be taken, it was stopped after 
taking about hiilf a pint. Finding that no 
relief was obtained from bleeding, and 
that nothing would go down the throat, I 
proposed b.ithing it externally with sal 
volatile, which was done, and in the oper.a- 
tion, which was with the hand, and in the 
gentlest manner, he observed, "It is very 
sore." A piece of flannel dipped in sul 
volatilf was put around his neck, and his 
feet bathed in warm water, but without 
affording any relief. 



In the meantime, before Dr. Craik ar- 
rived, Mrs. Washington desired me to 
send for Dr. Brown, of Fort Tobacco, 
whom Dr. Craik had recommended to be 
called, if any case should ever occur that 
was seriously .alarming. 

Dr. Dick came about three o'clock, and 
Dr. Brown arrived soon after. Upon Dr. 
Dick's seeing the general, and consulting 
a few minutes with Dr. Craik, he was bled 
again. The blood came very slow, was 
thick, and did not produce any .symptoms 
of fainting. Dr. Brown came into the 
chamber soon after, and upon feeling the 
general's pulse, the physicians went out 
together. Dr. Craik returned soon after 
The general could now swallow a little. 
Calomel and tartar emetic were adminis- 
tered, but without any effect. 

The weather became severely cold, 
while the group gathered nearer to the 
couch of the sufferer. He spoke but little. 
To the respectful and affectionate inquir- 
ies of an old familj' servant, as she 
smoothed down bis pillow, how he felt 
himself, he answered, '" I am very ill." 
To Mrs Washington he said, '' Go to mj' 
desk, and in the private drawer you will 
find two papers — - bring them to me." 
They were brought. Upon looking at 
them he observed, " These are my wills — 
preserve this one and burn the other ; " 
which was accordinglj' done. 

In the course of the afternoon he ap- 
peared to be in great pain and distress, 
from the difiiculty of breathing, and fre' 
quently changed his posture in the bed. 
On these occasions I lay uiion the bed and 
endeavored to raise him, and turn him 
with as much ease as possible He ap- 
jieared penetrated with gratitude for my 
attentions, and often said. " I am afraid I 
shall fatigue you too much ;" and upon my 
assuring him that I could feel nothing but 
a wish to give him ease, he replied, 

" Well, it is a debt we must pay to each 
other, and I hope, when you want aid of 
this kind, j'ou will find it." 

He asked wlien IMr Lewis and Wash- 
ington Custis would return. (They were 
then in New Kent.) I told him about the 



DEATH OF GEORGE WASHINGTON — 179'.i. 



139 




mhM-^Mffm- js- 



20tli of the month. 
The general's serv- 
ant, Christopher, 
was in the room (hir- 
ing the ihiv ; ami in the afternoon, tlie 
general di reeled him to sit down, as he had 
been standing almost the whole day. He 
did so. About eight o'clock in the morn- 
ing, he had expressed a desire to get up. 
His clothes were put on, and he was led to 
a chair by the fire ; he found no relief 
from that position, and lay down again 
about ten o'clock. About five o'clock. Dr. 
Craik came again into the room, and, 
upon going to the bedside, the general said 
to him, 

" Doctor, I die hard, but I am not afraid 
to go. I believed, from my first attack, 
that I should not survive it. My breath 
can not last long." 

The doctor pressed his hand, but could 
not utter a word. He retired from the 
bedside, and sat by the fire absorbed in 
grief. Between five and six o'clock, Dr. 
Dick and Dr. Brown came into the room, 
and with Dr. Craik went to the bed, when 
Dr. Craik asked him if he could sit up in 
the bed. He held out his hand, and I 
12 



^^U 

&■ ?~^' 



UlNOluA, DEC. U, 1799. 

raised him up. He then 
said to the physicians. 

" 1 feel myself goitu I : 
I thank you for your 
attentions ; but I -pray yon to tiihe no more 
trouble about me. Let vie go off quietly. 
I cannot last long." 

About ten o'clock he made several at- 
tempts to speak to me before he could 
effect it. At length he said, 

" I am just going. Have me decently 
buried; and do not let my body be put 
into the vault in less than three days after 
I am dead." 

I bowed assent, for I could not speak. 
He then looked at me again and said, 

" Do you understand me ? " 

" Yes," I replied. 

"'Ti.s WELL," said he; the last words 
which he ever uttered on earth. 

With surprising self-possession he pre- 
pared to die — composing his form at full 
length, and folding his arms on his bosom. 

About ten minutes before he expired 
(which was between ten and eleven o'clock 
Saturday evening), his breathiiig became 
easier. He lay quietly ; he withdrew his 
hand from mine, and felt his own pulse. 



110 



FiiOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



I saw lug conntenance oliango. I spoke to 
Dr. Craik, «lio sat Iiy the tire. He came 
to the bedside. The general's hand fell 
from his wrist. I took it in mine, and 
pressed it to my bosom. Dr. Craik imt 
his hands over his eyes, and he expired 
without a struggle or a sigh, December 
fourteenth, 1799, in the sixty-eighth j'ear 
of his age, after an illness of twenty-four 
hours. 

While we were fixed in silent grief, 
Mrs. Washington, who was sitting at the 
foot of tlie bed, asked with a firm and 
collected voice, '■ Is he gone ? " I could 
not speak, but held up my hand as a signal 
that he was no more. " 'Tis well," said 
>he, in the same voice, "all is now over; 
I shall soon follow him ; I have no more 
trials to pass through." 

The disease of which Washington died 
was what is now technically called "acute 
laryngitis," a disease of very rare occur- 
rence. 




OKOKiJK w VSIIIVfJTON, AH rOLONEL, 

About twelve o'clock, the body was car- 
ried down stairs, and laid out in the large 
drawing-room ; the burial taking place the 
next Wednesday, December 18th, his 
mortal remains being dei)Osited in the 
family vault at IMount Vernon. The 
sudden tidings of his death fell like a do- 
mestic sorrow upon the hearts of the 
oeople ; lamentations and solemn obsequies 
filled the land, — -and, throughout the whole 
world, the event was heard with the deep- 
est emotion. 

Nearly forty years after Washington's 



death and burial, his remains, together 
with those of his wife, were re-entombed, 
in order to their being placed in the 
marble coffins which had been generously 
offered for that purpose by a patriotic citi- 
zen of Philadelphia, to the legal represen- 
tatives of the departed chieftain. This 
was in 18.37. At the time of Washing- 
ton's interment, Decemher 18, 1799, his 
body was placed in a mahogany coffin lined 
witii lead, soldered at the joints, with a 
cover of lead to be soldered on after the 
body should be in the vault. The coffin 
was put into a case, lined and covered 
with black cloth. 

On entering the tomb and examining 
the coffin, on the occasion in question, it 
was found that the lid had become dis- 
placed and broken, and the silver shield 
which had originally surmounted the lid 
had dropped down into the case. At the 
request of Major Lewis, who was one of 
the family group to witness the re-entoml>- 
nieiit, the fractured part of the lid was 
turned over on the lower part, exposing to 
view a head and breast of large dimen- 
sions, which appeared, by the dim light of 
the candles, to have suffered but little 
from the effects of time. The eye-sockets 
were large and deep, and the breadth 
across the temples, together with the fore- 
head, appeared of unusual size. There 
was no appearance of grave-clothes ; the 
chest was b^oad, the color was dark, and 
there was the appearance of dried flesh 
and skin adhering closely to the bones. 

The ancient family vault, in which 
Washington's remains first reposed, was 
situated under the shade of a small grove 
of forest trees, a shoi-t distance from the 
family mansion of Mount Vernon, and 
near the brow of the precipitous bank of 
the Potomac. Diminutive and unadorned, 
this humble sepulchre stood in a most 
romantic and picturesque spot, and, on ac- 
count of its prominent locality, could be 
distinctly seen by travelers, as they passed 
in steamboats uj) aiul down the river. 

But the ashes of the father of his coun- 
try were in course of time removed from 
that place, to a lot near the corner of a 



DEATH OF GEOEGE WASHINGTON — 1799. 



141 



beautiful enclosure, where the river is con- 
cealed from view. This site was selected 
by Washington himself, in the later years 
of his life, for a tomb. 

It is scarcely necessary to cite the opin- 
ions held by the illustrious men of Amer- 
ica concerning Washington. Those opin- 
ions, held and shared by all, from the 
highest to the humblest citizen, may all 
be summed up in tha'j grand ajjotheosis of 
eulogy, namely, that he was "Fikst in 
Wak, Fix.st tn Peace, First in- the 

HE.iRTS OF Hl.S COUXTKVMEN." It will 

be of interest, however, in this place, 
to glance at the estimate of Washing- 
ton held by some of the great historic 
characters of the old world, — kings, queens, 
nobles, and orators. 

When Napoleon was about to embark 
for Egypt, some American gentlemen who 
happened to be at Toulon, being an.xious 
for an interview with the mightjr Corsi- 
can, obtained an introduction to him. 
Scarcely were the customary salutations 
exchanged, when he eagerly asked — 

"How fares j-our countryman, the gretit 
Washington ? " 

"He was very well, general, when we 
left America," replied the travelers. 

"Ah, gentlemen," rejoined the man of 
destiny, "Washington can never be other- 
wise than well. The measure of his fame 



a great admirer of the heroism and per- 
sonal character of Washington, though 
not in sympathy with his political princi- 
ples. Wishing to send to him a royal 




GEORGE WASHINGTON. GENERAL V. 3. A. 

is full. Posterity will talk of him with 
reverence as the founder of a great empire, 
when my name shall be lost in the vortex 
of revolutions." 

Marie Antoinette, queen of France, was 




cs^yfA 



FRESIUKNT O? FHK UNITED 8TATE>. 

gift in token of her appreciation of his 
great merits, she consulted Lafayette as to 
the form of presentation, citing the terms 
used on similar occasions, in addressing 
kings and other monarchs. Lafayette 
mildly objected to those terms, as being 
not altogether suitable in the present case, 
saying : " They, madam, were only kings. 
Washington is the General of a free na- 
tion," — a sentiment to which the gentle- 
mannered queen at once yielded a most 
gracious assent, in deference to the ac- 
knowledgerl pre-eminence of Washington. 
Lord Erskine, in writing to Washington 
from London, said : " I have taken the 
liberty to introduce your august and im- 
mortal name in a short sentence, which is 
to be found in a book I send you. I have 
a large acquaintance among the most val- 
uable and exalted classes of men ; but you 
are the only human being for whom I have 
ever felt an awful reverence. I sincerely 
pray God to grant you a long and serene 
evening to a life so gloriously devoted to 
the universal happiness of the world." 



142 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



In the j'car 1780, Frederick the Great, 
king of Prussia, presented General Wash- 
ington witli a picture of liis majesty taken 
to the life, and inscribed underneath with 
the words — 

"From the oldest r/e/uinil in Europe, to 
the greatest geyieral on earth." 

Charles James Fox, the renowned Brit- 
ish premier, declared of Washington, in 
the presence of parliament : " How infi- 
nitely wiser must appear the spirit and 
principles manifested in his late addresses 
to congress than the policy of modern Eu- 
ropean courts ! Illustrious man ! deriving 
honor less from the splendor of his situa- 
tion than from the dignity of his mind ; 
before whom all borrowed greatness sinks 
into insignificance, and all the potentates 
of Europe — excepting the members of our 
own royal family — become little and con- 
temptible. I can not, indeed, help admir- 
ing the wisdom and fortune of this great 
man. A character, of virtues so happily 
tempered by one another, and so wholly 
unalloyed by any vices, is hardly to be 
found on the pages of history. For him it 
has been reserved to run the race of glory, 
without experiencing the smallest inter- 
ruption to the brilliancy of his career." 

When the news of Washington's death 
reached France, Napoleon announced the 
event to his army, and ordered black crape 
to be suspended from all the flags and 
standards in the French service for ten 
days ; and, on the eighth of February, 
1800, M. DeFontanes, by direction of Na- 
poleon, pronounced a funeral oration in 
honor of Washington, in the presence of 
Bonaparte and the great dignitaries of the 
realm, in which oration the illustrious de- 
ceased was declared to be " a character 
worthy the best days of antiquity." 

Of Washington's personal apjjcarance, 
little further need be remarked than that 
it comported entirely with the solid gran- 
deur of his character. In respect to jihy- 
sique, no man could have been better 
formed for command. A stature some- 
what exceeding six feet, a full but admir- 
ably-proportioned frame, calculated to 
su.stain fatigue, without th.at heaviness 



which generally attends great muscular 
strength and abates active exertion, dis- 
played bodily power of no moan standard. 
A light gray eye and full, firm forehead, 
Roman nose ; his mouth was peculiar of its 




iUMB OF WASHi>(iluM. 



class— the lii)S firm, and the under jaw 
seeming to grasp the upper with force, as 
if its muscles were in full action when he 
sat still. It was W^ashington's habit to 
fasten his eyes calmly and steadily upon 
those who were ushered into his presence, 
whether friend or foe, nor was it a slight 
ordeal thus to meet his penetrating gaze. 
His limbs were long, large, and sinewj', 
and his frame was of equal breadth from 
the shoulders to the hips ; his joints were 
large, as were also his feet, and the great 
size of his hand never failed to attract 
attention. His gait and tread was that of 
a practiced soldier; his deportment inva- 
riably grave and reserved ; his speech 
sparing and deliberate. At home he wore 
the usual dress of a citizen ; on state occa- 
sions, he dressed in a full suit of the rich- 
est black velvet, with diamond knee- 
buckles, and square silver buckles set 



DEATH OF GEOEGE WASHINGTON — 1799. 



143 



upon shoes jajDanned with the most scru- 
pulous neatness, black silk stockings, his 
shirt ruffled at the breast and wrists, a 
light dress sword, his hair profusely pow- 
dered, fully dressed, so as to project at the 
sides, and gathered behind in a silk bag. 



ornamented with a large rose of black 
ribbon. In the prime of life, Washington 
stood six feet two inches, and weighed 
nearly two hundred and twenty pounds ; 
he measured precisely six feet when at- 
tired for the grave. 



XIII. 

Fi^TAL DUEL BETWEEN MR. BURR AND GENERAL 

ALEXANDER HAMILTON.— 1S04. 



Fall of Hamilton at First Fire. — His Death in Thirty Hours — Profound Sensation and Solemn Obse 
quies in all Parts of the Land. — Mourned as one of the Founders of the Republic. — Indictment of the 
Assassin for the Crime of Murder. — Hamilton's Brilliant Public Life. — Washington's Highthand Man. 
— Champion of the Federalists. — Burr's Career in the Revolution. — His Notorious Debauchery. — Fi- 
nally Dismissed by Washington. — Becomes Vice-President in I8U0 — Deadly Personal Hatreds. — 
Criticisms on Burr by His Opponents. — Challenge Sent to Hamilton — Pacific E.xplaiiations Spurned. 
— Forced to Meet Burr. — Makes His Will in Anticipation — Sings at a Banquet the Day Before. — 
Arrival of the Fatal Hour — Hamilton's Mortal Wound. — What He Said of the Event. — Conversation 
Before Dying — Partakes of the Communion. — His Testimony Against Dueling. — Heartless Con'.uct 
of Burr. — A Fugitive and an Outlaw. 



CiEitar to Aitton'i • 



"L«t the old niftiaa know 

I have many other ways to die: meantime, 

Lauiili at his chuUenje."— Ant. & Clbo.. Act. 4. 8c. 1. 




Y far the most exciting personal tronsac- 
tion tliat occurred among the first genera- 
tion of American statesmen and jtoliti- 
cians, was the duel fought in July, 1804, 
between Colonel Aaron Burr, at tliat time 
vice-president of the United States, and 
General Alexander Hamilton, formerly 
secretary of the treasury, during the ad- 
ministration of "Washington; and in which 
duel Hauiilton fell mortally wounded, his 
country being thus deprived of its most 
brilliant ornament. 

Of transcendent abilities and unsullied 
official integrity, it may be said of the 
victim in this murderous tragedy, that no 
one labored more efficiently than he, in the 
organization of the present federal govern- 
ment. At the age of nineteen he entered 
the revolutionary army, and in 1777 was 
appointed aid-de-canip of General Wash- 
ington,witli the rank of lieutenant-colonel. 
In this capacity he served during the re- 
mainder of the war, and at the siege of Yorktown led in person the detachment 
that carried by assault one of the British outworks. "When his military services 
■were no longer reijuired, he commencctl the study of tlie law, entered into its jirac- 



MONDMEXT TO ALEXANDEK HAillLTON. 



DUEL BETWEEN BURR AND HAMILTON — ISOi. 



14d 



tice in New York, and soon rose to dis- 
tinction. In 1782, lie was chosen a 
member of congress ; in 1787, a, member of 
the convention that framed the federal 
constitution. Of this work, as profound as 
any, and more generally intelligible than 
most, that have been written on the science 
of government, the larger portion pro- 
ceeded from the pen of Hamilton. In 
political life, he was one of the strongest 
champions of the party which had Wash- 
ington at its head. In 1789, he was placed 
in the cabinet, as secretary of tlie treasurj', 
and while in this position rendered the 
most efficient service to his countrj', by 
the establishment of an admirable system 
of national finance. During the insurrec- 
tion in Pennsylvania, when the people of 
the western counties took up arms against 
the general government, Hamilton was 
placed at the head of the government force 
destined to act against them ; the disturb- 
ances being quelled without bloodshed, ho 
resigned his post. His last appearance in 
military character was again by the side 




of Washington, in 1798, as second in com- 
mand of the army, which was to be called 
into service in case of hostilities with 
France. 

10 



Aaron Burr was one j'ear the senior of 
Hamilton, in point of age. His father was 
the Rev. Aaron Burr, the learned and de- 
vout president of Princeton college, and 




his mother the daughter of that eminent 
divine, Jonathan Edwards. Before Burr 
had reached his third year, however, he 
was an orphan. When twelve years of 
age he entered college, graduating at si.x- 
teen with the highest reputation. In 
1775, while a student of law, he joined the 
American army under Washington, and 
siuli was his ardor in his countrj''s cause, 
that he joined Arnold as a volunteer in 
the expedition against Quebec. After his 
arrival there he was appointed aid-de-carap 
to Montgomery, and was by the side of 
that brave officer when lie fell. Subse- 
quently, in 1776, he was received by 
Washington as one of his military family, 
but was soon cast off by that stern moral- 
ist in consequence of his debauchery. 
This act of Washington, Burr never for- 
gave. His unquestioned military talents, 
however, secured for him the high position 
of lieutenant-colonel in 1777, which he re- 
tained until 1779, when he was obliged to 
relinquish it on account of ill-health. De- 
voting himself to law, he early became one 
of the greatest lawyers in New York, of 
which state he was made attorney-general 
in 1789. Prom 1791 to 1797, he was a 
United States senator. In 1800, he was a 



UG 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



caaJidate for the presidency, and receivt'd 
the same number of votes as Thomas Jef- 
ferson ; the choice thus went to congress, 
which, on the thirtj'-sixth ballot, elected 
Jefferson jj resident and Burr vice-presi- 
dent. In his 2)ersonal appearance, Burr 
is described as liaving been, in the prime 
of liis manhood, a small but well-formed, 
fair-complexioned, fascinating man; his 
face was handsome, by some described as 
striking, and eyes jet-black and uncom- 
monly brilliant and piercing. In public 
he had an air of eminent authority, but in 
the drawing-room his manner was singu- 
larly graceful, gentle, and winning. He 
was a wit, a beau, a good scholar, a iw\- 
ished gentleman, an unscrupulous lawyer 
and politician, and a libertine in morals. 
But whoever would read, in all its varied 
detail, the life of this wonderful man, 
must consult the biographies of him by 
Parton and Davis. 

The animosity between Burr and Ham- 
ilton, as the leaders, respectively, of the 
two great political parties, was very bitter. 
The liistory of this quarrel, in its immedi- 
ate bearing upon the fatal rencontre in 
which it finally culminated, is somewhat 
differently characterized by various biogra- 
phers, and perhaps not always impartially. 
Reviewing the matter from the date of 
Washington's death, the fact is brought to 
notice, that such was the number of seced- 
ers from the federal party after that un- 
looked-for event, that their opponents re- 
solved to adopt the bold policy of running 
two presidential candidates, in order thus 
to secure at least the election of a vice- 
president, and in this way, although a 
choice by the electoral colleges was not 
effected, the two candidates of the demo- 
cratic party were brought before the house 
of representatives with claims apparently 
equal. In the vote of tliis liody by states, 
it soon appeared that the federal members 
had it in their power to determine which 
of the two, Jefferson or Burr, .should lie 
president. Many violent federal parti- 
sans were inclined to throw a brand of 
discord into the republican party, by con- 
ferring the dignity on Burr; and he is 



accused of intriguing with them for th<' 
purpose. 

It is believed tliat Burr, from this time 
forth, became Hamilton's mortal foe, and 
watched for an occasion to get rid of such 
a rival. In the careful account given by 
Hildreth, of the subsequent progress of 
this feud, — a portion of which is h?re cited, 
— he mentions, primarily, the two well- 
known letters written by Dr. Cooper, a 
zealous partisan, in one of which it is 
alleged that Hamilton had spoken of Burr 
as a dangerous man, who ought not to be 
trusted with the reins of government. In 
the other letter, after repeating the above 
statement. Cooper added that he could de- 
tail a still more despicable opinion which 
General Hamilton had expressed of Mr. 
Burr. 

Upon this latter jjassage, the historian 
asserts, Burr seized as the means of forcing 
Hamilton into a duel. For his agent and 
assistant therein he selected William P. 
Van Ness, a young lawyer, one of his most 
attached partisans, and not less dark, de- 
signing, cool, and implacable than himself. 
Van Ness was sent to Hamilton with a 
copy of Cooper's printed letter, and a note 
from Burr, insisting upon a prompt and 
unqualified acknowledgment or denial of 
the use of any expressions which would 
warrant Cooper's assertions. 

Hamilton expressed a perfect readiness to 
avow or disavow any specific opinion which 
he might be charged with having uttered; 
but added that he never would consent to be 
interrogated generally as to whether he had 
ever said anything in the course of fifteen 
years of political competition to justify in- 
ferences which others might have drawn, 
thus exposing his candor and sincerity to 
injurious imputations on the part of all 
who might have misapprehended him. 

" More than this," said Hamilton in (he 
conclusion of his letter to Burr, " can not 
fitly be expected of me; especially, it can 
not lie reasonably expected that I shall 
enter into any explanations upon a basis 
so vague as that you have adopted. I 
trust, on more reflection, you will see the 
matter in the same light. If not, I can 



DUEL BETWEEN BURR AND HAMILTON — ISOi. 



147 



only regret the circumstance, and must 
abide the consequences." 

Burr's curt, rude, and offensive reply 
began with intimating that Hamilton's 
letter was greatly deficient in that sincer- 
ity and delicacy which he professed so 
much to value. The epithet in question, 
in the common understanding of it, im- 
plied dishonor. It having been affixed to 
Burr's name upon Hamilton's authority, 
he was bound to say whether he had au- 
thorized it, either directly, or by uttering 
expressions or opinions derogatory to 
Burr's honor. 

It was apparent from this letter, and it 
was subsequently distinctly stated by Van 
Ness, that what Burr required was a gen- 
eral disavowal on the part of Hamilton, of 
any intention, in any conversation he 
might ever have held, to convey impres- 
sions derogatory to the honor of Burr. 
Desirous to deprive Burr of any possible 
excuse for persisting in his murderous 
designs, Hamilton caused a paper to be 
transmitted to him, through Pendleton, a 
brother lawj'er, who acted as his fi-iend in 
this matter, to the effect that, if properly 
addressed — for Burr's second letter was 
considered too insulting to admit of a reply 
- — he should be willing to state that the 
conversation alhiiled to by Dr. Cooper, so 
far as he could recall it, was wholly in re- 
lation to politics, and did not touch upon 
Burr's private character ; nor should he 
hesitate to make an equally prompt avowal 
or disavowal as to any other particul.ar and 
specific conversation concerning which he 
might be questioned. 

But as Burr's only object was to find a 
pretext for a challenge, — since he never 
could have expected the general disavowal 
he demanded, this offer was pronounced 
unsatisfactory and evasive ; and again, a 
serond time, disavowing in the same bi-eath 
the charge made against him of predeter- 
mined hostility, Burr requested Van Ness 
to deliver a challenge. 

The eleventh of July, at seven in the 
mcrning, was the time mutually agreed 
upon for the duel ; the place, Weehawken, 
New Jersej', opposite the city of New York ; 



the weapons to be jiistols, ana the distance 
ten paces. In the meantime, Hamilton and 
Burr met once more at the convivial board, 
namely, at the annual banquet of the Soci- 
ety of the Cincinnati, of which Hamilton 
was president and Burr a member. It is 
related that on this occasion Hamilton was 
cheerful, and at times merry. He was 
urged, as the feast wore away, to sing the 
onl3' song he ever sang or knew, the 
famous old ballad of " The Drum." It 
was thought afterward, that he was more 
reluctant than usual to comply with the 
company's request ; but after some delay, 
he said, " Well, 30U shall have it," and 
sang it in his best manner, greatly to the 
delight of the old soldiers \>y whom he 
was surrounded. Burr, on the contrary, 
was reserved, and mingled little with the 
company, and held no intercourse what- 
ever with the president. He was never a 
fluent man, and was generally, in the soci- 
ety of men, more a listener than a talker. 
On this occasion, his silence was, there- 
fore, the less remarked ; yet it was re- 
marked. It was observed, too, that he 
paid no attention to Hamilton's conversa- 
tion, nor, indeed, looked toward him, until 
he struck up his song, when Burr turned 
toward him, and, leaning upon the table, 
looked at the singer until the song was 
done. 

The fatal morning came. Colonel Burr 
arrived first on the ground, as had been 
previously agreed. He deliberately took 
off his coat, surveyed the ground, and 
then cleared away the bushes, limbs of 
trees, etc. When General Hamilton ar- 
rived, the parties exchanged salutations, 
and the seconds proceeded to make their 
arrangements. They measured the dis- 
tance, full ten paces, and cast lots for the 
choice of position, as also to determine by 
whom the word should be given, both of 
which fell to the seconds of Hamilton. 
They then proceeded to load the pistols in 
each other's presence, after which the 
parties took their stations. 

The gentleman who was to give the 
word now explained to the parties the 
rules which were to p:overn them in firing, 



148 



FKo:n coI.o^'Y to woklu power. 




SCENE OF THE BURH AND H 

which were as follows : ' The parties heing 
placed at their stations, the second who 
gives the word shall ask them whether 
they are ready ; being answered in tlie 
affirmative, he shall say Present : after 
this, the parties shall present and lire 
wJieii they please. If one fires liefore 
the other, the opposite second shall say, 
One, two, three, fire ; — and lie shall then 
fire, or lose his fire.' He then asked if 
they were prepared ; being answered in 
the affirmative, he gave the word Present, 
as had been agreed on, and both parties 
presented and fired in succession. The 
fire of Burr took effect ; Hamilton sprang 
upon his toes with a convulsive movement, 



AMILTOX DtTEL, WEEHAWKEN. 

reeled a little toward the heights, at which 
moment he involuntarily discharged his 
pistol, and then fell headlong upon his face, 
and remained motionless upon the ground. 
His ball rustled among the branches, seven 
feet above the head of his antagonist, and 
four feet wide of him. Burr heard it, 
looked up, and saw where it had severed a 
twig. Looking at Hamilton, he beheld 
him falling, and advanced towards him 
with a manner and gesture that ajjpeared 
to be e.xpressive of regret, but without 
speaking turned about and withdrew, 
being urged from the field by his friend. 
No further communication took place be- 
tween the principals, and the barge that 



DUEL BETWEEN BURR AXD IIAIFILTON — 1804. 



149 



carried Colonel Burr immediately left the 
Jersey shore for New York. 

Hamilton was at once borne away ten- 
derly in the arms of Pendleton, and his 
necessities ministered to by Dr. Hosack. 
He had, at this moment, just strength 
enough to say, "This is a mortal wound, 
doctor ; " when he sank away, and became 
to all appearance lifeless. "My vision is 
indistinct," were his first words. Soon 
after recovering his sight, he happened to 
cast his eye upon the case of pistols, and 
observing the one he had usi'd lying on 
the outside, he said : 

" Take care of that pistol ; it is undis- 
charged, and still cocked; it may go off 
and do harm ; — Pendleton knows (attempt- 
ing to turn his head towards him) that I 
did not intend to fire at him." 

"Yes, I have already made Dr. Hosack 
acquainted with your determination as to 
that," replied Pendleton. 

On approaching the shore, he said, " Let 
Mrs. Hamilton be imraediatelj^ sent for ; 
let the event be gradually broken to her ; 
but give her hopes." His friend, Mr. 
Baj'ard, stood on the wharf in great agita- 
tion, and, on seeing Hamilton lying in the 
bottom of the boat, he threw up his arms 
and burst into a flood of tears and lamen- 
tation. Hamilton alone appeared tranquil 
and composed. On being put to bed, a 
consultation of physicians was held, who 
united in the opinion that thei-e was no 
chance of his recoverj'. General Key, the 
French consul, also had the goodness to 
invite the surgeons of the French frigates 
then in New York harbor, as they had had 
much experience in gun-shot wounds, to 
render their assistance. They immedi- 
atel}^ came, but their opinion was unani- 
mous as to the lKi[ielessness of the case. 
The ball had struck the second or third 
false rib, and fractured it about the middle ; 
it then passed through the liver and 
the diaphragm, and as far as was sub- 
sequently ascertained, lodged in the first 
or second lumbar vertebra, the latter being 
considerabljr splintered, so that the spic- 
ulas were perceptible to the touch of the 
finger. 



The news of Hamilton's fall, and prob- 
ably speedy death, by a duel with the vice- 
president of the United States, jiaralyzed 
the whole nation, as the shocking intelli- 
gence sped itself over the country. In 
New York, especially, bulletins, hourly 
changed, kept the citj' in agitation. All 
the circumstances of the catastrophe were 
told, and re-told, at every corner. The 
thrilling scenes that were passing at the 
bedside of the dying man, the consultation 
of the jdiysicians, the arrival of the stricken 
family, Mrs. Hamilton's overwhelming 
sorrow, the resignation and calm dignity 
of the illustrious sufferer, his broken slum- 
bers during the night, the piteous specta- 
cle of the seven children entering together 
the awful apartment, — all these jaroduced 
an impression on the public that can only 
be imagined. 

At General Hamilton's request. Bishop 
Moore and Rev. Dr. Mason visited him at 
his bedside. To the former he said : " My 
dear sir, you perceive my unfortunate sit- 
uation, and no doubt have been made 
acquainted with the circumstances which 
led to it. It is my desire to receive the 
communion at your hands. I hope you 
will not conceive there is any impropriety 
in mj' request. It has for some time past 
been the wish of my heart, and it was my 
intention to take an early opportunity of 
uniting myself to the church by the recej}- 
tion of that holy ordinance." Bishop 
Moore observed to him, that he must be 
very sensible of tlie delicate and trying 
situation in which, as a minister, he was 
then placed ; that however desirous he 
might be to afford consolation to a fellow 
mortal in distress, still it was his duty as 
an ambassador of the gosjiel, to hold up the 
law of God as paramount to all other law, 
and that, therefore, he must imequivocally 
condemn the practice which had brought 
him to his present unhappy condition. 
Hamilton acknowledged the propriety of 
these sentiments, and added, " I have no 
ill-will ar/ainst Colonel Burr. I met him, 
tvith a fixed determination to do him no 
harm. I forgive all that happened.!'' 
After some other religious conversation 



loO 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



incident to tlie occasion, he received the 
sacrament with great devotion, exjjressing 
strong confidence in divine mercy. In liis 
interview witli Dr. Mason, lie exhibited 
the same spiritual conviction, and repeated 
tlie emphatic testimony he had given to 
Bishop Moore, against the barbarous 
custom of dueling. 

The next day, Thursda}', at eleven 
o'clock, being about thirty hours after 
receiving the fatal wound, Hamilton em- 
braced his wife for the last time, then 
calmly composed himself to die, and ex- 
pired witliout a shudder or a groan, in the 
prime of his manhood, being forty-seven 
years of age. 

The death of this most illustrious .states- 
man was universally deplored, as a na- 
tional calamity second only to the death of 
Washington himself ; and, indeed, on ac- 
count of the tragical circumstances under 
which the great patriot was brought to 
his end, the excitement produced through- 
out the country was, if possible, more 
startling and profound than that which 
followed the announcement of Washing- 
ton's decease. In the city of New York, 
the most imposing funeral ceremony ever 
witnessed in America revealed the unex- 
ami)led grief that burdened the public 
mind. All business was suspended, the 
bells tolled in solemn requiem, public meet- 
ings of the various societies were held, the 
ships in the harbor hoisted their flags at 
half-mast, and sorrow was depicted on 
every countenance. 

The indignation against Burr knew no 
bounds. His fixed determination to bring 
Hamilton within range of his pistol, feel- 
ing " sure of being able to kill him," 
caused his act to be branded as willful 
murder, and an indictment was dulj* found 
against him ; but in a few daj's he fled, an 
outlaw and an outcast, and thus eluded 
justice. Burr's execrable heartlessness 
may be judged of, by the note written by 
him to Mr. Allston, his son-in-law, in which 



he said : " General Plamilton died j-ester- 
day. The malignant federalists or tories, 
and the embittered Clintonians, unite in 
endeavoring to excite public sympathy in 
his favor and indignation against his an- 
tagonist. Thousands of absurd falsehoods 
are circulated with industry. The most 
illiberal means are practiced in order to 
produce excitement, and for the moment 
with effect." 

One week before the time fixed upon for 
the duel, Hamilton pre]>ared a letter to his 
wife, to be handed to her in case of his 
death. In this affecting epistle, he assures 
her that he had striven by all honorable 
means to avoid the meeting, and expects 
to fall in it; he entreats her forgiveness 
for the calamity his death would bring 
upon her, and conjures her to meet the 
blow in calm submission to jirovidence. 

Hamilton's widow, a woman of rare 
excellence and dignity, survived him some 
fifty years. Once only did she see her 
huslianil's murderer, the circumstances of 
this occasion being related as follows : In 
the year 1822, she was traveling from 
New York to Albanv. on one of the 
boats plying the Hudson. The com- 
j)any had been summoned to dinner. 
When Mrs. Hamilton had almost reached 
her seat in the dining-saloon, on rais- 
ing her ej'es she perceived Aaron Burr 
standing directly opposite to her, with 
only the narrow width of the table between 
them. The shock was too much for her 
system, — she uttered a loud scream, fell, 
and was carried in a fainting state from 
the apartment. As soon as she recovered, 
she insisted on being set on shore at the 
first landing-place, refusing to journey 
further in the same vessel with Burr. It 
is said, that, after the removal of Mrs. 
Hamilton from the dining saloon. Burr 
deliberately sat down and ate a hearty 
dinner with the utmost composure. This 
story, however, wears an air of improba- 
bility. 



XIV. 

FULTON'S TRIUMPHANT APPLICATION OF STEAM TO 

NAVIGATION.— 180 T. 



First Steam-boat Voyage on American Waters Under His Direction. — Astonisliment Produced by the 
Exhibition, — Great Era in National Development. — The World at Large Indebted to American 
Ingenuity and Enterprise for this Mighty Revolutionary Agent in Human Progress and Power. — 
The Whole Scale of Civilization Enlarged. — Fulton's Early Mechanisms, — His Inventive Projects 
Abroad. — Steam Propulsion the End Sought. — Various Experiments and Trials. — Livingston's 
Valued Co-operation. — Studying the Principle Involved. — Its Discovery at Last. — Legislative En- 
couragement Asked. — Public Ridicule of the Sclieme. — Construction of a Steamboat. — The " Queer- 
Looking Craft." — Incidents at the Launch. — -Undaunted Confidence of Fulton. — Sailing of the 
" New-Fangled Craft." — Demonstrations Along the Route. — (^omplete Success of the Trip. — First 
Passage-Money. — That Bottle of Wine. — Opposition Lines, and Racing. — First Steam-boat at the 
West — Amazing Subsequent Increase. — Fulton's Checkered Fortunes. 



"It is to the undaunted perseverance and exertions of tlie American Fdlton that ia due the everlasting honor of having produced this 
reTolution, both in naval architecture and ncvigalion."— Jury RKfOHT op THB ExniBlTlo.\ OF all Kations. Londo..*, IRM. 




ITEAM, in its application to the purposes of navigation, 
w.is first successfully employed by Robert Fulton, a na- 
tive of Little Britain, Pennsylvania. His peculiar genius 
iiKiiiifested itself at an early age, in an irrepressible taste 
for producing drawings and various mechanisms. At the 
age of twenty-one he was intimate with Franklin. He 
had previously painted portraits and landscapes in Phila- 
delphia, and derived considerable profit from the occupa- 
tion. He subsequently sailed for England, with the view 
of seeking Mr. West's aid in the prosecution of his art. 
That great painter took him into his family, at once. In 
1793, Mr. Fulton was actively engaged in a project to im- 
prove inland navigation. Even at that time he had con- 
ceived the idea of propelling vessels by steam. In 1804 he had acquired much 
valuable information upon the subject, and written it down, as well as much concern- 
ing his own life, and sent many manuscripts from Paris to this country, but the 
vessel was wrecked and most of the papers destroyed. About this period, the sub- 
ject of canals seems to have been the principal object of his attention, although not 
exclusively-. In 1806, Mr. Fulton left Europe for New York, and on hts arrival 
in this country, he immediately commenced his arduous exertions in the cause of 
practical science. The fertility of his mind in this direction may be understood, 
when it is stated that, in 1794, he had been engaged by the Didce of Bridge water in 



FIRST STEAM BOAT ON THB 
HLDSON 



l.'j 



-lO 



Tmni coLoxY to wokld powek. 



fuiKil projects, had alopted and patented 
tlie system of inclined planes as a substi- 
tute fur locks, anil ]ia<l written a treatise 
on canals. He also invented a mill for 
sawing marble, patented severul methods 
of spinning tiax and making ropes, and 
constructed a torpedo to be used in war, 
fur the destruction of an oneniv's vessels. 

At what time Mr. Fulton's min<l was 
first directed to steam navigation, is not 
definitely known; but even in 1793, he 



Brunei's direction. The incompleteness of 
Fitch's plan is matter of historj-, though 
his inventive ingenuity was very great. 

Among those of Fulton's own country- 
men who had jireviously made unsuccessful 
attempts to render the force of steam sub- 
servient to practical and useful purposes, 
was Chancellor Livingston, of New York. 
As early as 1798, he believed that he had 
accomplished his object, and represented 
to the legislature of the state of New York, 



had matured a plan in which he reposed I that he possessed a mode of applying the 
great confidence. No one, previously to ' steam engine so as to propel a boat on 
Mr. Fulton, had constructed a steam-boat ' new and advantageous jn'inciples; but he 

was deterred from carrj-ing it into effect, 
by the uncertainty and hazard of a very 
expensive experiment, unless he could be 
assured of an exclusive advantage from it, 
should it be found successful. 

The legislature in March, 1798, passed 
an act vesting Mr. Livingston with the 
exclusive right and privilege of navigating 
all kinds of boats which might be propelled 
hy the force of fire or steam, on all the 
waters within the territory or jurisdiction 
of the state of New Y''orli:, for a term of 
twenty years from the passing of the act, 
— upon condition that he should within a 
twelvemonth build such a boat, the mean 
of whose jjrogress should not be less than 
four miles an hour. 

The bill was introduced into the house 
of assembly by Dr. Mitchell, upon which 
tf-^'X-^occasion the wags and the law^-ers united 
their powers in opposition to the bill in 
such a manner that the good doctor had 
to encounter all their jokes, and jiarry all 
their blows. 

According to Mr. Livingston's own 
account of these most interesting circum- 
stances, it apjjears that, when residing as 
minister jdenipoteutiary of the United 
States in France, he there met with Mr. 
Fulton, and they formed that friendship 
and connection with each other, to which 
a similarity of pursuits naturally gives 
birth. He communicated to Mr. Fulton 
his views of the importance of steam-boats 
to their common country ; informed him of 
what had been attempted in America, and 
of his resolution to resume the piursuit on 




/I^i^aJ- i^^^ 



in any other way, or with any other result, 
than as an unsuccessful experiment ; and 
although many have disputed his right to 
the honor of the discovery, none have done 
so with any semblance of justice. Miller's 
experiments, which simply proved the 
practicability of the pnncijde of propelling 
vessels by steam, were made in 1787, in 
Scotland; but Fulton's boat, which began 
to navigate the Hudson in 1807, was cer- 
tainly the first practical demonstration of 
this application of steam, Ix'ing five years 
prior to the success of Henry Bell on the 
Clyde, and nearly ten years preceding the 
first attempts on the Thames river, under 



FULTON'S APPLICATION OF STEAM TO NAVIGATION — isor. 153 



his return ; and advised him to turn his 
attention to the subject. It was agreed 
between them to embark in the enterprise, 
and immediately to make such experi- 
ments as would enable them to determine 
how far, in spite of former failures, the 
object was attainable. The principal 
direction of these experiments was left to 
Mr. Fulton. 

On the arrival at New York of Mr. 
Fulton, which was not till 1806, they im- 
mediately engaged in building a boat of — 
as was then thought — very considerable 
dimensions, for navigating the Hudson. 
This boat, named the Clermont, was of 
one hundred and sixty tons burden, one 
hundred and thirtj' feet long, eighteen 
feet wide, and seven feet deep. The 
diameter of the paddle-wheels was fifteen 
feet, the boards four feet long and dipping 
two feet in the water. She was a queer- 
looking craft, and, while on the stocks, 
excited much attention and no small 
amount of ridicule. WHien she was 
launched, and the steam engine placed in 
her, that also was looked upon as being of 
a piece with the boat built to float it. A 
few had seen one at work raising the Man- 
hattan water into the reservoir back of 
the almshouse; but, to the people at large, 
the whole thing was a hidden mystery. 
Curiositj' was greatlj' excited. Nor will 
the reader be at all surprised at the state- 
ment made by an eye-witne.ss and narrator 
of these events, that, when it \vas an- 
nounced in the New York papers that the 
boat would start from Cortlandt street at 
six and a half o'clock on Friday morning, 
the fourth of August, and take passengers 
to Albany, there was a broad smile on 
every face, as the inquiry was made, if 
any one would l;ie fool enough to go ? 
One friend was heard to accost another in 
the street with — ■ 

"John, will thee risk thy life in such a 
concern ? I tell thee she is the most fear- 
ful wild fowl living, and thy father ought 
to restrain thee ! " 

When Friday morning came, the 
wharves, piers, house-tops, and every 
' coir/ne de vantage ' from which a sight 



could be obtained, was filled with spectar 
tors. There were twelve berths, and 
every one was taken through to Albany. 
The fare was seven dollars. All the 
machinery was uncovered and exposed to 
view. The periphery of the balance- 
wheels, of cast iron, some four or more 
inches square, ran just clear of the water. 
There were no outside guards, the balance- 
wheels being suj^ported bj- their resjjective 
shafts, which projected over the sides of 
the boat. The forward part was covered 
by a deck, which afforded shelter to the 
hands. The after-part was fitted uj), in a 
rough manner, for passengers. The en- 
trance into the cabin was from the stern, 
in front of the steersman, who worked a 
tiller, as in an ordinary sloop. Black 
smoke issued from the chimney; steam 
issued from every ill-fitted valve and crev- 
ice of the engine. Fulton himself was 
there. His remarkably clear and sharp 
voice was heard above the hum of the mul- 
titude and the noise of the engine ; his 
step was confident and decided ; he heeded 
not the fearfulness, doubts, or sarcasm of 
those by whom he was surrounded. The 
whole scene combined had in it an individ- 
uality, as well as an interest, which comes 
but once and is remembered forever. 

Everything being ready, the engine was 
set in motion, and the boat moved steadily 
but slowly from the wharf : as she turned 
up the river, and was fairly under way, 
there arose such a huzza as ten thousand 
throats never gave before. The jiassen- 
gers returned the cheer, but Fulton stood 
upon the deck, his eyes flashing with an un- 
usual brilliancy as he surveyed the crowd. 
He felt that the magic wand of success 
was waving over him, and he was silent. 

As the boat sailed or steamed hy West 
Point, the whole garrison was out, and 
cheered most lustily. At Newburg, it 
seemed as if all Orange county was col- 
lected there ; the whole side-hill city 
seemed animated with life. Every sail- 
boat and water-craft was out. The ferrj'- 
boat from Fishkill was filled with ladies, 
but Fulton was engaged in seeing a pas- 
senger landed, and did not observe the 



154 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



boat until she bore up nearly alongside ; 
the flapping of a sail arrested his atten- 
tion, and, as he turned, the waving of so 
many handkerchiefs, and the smiles of so 



In a letter to his friend and jiatron. I\Ir. 
Barlow, Fulton saj's of this Clermont trial 
trip : " My steam-boat voj-age to Albany 
and back has turned out rather more 




many bright and happy faces, struck him 
with surprise, and, raising his hat, he ex- 
claimed, "' That is the finest sight we have 
seen yet." 



favorable than I had calculated. The dis< 
tance to Albanj- is one hundred and fifty 
miles. I ran up in thirty-two hours and 
down ill thirty. The latter is just five 



FULTOX'S APPLICATIOX OF STEAM TO XAVIGATIOX — 1807. 15.j 



miles an hour. I had a light breeze 
against me tlie whole way, going and com- 
ing, so that no use was made of my sails, 
ami this voyage has been performed whol- 
ly by the power of the steam engine. I 
overtook many sloops and schooners beat- 
ing to the windward, and passed them as 
if they had been at anchor." Such was 
tlie modest description of this greatest of 
modern inventions. 

Of peculiar interest and entertainment 
is the following narrative connected with 
this historic voj'age, from the graphic pen 
of one who was a personal actor in the 
scene described : — 

I chanced to be at Albany on business 
when Fulton arrived there in his unheard- 
of craft, which everybody felt so much 
anxiety to see. Being ready to leave, and 
hearing that this craft was going to 
return to New York, I repaired on board 
and inquired for Mr. Fulton. I was 
referred to the cabin, and there found a 
plain, gentlemanly man, wholly alone, and 
engaged in writing. 

"Mr. Yulton, I presume." 

"Yes, sir." 

"Do you return to New York, with this 
boat ? "" 

" We shall try to get liack, sir." 

" Can I have a passage down ? " 

"You can take your chance with us, 
sir." 

I inquired the amount to be paid, and, 
after a moment's hesitation, a sum, I 
think six dollars, was named. The amount, 
in coin, I laid in his open hand, and, with 
his eye fixed upon it, he remained so long 
motionless, that I supposed it might be a 
miscount, and said to liim, " Is that right, 
sir?" This question roused him as from 
a kind of reverie, and, as he looked up, the 
big tear was brimming in his eye, and his 
voice faltered as he said — 

" Excuse me, sir ; but memory was 
busy as I contemplated this, the first 
pecuniary reward I have ever received for 
all my exertions in adapting steam to 
navigation. I should gladly commemorate 
the occasion over a bottle of wine with 
you, but really I am too poor even for 



that, just now; yet I trust we may meet 
again, when this will not be the case." 

Some four j'ears after this (continues 
the writer of this agreeable reminiscence), 
when the Clermont had been greatly im- 
proved and her name changed to the North 
River, and when two other boats, viz., the 
Car of Neptune and the Paragon had been 
built, making Mr. Fulton's fleet consist of 
three boats regularh- plying between New 
York and Albany, I took passage upon one 
of these for the latter city. The cabin in 
that day was below; and, as I walked its 
length to and fro, I saw I was ver}^ closely 
observed by one I supjiosed a stranger. 
Soon, however, I recalled the features of 
Mr. Fulton ; but, without disclosing this, 
I continued my walk. At length; in pass- 
ing his seat, our eyes met, when he sprang 
to his feet, and, eagerly seizing my hand, 
exclaimed — 

" I knew it must be j'ou, for your feat- 
ures have never escaped me ; and, although 
I am still far from rich, yet I may venture 
that hoftle now ! " 

It was ordered ; and during its discus- 
sion Mr. Fulton ran rapidly, but vividly, 
over his experiences of the world's cold-' 
ness and sneers, and of the hopes, fears, 
disappointments, and difficulties, that were 
scattered through his whole career of dis- 
covery, up to the very point of his final, 
crowning triumph, at which he so fully felt 
he had arrived at last. And in reviewing 
all these matters, he said — 

" I have again and again recalled the 
occasion, and the incident, of our first 
interview at Albanj' ; and never have I 
done so without renewing in my mind the 
vivid emotion it originally caused. That 
seemed, and does still seem, to me, the 
turning point in my destiny — the dividing 
line between light and darkness, in my 
career upon earth ; for it was the first 
actual recognition of nij' usefulness to my 
fellow-men." 

Even at this early period in the employ- 
ment of so dangerous and slightly under- 
stood a motive power as steam, the rivalry 
and diversion of racing was indulged in. 
It was in the month of September, 1809, 



156 



FEOM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



that the exciting and criminal scene of a 
steam-boat race was first enacted. A com- 
pany from Albanj' had been formed for 
the purpose of competing with Fulton. 
The first vessel of this opposition line was 
advertised to leave Albany at the same 
time as Fulton's. Parties ran high in the 
hotels of Albany. The partisans of Fulton 
were enrolled under Professor Kemp, of 
Columbia College ; those of the opposition 
under Jacob Stout. The victory was long 
in suspense ; and it was not until after the 
thirtieth hour of a hard struggle that the 
result was proclaimed by Dr. Kemp, on 
the taffrail of Fulton's vessel, and holding 
out, in derision, a coil of rope to Captain 
Stout, for the purpose, as he remarked in 
so doing, of ''towing liim into port." 
When the age, high standing, and sedate 
character of these two gentlemen are con- 
sidered, it is not surprising that, in course 
of time, women at the West learned to 
devote their bacon to feeding the furnace 
fires of rival steam-boats. 

The comp)lete success attending steam 
navigation on the Hudson and the neigh- 
boring waters, previous to the j'ear 1809, 
turned the attention of the principal pro- 
jectors to the idea of its application on the 
western waters ; and in the month of 
April of that year, Mr. Roosevelt, of New 
York, pursuant to an agreement with 
Chancellor Livingston and Mr. Fulton, 
visited those rivers, with the purpose of 
forming an opinion whether they admitted 
of steam navigation or not. Mr. Roosevelt 
surveyed the rivers from Pittsburg to 
New Orleans, and, as his report was favor- 
able, it was decided to build a boat at the 
former place. This was done under his 
direction, and in the year 1811 the first 
boat was launched on the waters of the 
Ohio. It was called the New Orleans. 

Late at night, on the fourth day after 
quitting Pittsburg, they arrived in safety 
at Louisville, having been seventj' hours 
descending a distance of somewhat more 
than seven hundred miles. The novel 
appearance of the vessel, and the fearful 
rapidity — as it was then regarded — with 
which it made its passage, excited a mix- 



ture of terror and surprise among manv of 
the settlers on the banks, whom the rumor 
of such an invention had never reached. 

Mr. Livingston's former associate in his 
exjjeriments with applying steam to this 
purpose was Mr. John Stevens, of New 
Jersey, who persevered independently of 
Fulton and his patron, in various attempts 
to construct steam-boats. In this enter- 
prise he was aided by his son, and his 
prospects of success had become so flatter- 
ing, that he refused to renew his partner- 
ship with Livingston, and resolved to trust 
to his own exertions. Fulton's boat, how- 
ever, was first ready, and thus secured the 
grant of the exclusive privilege of the state 
of New York. The Stevenses were but a 
few days later in moving a boat with the 
required velocity. Being shut out of the 
waters of the state of New York, by the 
l^riority of Livingston and Fulton, Stevens 
conceived the bold design of conveying his 
boat to the Delaware by sea ; and this 
boat, which was so near reaping the honor 
of first success, was the first to navigate 
the ocean by steam. One of the most 
efiicient advocates of the new mode of nav- 
igation by steam was DeWitt Clinton. 

From the date of Fulton's triumph in 
1807, steam navigation became a fixed fact 
in the United States, and went on extend- 
ing with astonishing rapidity. Nor could 
a different result have been rationally 
expected in such a country as America. 

In person, ]\Ir. Fulton was about six 
feet high, slender form, but finel}' propor- 
tioned. Nature had made him a gentle- 
man, and bestowed upon him ease and 
gracefulness. A modest confidence in his 
own worth and talents, gave him an unem- 
barrassed deportment in all his social 
intercourse. He expressed himself with 
energy, fluencj', and correctness, and, as he 
owed more to liis own experience and 
reflections than to books, his sentiments 
were often interesting from their original- 
ity. But what was most conspicuous in 
his character, was his calm constancy, his 
industry, and that indefatigable patience 
and perseverance, which always enabled 
him to overcome difficulties. 



XV. 

CAPTURE OF THE BRITISH FRIGATE GUERRIERE BY 

THE U. S. FRIGATE CONSTITUTION.— 1812. 



Captain Dacres's Insolent Challenge to the American Navy. — Captain Hull's Eager Acceptance. — His 
Unrivaled Tactics and Maneuvers.— A Short, Terrific, Decisive Contest.— Yankee Valor on the 
Ocean a Fixed Fact, Sternly Hespected — The Constitution Becomes the Favorite Sliip of the 
Nation, and is Popularly Called " Old Ironsides."— Cruise of the Constitution.— Hull, the " Sea 
King," in Command — A Sail! The Enemy's Squadron !— Chased Three Days by Them. — Rowing 
and Warping in a Calm —.Most Wonderful Escape on Record.— Another Frigate in Sight, tlie Guer- 

riere. — Her Signals of Defiance — Yankee Eagerness for Ac- 
tion. — The Two Frigates Afoul. — Yard-arm to Yard-arm 
Encounter. — Fire of the Constitution Reserved. — Final and 
Deadly Broadsides. — Fearless Conduct of her Crew. — British 
Colors Hauled Down — Sinking of the Shattered Wreck. — 
Armament and Power of the Ships. — An almost Equal 
Match. — Anecdotes of the Two Commanders. — Honors to the 
Brave Victors. — Future Annals of the Constitution. — Her 
Varied and Noble Career. 




*' Never before, in the history of the worlil. did an Eogliah frigate Btrilie to an American, 
under equal circumatancea."— London Times. 



'-'^- ROUDEST among the triuniplis of tlie American flag will for- 
ever be associated the career of that noble old frigate, the Constitution, 
. j — re-christened, by popular acclaim, " Old Ironsides" for her grand 
and victoriotis resistance to British domination on the ocean, in succes- 
sive and hotly-contested battles. The greatest of these triumphs came, too, at a 
time when the public heart heaved with despondency; and the sensibilities of a 
whole nation, deeply wounded by the ill-success of their arms on the frontier, were 
suddenly thrilled with joj- at the announcement of an action brilliant bej'ond all 
precedent in its results, in the annals of naval warfare. The American heart beat 
high and warm, as the news of this proud achievement winged itself over the sea and 
over the land, and from the western to the eastern hemisphere. It may here be 
stated, as an interesting naval item, that the first commander of this pet frigate was 
Commodore Samuel Nicholson, brother of Commodore James Nicholson, of revolu- 
tionary note. 

Previous to the final declaration of war against Great Britain, in June, 1812, 
preparation liad been made by the United States government to send to sea, imme- 
diately on that event, all the frigates and armed vessels that could be put in readi- 
ness, to protect American commerce, and meet the enemy on the ocean. When, 



158 



FEO?[ COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



however, these little squadrons left tlieir 
ports to contend with the haughty mistress 
of the seas, every American breast was 
filled with anxiety. Indeed, the British 
naval commanders had boasted that they 
would drive the little striped bunting of the 
upstart states, in affright and dismay, 
from every part of the broad ocean. How 
the Constitution saved herself, on first 
sighting the British lion, is a narrative 
uniting the romantic and miraculous. 

It was on the twenty-first of June, that 
a squadron, consisting of the President, 
the United States, the Congress, the 
Hornet, and Argus, under the com- 
mand of Commodore Rodgers, sailed from 
New York on a cruise in quest of British 
merchantmen, then on their way from 
Jamaica to Englan/L Subsequently, tlie 
frigate Constitutioi., Captain Isaac Hull, 
received orders to lom the squadron of 
Rodgers, and, for that purpose, sailed from 
the Chesapeake on the twelfth of July. 
On the seventeenth, being off Egg Harbor, 
four sliips, apparently men-of-war, were 
discovered from the mast-head to the 
northward, approaching rapidly with a fine 
breeze, while it was nearly calm about the 
Constitution. In the belief that it was the 
American squadron, waiting her arrival, 
every effort was made to come up with 
them. At four in the afternoon, another 
ship was seen to the north-east, standing 
for the Constitution, with all sails set. At 
ten in the evening, being then within six 
or eight miles of the strange s.iil, the pri- 
vate signal was made by tiie Constitution ; 
which not being answered, it was con- 
cluded that tliey were the enemy's vessels. 

And now commenced what may jus-ly 
be termed the most remarkable series of 
naval tactics and maneuvers ever known, 
— the most wonderful chase recorded in 
nautical history — resulting in the success- 
ful, and almost miraculous, escape of the 
American frigate from a whole squadron 
of British vessels, commanded by Captain 
Broke, in close pursuit for nearly three 
days and nights. 

The position of the Constitution seemed 
hopeless indeed, when she found that one 



of the enemy's frigates was within about 
five or six miles, and a line-of-battle ship, 
a frigate, a brig, and schooner, some ten or 
twelve miles directly astern, all in chase 
of her, with a fine breeze, and coming up 
fast, — while, unfortunately, the wind had 
entirely left the Constitution, so that the 
ship would not steer, but fell round off 
with her head towards the two ships under 
her lee. The boats were instantl}' hoisted 
out, and sent ahead, to tow the ship's head 
round, and to endeavor to get her farther 
from the enemy, being now within five 
miles of three heavy frigates. The boats 
of the enemy were got out and sent ahead 
to tow, by which, with the light air that 
remained with them, thej' came up very 
fast. Finding the enemy gaining on him, 
and but little chance of escaping, Hull 
ordei-ed two guns to be ran out at the cal>in 
windows for stern guns on the gun-deck, 
and hoisted one of the twenty-four pound- 
ers off the gun-deck, and ran that, with 
the forecastle gun, an eighteen-pounder, 
out at the ports on the quarter-deck, and 
cleared the ship for action, being deter- 
mined they should not capture her, with- 
out encountering a resistance worthy of 
Americans. 

At about seven o'clock, on the morning 
of the eighteenth, the nearest ship ap- 
proached within gunshot and directly 
astern, seeing which, Hull ordered one of 
the stern gims to be fired, to see if her 
masts could be reached and disabled, but 
the shot fell a little short. At eight, four 
of the enemy's ships were nearlj' within 
gunshot, some of them having six or eight 
boats ahead towing, with all their oars and 
sweeps out, to row them up to the Consti- 
tution, which they were fast doing. It 
thus appeared that the notle frigate must 
b J taken — that escape was impossible, — 
four heavy ships being already so near, and 
coming up fast, with not the least Iw^pe of 
a breeze to give the Constitution a chance 
of getting off by outsailing them. 

In this situation, and finding himself in 
onlj' twenty-four fathoms of water, Hull, 
adopting the advice of Lieutenant Morris, 
determined to try and warp the ship ahead, 



CAPTURE OF THE GUERRIERE BY THE CONSTITUTION — lSl-2. 159 



by carrying out anchors ami warping her 
up to them. Three or lour Imudretl fath- 
oms of rope were instantly got up, and two 
anchors made ready and sent ahead, by 
which means the sliip began to distance 
the enemy's squadron ; but the latter soon 
saw this movement, and adopted the same 
plan, under very advantageous circum- 
stances, as all t!)e boats from the British 
ships furthermost off, were sent to tow and 
warp up those nearest to the Constitution, 
by which means they again came up, 
almost within gun-shot reach. 

From nine to twelve, Hull employed all 
hands in warping the ship ahead, and in 
starting some of the water in the main 
hold to lighten her, which, with the help 
of a slight breeze, enabled the Constitution 
to rather gain upon the enemy. About 
two, in the afternoon, all the boats from 
the line-of-battle ship and from some of 
the frigates were sent to the foremost frig- 
ate, to endeavor to tow her along more 
rapidly, but, a light air springing up, the 
Constitution held way with her pursuer, 
notwithstanding the latter had eight or ten 
boats ahead, and all her sails furled to tow 
her to windward. The wind continued 
light until eleven at night, and Hull's 
boats were kept ahead, towing and warp- 
ing to keep out of the reach of the enemy, 
three of the frigates being now very near ; 
at eleven, however, a fresh breeze blew 
from the southward, when the boats came 
alongside and were hoisted uj», the ship 
having too much way to keep them ahead. 

On the nineteenth, the enemy stood six 
sail in sight, still in chase, with all can- 
vas spread, and very near. The wind, 
however, continued to increase, gradually, 
during the whole day, and Hull gained six 
or eight miles upon Broke, notwithstand- 
ing the latter pressed on with everj' inch 
of sail he could fling to the breeze. The 
hopes of the Americans were now un- 
bounded in their buoyancy, and these 
hopes were succeeded by unspeakable 
exultation, when it was discovered, at day- 
light on the morning of the twentieth, 
that only three of the British vessels could 
be seen from the mast-head, the nearest of 



w^hich was about twelve miles off, directly 
astern. All bands were now set at work 
wetting the Constitution's sails, from the 
royals down, by means of the engine and 
fire-buckets, and it was soon found that 
the enemy was left far in the rear. At a 
quarter-past eight, the British, finding that 
they were fast dropping astern, gave over 
chase, and hauled their wind to the north- 
ward. The Constitution, being separated 
from the rest of the American squadron, 
made immediately for Boston, where she 
arrived in safety, and remained a few days. 

During the whole of this most remark- 
able, as well as exciting and wearisome 
chase, the gallant crew of the Constitution 
remained steadfastly and cheerfully at 
their stations, without murmur or confu- 
sion, and not only they and their officers, 
but the noble ship herself, gained a high 
reinitation for masterly movement and 
behavior. Eveu the officers of the British 
squadron expressed their admiration of the 
consummate nautical knowledge and j>ro- 
fessional adroitness displayed by Captain 
Hull, in maneuvering his ship and effecting 
his escape. 

But it was soon to be proved that Hull 
was no less a sea-warrior tlian a brilliant 
strategical navigator. (Dn the second day 




CAPTAIN HULL. 

of August, Hull again i)ut to sea, pursuing 
an easterly course. He passed near the 
coast as far down as the bay of Fundy, 
then ran off Halifax and Cape Sable ; but, 
not seeing any vessels for some days, Hull 
steered toward Newfoundland, passed the 



"160 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



isle of Sallies, and took a station off the 
gulf of iSt. Lawrence, to intercept the 
Canada trade. AVJiile cruising here, he 
captured two merchant-vessels. On the 
fifteenth, lie chased a convo}' of five sail, 
captured one of them, and prevented the 
prize-ship of an American privateer from 
being re-taken. Having received informa- 
tion that the British squadron was off the 
Grand Banks, and not far distant, lie 
changed his cruising-ground, and pro- 
ceeded southward. 

On the nineteenth of August, 1812, at 
two o'clock in the afternoon, the Constitu- 
tion being in latitude forty-<ine degrees 
and forty-two minutes nortli, and tifty-five 
degrees and thirty-tliree minutes west 
longitude, off the coast of Massachusetts, 
a ship was discovered from the mast-head 
of the Constitution. Captain Hull in- 
stantly made all sail in chase, auil soon 
gained on her. At three o'clock, it could 
plainly be perceived that she was a man- 
of-war, on the starboard tack, under easy 
sail, close-hauled to the wind ; and by half- 
past three the stranger was ascertained to 
be a British frigate, — the Guerriere, Cap- 
tain James A. Dacres. This vessel had 
hoisted at her mast-head, a flag with her 
assumed name, the Warrior, in large char- 
acters, and on another were inscribed the 
words, 'Not the Little Belt,'— the latter 
being a British sloop-of-war that had been 
badly handled in an engagement with the 
United States ship President. The Guer- 
riere had looked into several ports inquest 
of American frigates, and given a chal- 
lenge to all vessels of her class. On the 
heaving in sight, therefore, of the Consti- 
tution, the British commander assembled 
his crew, pointed to them the object of 
their wishes, assured them of an easy vic- 
tory, and was answered by three hearty 
cheers. So, too, the announcement by 
Captain Hull, that the ship in sight was a 
British man-of-war, and probably of about 
the same force as the Constitution, was 
received with lively exultation by the 
brave American crew. 

Eager fo; battle and hopeful of victory, 
Hull ordered the light sails to be taken in, 



the courses to be hauled up, and the ship 
to be cleared for action. The enemy now 
backed her main-top-sail, and waited fo; 
the Constitution to come down ; and as 
soon as the latter was ready for action, she 
bore down, intending to bring to im- 
mediate engagement the British frigate 
wjiich had been from the very first, the 
oliject of such eager attention by the 
Americans, on account of her fine ap- 
pearance and [lecnliar movements, and 
leading to the supposition that she was 
a craft of more than ordinary import- 
ance in the estimation of the enemy, 
— a supposition that did not fail to be 
realized. 

The very fact that she bore on one 
of her flags the words just quoted, in- 
ilii'ated that the feeling engendered by 
that event was a terribly sore one to 
the British, and tliat, if it were a pos- 
sible thing, the wound was to be healed, 
at the first opportunity, l)y some sig- 
nal act of retribution. 

On the Constitution coming within gun- 
shot, the Guerriere fired a broadside, then 
filled away, wore, and gave a broadside on 
the other tack ; this firing, however, pro- 
duced no effect, as the shot fell short. The 
British frigate maneuvered, and wore sev- 
eral times, for about three-quarters of an 
hour, in order to obtain a raking position, 
but, not succeeding in this, she bore up 
under her top-sails and jib, with the wind 
on the quarter. It is related that, during 
this time, the Constitution not having 
fired a single broadside, the impatience of 
her officers and men to engage was so 
excessive, that nothing but the most rigid 
discipline could restrain them. Hull, 
however, was preparing, with the utmost 
calmness and deliberation, to decide the 
contest according to a method of his own. 

Making sail so as to bring the Constitu- 
tion directly up with her antagonist, and, 
at five minutes before six in the afternoon, 
being alongside within half jHstol shot, 
Hull ordered a brisk firing to be com- 
menced from all the Constitution's guns, 
which were double-shotted with round and 
grape shot ; and so well-directed and so 



CAPTURE or THE GUERRIERE BY THE CONSTITUTION — 1812. Ifil 



warmly kept ap was the American fire, 
that, ill fifteen minutes, the mizzen-mast 
of the Guerriere went by the board, and 
her main-yard in her slings. Her hull 
was much injured, and her rigging and 
sails completely torn into shreds. The 
fire was kept up, in the same spirited 
manner, for fifteen minutes longer, by the 
Constitution. She had now taken a posi- 
tion for raking, on the bows of the Guer- 
riere, when the latter could only bring her 
bow guns to bear on the Constitution ; the 
grape-shot and small-arms of the latter 
ship completel_y swept the decks of the 
British frigate, and she was an utter 
wreck. 

Thirty minutes after the commencement 
of the contest, by the Constitution, tjie 
main-mast and fore-mast of the Guerriere 
went by the board, taking with them every 
spar except the bowsprit. Seeing her con- 
dition, Captain Hull ordered the firing to 
cease ; and Captain Dacres then struck his 
colors, which had been fastened to the 
stump of the mizzen-mast. 

Setting her fore and main sails, the Con- 
stitution now hauled to the eastward, to 
repair damages. All her braces, a great part 
of her standing and running rigging, and 
some of her spars, were shot away. At 
seven in the evening, she stood under the 
lee of the prize, and sent a boat on board, 
which returned in a short time with Captain 
Dacres, commander of the ill-fated frigate. 
In the action, the Constitution lost seven 
killed, and seven wounded ; the Guerriere, 
fifteen killed, and sixty-two wounded, — 
the latter including several ofiicers, and 
there were twentj'-four missing. Among 
the killed, on board of the Constitution, 
was Lieutenant Bush ; and among the 
wounded, First Lieutenant Morris and 
Master Alwyn. The circumstances were 
as follows : As soon as the two vessels 
fell afoul of each other, the cabin of 
the Constitution was observed to take 
fire, from the close explosion of the 
forward guns of the enemy, who obtained 
a small, though but momentary, advantage 
from his position; the ready attention, 
however, of Lieutenant Hoffman, who 
11 



commanded in the cabin, soon repaired 
this accident, and a gun of the enemy's, 
that threatened further injury, was effects 
ually disabled. But, in a moment, affairs 
took a more tragical turn, for, the vessels 
having come close together, both parties 
prepared to board. The English turned 
all hands ujj from below, and mustered for- 
ward, with that object, while Lieutenant 
Morris, Master Alwyn, and Lieutenant 
Bush, sprang upon the taffrail of the t^on- 
stitution, with a similar intention. The 
position of the two frigates was already 
giving employment to the sharpshooters of 
either side, and incessant volleys of mus- 
ketry rattled in the tumult all around. 
Morris was shot througli the body, but 
maintained his post, the bullet fortunately 
missing the vitals. Alwyn was wounded 
in the shoulder. Bush, just as he was 
making the spring, was pierced by a ball 
in the head, and tumbled headlong, in the 
speedy agonies of death. 

On the Guerriere's striking her flag, and 
being in a sinking condition. Captain Hull 
immediately sent his boats to bring the 
wounded and prisoners on board the Con- 
stitution. At about two o'clock in the 
aftei'noon, a sail was discovered off the lar- 
board beam, standing to the south. The 
Constitution was instantly cleared for 
action ; but at three, the vessel stood 
away. At daybreak, information was 
received from the lieutenant on board the 
prize, that the Guerriere was an unman- 
ageable wreck, with four feet of water in 
the hold, and in a sinking condition. As 
soon, therefore, as all the crew were 
removed from on board of her, she was 
abandoned, and her shattered hulk set fire 
to and blown up. During the whole 
period of combat, the total loss on board 
the Constitution amounted to seven killed 
and seven wounded, and, as soon as she 
had rove new rigging, applied the neces- 
sary stoppers, and bent a few sails, she 
was ready, as has been seen, to engage 
another frigate. Captain Hull, in his 
tribute to his crew, says : " Tiiey all 
fought with great bravery ; from the 
smallest boy in the ship to the oldest 



102 



FROM COLOJSiY TU WOKLD POWEK. 




ACTION BET'WEEN THE FRIGATES rONSTlTCITION AKD GUERRIEKE. 



seaman, not a look of fear was seen. They 
all went into action giving three cheers, 
and requesting to be laid close alongside 
the enemy." In the very heat of the 
engagement, one of the crew of the Con- 
stitution, perceiving that the flag at the 
foretop-mast head had been shot away, 
went up with it, and lashed it so securely 



as to render its removal impossible, unless 
the mast went with it. 

The total casualties, from first to last, 
on board the Guerriere, in killed and 
wounded, numbered nearly eighty, com- 
prising about one-third of her entire crew, 
and, according to the statement of Captain 
Dacres, in his defense before the court 



CAPTURE OF THE GUEKRIEKE BY THE CONSTITUTION — 1812. 163 



which tried him for the loss of his ship, 
she had, besides being dismasted, received 
no less than thirty shot as low as five 
sheets of copper beneath the bends. 

In respect to armament and force, the 
Guerriere rated thirtj^-eight guns, and car- 
ried forty-nine, one of which was a light 
boat-carronade. Her gun-deck metal was 
eighteen-pounders, and her carronades, like 
those of the Constitution, thirty-twos. 
The Guerriere was a French-built ship, 
and nearly as long as her adversary, 
though the latter was somewhat larger and 
heavier. The Constitution rated forty- 
four guns, and mounted fifty-five. On an 
actual weight, however, of the shot of both 
ships, it was found that the Constitution's 
twenty-fours were only three pounds heav- 
ier than the Guerriere's eighteens, and 
there was nearly the same difference in 
favor of the latter's thirty-twos. The 
great inferiority of the Guerriere was in 
her men, as she mustered but two hundred 
and sixty-three souls at quarters, in conse- 
quence of the absence of some of the offi- 
cers and men who had charge of prizes. 
Captain Dacres had also some ten or a 
dozen Americans in his force, who refused 
to fight, and, much to his credit, he per- 
mitted them to go below. The Constitu- 
tion's complement of men was four hundred 
and fifty, all newly shipped. 

The character and peculiarities of this 
victory have been justly described, by 
Cooper, as consisting in a fine display of 
seamanship in the approach, extraordinary 
efficiency in the attack, and great readiness 
in repairing damages, all of which denote a 
disciplined man-of-war. Nor diil Captain 
Dacres lose any professional honor by his 
defeat. He had handled his sliip in a 
manner to win the applause of his enemies, 
and only submitted when further resist- 
ance would have been as culpable as, in 
fact, it was impossible. Less can be said in 
favor of the efficiency of the Guerriere's 
batteries, which were not equal to the mode 
of fighting introduced by her antagonist, 
and which, indeed, was the commencement 
of a new era in combats between single 
ships. Never was any firing so dreadful. 



The news of this brilliant and unexam- 
pled victory — the first, in fact, of any 
importance, as yet obtained by the United 
States in the present contest, — was 
received with rapturous applause by the 
American people, especially in view of the 
vie' ">ry having been achieved on the water, 
an element upon which scarcely any Euro- 
pean nation dared to cope with Brit- 
ish prowess. The event was therefore as 
mortifying to the pride of England as can 
possibly be imagined ; for, in the long 
period of thirty years up to this date, it 
was Britain's boast that she had not lost a 
single frigate in anything like an equal 
conflict. By the English journals, the 
American navy was contemptuously spoken 
of as " a few fir-built frigates, manned by 
a handful of dastards and outlaws ! " But 
the generositj' and heroism of Cajjtain 
Hull and his crew extorted praise even 
from the vanquished. Captain Dacres, in 
his official letter, confesses their conduct 
to have been " that of a brave enemy- — the 
greatest care being taken to prevent our 
men losing the slightest article, and the 
greatest attention being paid to the 
wounded." This victory of Hull, on the 
ocean, went far to wipe out the stain upon 
American arms produced by General Wil- 
liam Hull's unfortunate campaign in 
Canada, The victory of the Constitution 
over the Guerriere was soon followed bj 
the capture of the Frolic by the Unitec. 
States sloop-of-war Wasp, under Lieuten- 
ant Biddle ; the capture of the Macedo- 
nian, a large frigate, by Commodore 
Decatur, of the frigate United States ; and 
the capture of the frigate Java, on th(! 
twenty-ninth of December, by Commodord 
Bainbridge, who had succeeded Hull in 
command of the Constitution. 

An amusing anecdote is related of 
Dacres, showing the effect of circum- 
stances upon the gallant captain's temper. 
A short time previous to her capture by 
the Constitution, the Guerriere had fallen 
in with, and taken, a French prize, France 
and England being then at war. Among 
the jiassengers transferred on this occasion 
to the deck of the Guerriere, was a French 



1G4 



TKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEli. 



gentleman charged with di.siiatches to tlie 
American government, and wlio, on pre- 
senting himself to the Briti.sh commander, 
was dispossessed of his books and papers, 
and peremptorily ordered to go below. 
Overwhelmed with this sudden and fatal 
termination of his mission, the gentleman 
passed several days in great distress of 
mind, aggravated not a little by the 
haughty bearing of Dacres. Once or 
twice, addressing him with his blandest 
manner and best English, he said — 

" Captain Dacre, I tank you, sare, for 
my government deespatch and my law 
books." 

" Go below ! you frog-eating, sallow- 
faced wretch," was the only reply of the 
proud Briton. 

Ere long, however, a sail was descried 
on the edge of the distant horizon. Her 
gradually-increasing size gave token that 
she approached, and, as she neared to 
view, the tapering spars and the graceful 
trim of Yankeedom were seen. Dacres, 
with glass in hand, had observed her from 
3 mere speck, and as soon as he was satis- 
fied that she was American, gave vent to 
the wildest expressions of joy. He paced 
the deck with exulting step — sv>'ore he 
would ' take that craft in fifteen minutes,' — 
and, to crown his anticipated triumph, 
directed that a hogshead of molasses be 

hoisted upon deck, ' to treat the 

Yankees.' Strange as it may appear, this 
order was actually olieyed ; and, at almost 
the first shot, the Constitution struck the 
hogshead, and, its contents spreading over 
the deck, conduced somewhat, no doubt, to 
the Guerriere's disadvantage in the action. 
The Frenchman, who was meanwhile a 
silent thougli not an uninterested observer 
of what was passing before him, again 
put on his most winning smiles, and 
remarked — ■ 

" Captain Dacre, sare, wid your permis- 
sion I stay upon deck, and see de fight." 

"Go to the ," responded the rough 

old salt — now busied in preparations for a 
bold and brilliant achievement. 

The little Frenchman was soon snugly 
unsconced among the rigging, and the two 



vessels continued gradually and silently to 
approach each other. The Constitution 
having finally got within reach of the 
enemy's long-guns, the scene that followed 
is thus described by the lively "deesjiatch" 
bearer: — "Captain Dacre, he sail dis way, 
and den he sail dat way, and again he go 
— boom ! De Yankee man, he say nothing 
— but still keep comin'. Again, Captain 
Dacre sail dis way, and den he sail dat 
way, and again he go—hooiii .' Enfin, de 
Yankee man go jjojj, pop, pop, — pop, pop, 
pop ! I say to Captain Dacre, ' Sare, wid 
your permission I go below — ^tis too hot 
'her,'!'" 

He went below ; and the action con- 
tinued. When the firing ceased, the sleep- 
less little Frenchman, peeping up the 
hatchway, espied one oflicer-like man, and 
Captain Dacres handing his sword. The 
truth flashed upon him in an instant. He 
rushed upon deck ; and finding himself 
again at liberty, he capered about like one 
' jiossessed.' Finally advancing to the 
now mute and fallen Dacres, he said, with 
an air which utterly defies description : 

" You tell me, sare, you take dis ship in 
fifteen minutes ; by gar, he take you .' 
Now, sare," he added, with a low and 
bitter emjihasis, '• / tank you for my gou- 
erinni'iit dcespatcJi and law hooks." 

As has already been stated, the crew of 
the Constitution became somewhat impa- 
tient at Hull's cool delay to commence 
action, after receiving the Guerriere's first 
fire. Even Morris, on seeing his favorite 
coxswain carried by a shot, looked rather 
hard at ' the old man,' as Hull, though 
young in year.s, was familiarly called, and 
then walked up to him. saying, by way of 
hint, in a low tone, " The ship is ready for 
action, sir, and the men are getting impa- 
tient." Hull nev'er turned, but, keeping 
his eye steadily on the enemy, simply 
replied, " Are — you — all ready, Mr. 
Morris ? " " All ready," said the lieuten- 
ant. "Don't fire a gun till I give the 
orders, Mr. Morris," was the rejoinder. 
Presently, up went a midshipman from the 
main deck, and, touching his cap. said to 
' tlie old man,' " First division all ready, 



CAPTURE OF THE CxUEERlEEE BY THE CONSTITUTIOX — 1812. 165 



sir, — the second lieutenant reports the 
enem3''s shot liave Iiiirt liis men, and he 
can with difficulty restrain them from 
returning their fire." " Tell them to wait 
for orders," was Hull's repl^' again, with- 
out deigning to turn his head. At length, 
however, when the Constitution had actu- 
ally become enveloped in the enemy's 
smoke, and even the old gun-boat men 
began to stare wonderingly, up jumped the 
great-hearted Hull in the air, slapped his 
hand ou his thigh with a report like a 
pistol, and roared out in a voice that 
reached the gunners in the magazines, — 

" Now, Mr. Morris, give it to them, — 
now give it to them, — fore and aft, — round 
and grape, — give it to 'em, sir, — give it to 
'em. ! " 

These words were scarcely uttered, 
before a whole broadside glanced at half 
pistol shot — the old ship trembling from 
her keel to her trucks, like an aspen, 
with the roar and crash of her own guns, 
— then, instantly shooting ahead and 
doubling across the enemy's bows, another 



broadside was poured into her, with 
three deafening cheers. It was terrible. 
The continual boom and flash of the 
batteries seemed like a thunder-storm in 
the trojjics. 

The Constitution arrived in Boston 
harbor, the last of August. Never did any 
event spread such universal joy over the 
whole country, and such astonishment 
throughout Europe, as this complete and 
magnificent victory. The gallant Hull, 
as well as his equally-gallant officers and 
crew, were received with enthusiastic dem- 
onstrations of gratitude, wherever they 
appeared. He was presented with the 
freedom of all the cities, on his route to the 
seat of government, and with elegant serv- 
ices of silver-plate, also tlie thanks of leg- 
islative and other bodies ; several officers 
were promoted ; and congress voted fifty 
thousand dollars to the crew, as a recom- 
pense for the loss of the prize. 

At home and abroad, the valor of the 
American sailor was acknowledged to be 
a fixed fact. 



XVI. 

GENERAL JACKSON'S TERRIBLE ROUT AND SLAUGHTER 
OF THE BRITISH ARMY AT NEW ORLEANS.— 1815. 



His Cousummate Generalship in the Order aud Conduct of this Campaign. — The War witli England 
Terminated by a Sudden and Splendid Victory to the American Arms. — Jackson is Hailed as One 
of the Greatest of Modern Warriors, and as the Deliverer and Second Savior of His Country — 
National Military Prestige Gained by this Decisive Battle. — British Invasion of Louisiana. — Prepar- 
ations to Resist Them. — Jackson Hastens to New Orleans. — His Presence Inspires Confidence. — 
Martial Law Proclaimed — Progress of the Britisli Forces. — They Rendezvous at Sliip Island. — • 
Pirates aud Indians for Allies, — Cajiture of the United States Flotilla. — Arrival of Veterans from 
England — Desperate Attenijits at Storming. — Both Armies Face Each Other. — The Day of Action, 
January Eighth. — General Pakeuham Leails the Charge. — His Motto, " Booty and Beauty." — Fire 
and Death Open Upon Them. — They are Mown Down Like Grass. — Pakeuham Falls at the Onset. 
— Panic aud Precipitate Retreat- — America's Motto, " Victory or Death." — The Result at Home and 
Abroad. — Startling aud Impressive Effect. 



'■ The redcoate will find out whom Ihey have to deal with. I will smash them, so help me God!"— General Jaceso^, on assuming 

THE DEFENSE OK NEW ORI-SANS. 




AMFKII AN DEFENSES AT NEW ORLEANS. 



T IS a fact fiuitful of the most suggestive reflections, 

that, had the facilities of communication by steam 

and electricity been enjoyed in 1815, as they are at 

the pre^>ent time, the battle of New Orleans, and 

the blood which flowed so freely on that memorable 

occasion, would have been spared ; for, onlj' two 

weeks previous to the sanguinary conflict, namely, on the 24th 

of December, 1814, the treaty of peace between the United 

States and Great Britain was signed at Ghent, by the ap- 

ointed commis.sioners, — a most joyous event to all, but the 

tilling^ of which did not, unfortunately, reach the contending 

armies in Tjouisiana, until several weeks after the battle took 

place. Nevertheless, perhaps no other battle in American 

annals, up to that period, had given such prestige to the valor 

of American arms, nor can any estimate be made of the 



4 



GEXERAL JACKSON AT NEW ORLEANS — 1815. 



167 



immense consequences of that victoiy to 
General Jackson and his country. Mr. 
Bancroft, the historian, says that the 
heroes of antiquity would have contem- 
plated with awe the unmatched hardihood 
of Jackson's character. 

The circumstances which led to a battle 
so creditable in its result to the genius 
and hraverj' of the American arnij' were 
as follows : On the twenty-fifth of August, 
1814, a British army landed at Pensacola, 
and took forcible possession of the place, 
being aided by the Spaniards in all their 
proceedings ; thej' collected all the Indians 
that would resort to their standard ; and 
Colonel Nichols, the chief British com- 
mandei', even sent an officer to the notori- 
ous piratical establishment at Barataria 
to enlist the chief, Lafitte, and his follow- 
ers, in their cause, the most liberal and 
tempting inducements being held out. 
These people, however, showed a decided 
preference for the American cause, and, 
deceiving the Er.glish by delay, convej'ed 
intelligence of their designs to the gov- 
ernor of New Orleans, and frankly offered 
their services to defend the country. Dis- 
appointed in securing their aid, the expe- 
dition proceeded to the attack of Fort 
Bowyer, on Mobile point, commanded by 
Major Lawrence. The result, however, 
was a loss to the besiegers of more than 
two hundred men ; the commodore's ship 
was so disabled that they set fire to her, 
and she blew up, and the remaining three 
vessels, shattered and filled with wounded 
men, returned to Pensacola. While the 
British were thus sheltered in this [ilace, 
busily occupied in bringing over the Indi- 
ans to join them, General Jackson, — who, 
after the peace with the Creeks had become 
active commander at the south, — formed 
an expedition of about four thousand men, 
to dislodge them. He summoned the 
town, was refused entrance by the Spanish 
governor, and his flag of truce was fired 
upon ; the British soldiers being also in 
the forts, where their flag had been 
hoisted, in conjunction with the Spanish, 
the day before the American forces 
appeared. Preparations were immediately 



made to carry the place ; one battery 
having been taken by storm, with slight 
loss on either side, the governor surren- 
dered, the English having previously 
retired on board their ships. The forts 
below, which commanded the passage, 
were blown up, and this enabled the 
English fleet to put to sea. 

Returning to Mobile, General Jackson 
learned that preparations were making by 
the British for the invasion of Louisiana, 
and with especial reference to an attack 
on New Orleans. 

He accordingly hastened to New Orleans, 
which he found in great alarm and confu- 
sion. He at once put in operation the 
most rigorous measui'es of defense. The 
militia of Louisiana and Mississipjii were 
ordered out en masse, and large detach- 
ments from Tennessee and Kentucky. 
From a previous correspondence with Gov- 
ernor Claiborne, General Jackson had been 
informed that the city corps had, for the 
most part, refused obedience to the orders 
which had been given them to turn out ; 
that thej' had been encouraged in their dis- 
obedience by the state legislature, then in 
session in the city : and that, although 
there were many faithful citizens in the 
place, there were many others who were 
more devoted to the interests of Spain, and 
others still wiiose hostility to the English 
was less observable than their dislike to 
American government. 

Under these circumstances, and finding 
that the statements relative to the disaf- 
I fection of the populace were fully confirmed, 
Jackson, on consultation with the gover- 
nor, in conjunction with Judge Hall, and 
many influential persons of the city, on 
the sixteenth of December, issued an 
order, declaring the city and environs of 
New Orleans to be under strict martial 
law. 

Nor were the military modes and plans 
adopted by General Jackson, outside of 
the city proper, wanting in efficiency. 
Fort St. Philip, which guarded the passage 
of the river at the detour la Plaquemine, 
was strengthened and placed under the 
command of Major Overton, an able and 



168 



n;oM COLONY to woeld towee. 



skillful engineer. A site was also selected 
for works of defense, four miles below the 
cit}', where its destinies were ultimately to 
be determined. The right rested on the 
river, and the left was flanked by an 
impenetrable cypress swamp, which ex- 
tended eastward to Lake Pontchartrain, 
and westward to within a mile of the river. 
Between the swaniii and tlie river was a 
large ditch or artificial bayou which had 
been made for agricultural objects, but 
which now served an important military 
purpose. On the northern bank of this 
ditch, the entrenchments were thrown up, 
and large quantities of cotton-bales so 
arranged, that the troops could be 
effectually protected from the fire of the 
British. Each flank was secured by an 
advance bastion, and the latter protected 
by batteries in the rear. These works 
were well mounted with artillery. Oi)po- 
site this position, on the west bank of the 
river, on a rising ground. General Morgan, 
with the city and drafted militia, was sta- 
tioned ; and Commodore Patterson, with 
the crews of the Caroline and Louisiana, 
and the guns of the latter, formed another, 
near General Morgan's ; both of which 
entirely enfiladed the approach of an 
enemy against the principal works. A 
detachment was stationed above the town, 
to guard the jiass of the bayou St. John, 
if an attempt should be made from that 
quarter. 

On the twenty-second of December, the 
enemy proceeded from their rendezvous on 
Ship island, with all their boats and small 
craft capable of navigating the lake to the 
bayou Bienvenue, and having surprised 
and captured the videttes at the mouth of 
the bayou, the first division accomplished 
their landing unobserved. Major-General 
Villery, of the Kew Orleans militia, living 
on the bayou, to whom the important 
service of making the first attack, and 
giving notice of the enemy's approach was 
intrusted, found them on his own planta- 
tion, nine miles below the cit3', without 
any previous knowledge of their approach. 

The morning of New Year's day, 1815, 
was very dark and foggy amid the swamps 



and bogs of New Orleans, and the day was 
somewhat advanced before the Americans 
discerned how near the enemy had ap- 
proached to them, or the novel use which 
had been made of their molasses and sugar 
hogsheads. In the course of the day, 
under cover of these batteries, three 
unsuccessful attempts were made to storm 
the American works. By four in the 
afternoon, all the enemy's batteries were 
silenced, and the next night found them 
in their former position. 

On the fourth of January, General 
Adair arrived, with four thousand Ken- 
tucky militia, jirincipally without arms. 
The muskets and munitions of war, des- 
tined for the supply of this corps, were 
provided at Pittsburg, but did not leave 
that place until the twenty-fifth of Decem- 
ber, and arrived at New Orleans not until 
several days after the decisive battle of 
January eighth. On the sixth, the enemy 
received their last re-enforcement of threfe 
thousand men from England, under Major- 
General Lambert. But before the final 
assault on the American lines, the British 
general deemed it necessary to dislodge 
General Morgan and Commodore Patter- 
son, from their positions on the right 
bank. These posts so effectually enfiladed 
the approach to General Jackson's works, 
that the army advancing to the assault, 
must be exposed to the most imminent 
hazard. To accomplish this object, boats 
were to be transported across the island 
from lake Borgne to the Mississippi ; for 
this purpose the British had been labori- 
ously employed in dee]ieuing and widening 
the canal or bayou Bienvenue, on which 
they first disembarked. On the seventh, 
they succeeded in opening the embank- 
ment on the river, and completing a com- 
munication from the lake to the Missis- 
sippi. In pushing the boats through, it 
was found, at some places, that the canal 
was not of sufficient width, and at others 
the banks fell in and choked the passage, 
thus occasioning great delay ; at length, 
however, they succeeded in hauling through 
a sufficient number to transjwrt five hun- 
dred troops to the right bank. 



GENERAL JACKSON AT NEW ORLEANS — 1815. 



169 



Ou the left bank, where General Jack- 
son in person commanded, everything was 
in readiness to meet the assault when it 
should be made. The redoubt on the 
levee was defended by a company under 
Lieutenant Ross. The regular troops 
occupied that part of the entrenchment 
next to the river. General Carroll's divi- 
sion was in the center, supported by Gen- 
eral Adair's Kentucky troops ; wliile the 
extreme left, extending for a considerable 
distance into the swamp, was protected by 
the brigade of General Coffee. How soon 
the onset should take place, was uncertain ; 
at what moment rested with the enemy, — 
with the Americans, to be in readiness for 



pace with the zeal and preparation of the 
enemj-. He seldom slept ; he was alwu) & 
at his post, performing the duties of both 
general and soldier. His sentinels were 
doubled, and extended as far as possible in 
the direction of the British camp; wliile a 
considerable portion of the troojis were 
constantly at the line, with arms in their 
hands, readj' to act, when the first alarm 
should be given. Tor eight dajs did the 
two armies remain thus upon the same 
field, in battle array and in view of each 
other, without anj'thing decisive on either 
side being effected. Tvpice, since their 
landing, had the British columns essayed 
to effect by storm the execution of their 



Q^J^^-z^^-^o^c^^^ 



resistance. There were majiy circum- 
stances, however, favoring the belief that 
the hour of contest was fast approaching ; 
the unusual bustle, — the efforts of the 
enemy to carry their boats into the river, 
— the fascines and scaling-ladders that 
were preparing; all these circumstances 
indicated the hour of attack to be near at 
hand. General Jackson was not only 
unmoved by these appearances, but, accord- 
ing to General Eaton's statements, he 
anxiously desired a contest, which, he 
believed, would give a triumph to his 
arms, and terminate the hardships of his 
soldiers. Unremitting in exertion, and 
constantly vigilant, his precaution kept 




plans, and twice had failed and retired 
from the contest. 

The eighth of Januanj, 1815, at length 
arnved. The day dawned ; and the sig- 
nals, intended to produce concert in the 
enemy's movements, were descried. On 
the left, near the swamp, a sky-rocket was 
perceived rising in the air; and presently 
another ascended from the right, next the 
river. They were intended to announce 
that all was prepared and ready, to proceed 
and carry by storm a defense which again 
and again had foiled their utmost efforts. 
Instantly the charge was made, and with 
such rapidity, that the American soldiers 
at the outposts with difficulty fled in. 



170 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



The British batteries, wliich had been 
demolished on tlie first of tlie month, had 
been re-established during the preceding 
niglit, and heavy pieces of cannon mounted, 
to aid in their intended operations. Tliese 
now opened, and showers of bombs and 
balls were poured upon our line, while the 
air was lighted with their congreve rock- 
ets. The two divisions, commanded by 
Sir Eilward Pakenhau'. in person, and 
sujoported by Generals Keane and Gibbs, 
pressed forward ; the right against the 
center of General Carroll's command, — 
the left against our redoubt on the levee. 
A thick fog, that obscured the morning, 
enabled them to approach within a .short 
distance of our entrenchment, before they 
were discovered. They were now perceived 
advancing, with firm, quick, and steady 
pace, in column, with a front of sixty or 
seventy deep. The American troops, who 
had for some time been in readiness, and 
waiting their ajipearance, gave three deaf- 
ening cheers, and instantly the whole line 
was lighted with the blaze of their fire. 
A burst of artillery and small-arms, poui'- 
ing with destructive aim upon them, 
mowed down their front, and arrested their 
advance. It was a perfect sheet of fire 
and death I 

The havoc and horror before them — the 
terrible carnage which swept down their 
advancing ranks, — became at last too 
great to be withstood, and already were 
the British troops seen wavering in their 
determination, and receding from the con- 
flict. At this moment, Sir Edward Paken- 
ham, the distinguished commander-in-chief 
of the British forces, hastening to the 
front, endeavored to encourage and inspire 
them with renewed zeal. His example, 
however, was of short continuance, for, 
when near the crest of the glacis, he 
received a ball in the knee; still continu- 
ing to lead on his men, another shot soon 
pierced his body, and he was carried in 
mortal agony from the field, in the arms of 
h'S aid-de-camp. Nearly at the same time, 
Major-General Gibbs, the second British 
officer in command, received a mortal 
wound when within a few vards of the 



lines, and was removed. The third in 
command also, Major-General Keane, 
while at the head of his troops near the 
glacis, was terril)ly wounded, and at once 
borne away. 

At this moment, General Lambert, — 
who had arrived from England but two 
days before, and found himself now the 
only surviving general, — was advancing at 
a small distance in the rear, with the 
reserve, and met the columns precipitately 
retreating, broken and confused. His 
efforts to stop them were unavailing, — 
onward they continued in their headlong 
retreat, until they reached a ditch, at the 
distance of four hundred 3'ards, where a 
momentary safety being found, the pant- 
ing and fear-stricken fugitives were i-al- 
lied, and halted. 

The field l>efore them, over which they 
had so confidently advanced, was strewed 
with the dead and dying. Imminent 
danger faced them ; yet, urged .and en- 
couraged by their officers, who feared 
their own disgrace involved in the failure, 
they again moved to the charge. They 
were already near enough to deploy, and 
were endeavoring to do so ; but the same 
constant and unremitted resistance that 
caused their first retreat, continued yet 
unabated. Our liatteries had never ceased 
their fire ; their constant discharges of 
grape and canister, and the fatal aim of 
our musketr\', mowed down the front of 
the columns as fast as they could be 
formed. Satisfied nothing could be done, 
and that certain destruction awaited all 
further attempts, they forsook the contest 
and the field in disorder, leaving it almost 
entirelv covered with the dead and 
wounded. It was in vain their ofiicers 
endeavored to animate them to further 
resistance, and equally vain to attempt 
coercion. The panic produced by the 
dreadful repulse they had experienced, — 
the sight of the field on which they had 
acted, covered with the ghastly bodies of 
their countrymen, — and the bitter fact 
that, with their most zealous exertions, 
they had been unable to obtain the 
slightest advantage; all these circum- 



GENERAL JACKSON AT NEW ORLEANS — 1815. 



171 



stances were well calculated to make even 
the mobt submisM^t s 1 li i t i ^i tin 




intiiont} til It would ba^e contiolkil liini 
The decided advantage of the Americans 



gave to the conduct of the enemy more of 
til. liTacter of madness than of valor. 
As has already been stated, the 
fall of General Pakenham and 
the two next in command de- 
volved the leadership upon 
Lambert, the only general offi- 

■er left upon the field, and to 
whom had been consigned the 
rliarge of the reserve ; and 
though, meeting the discom- 
fited troops in their flight, he 
endeavored to restore the for- 
tune of the day, the effort was 
3 truitless to the last degree. 
^ On the ninth. General Lam- 
bert determined to relinquish 
xltogether so desperate and 
hopeless an enterprise, and 
immediately commenced the 
necessary preparations, though 
with the utmost secrecy. It 
was not until the night of the 

ighteenth, however, that the 
ISritish camp was entirely 

vacuated. 
The loss of the British in 
this fatal expedition was im- 
mense, the narrow field of strife 

etween the opposing combat- 
mts being strewed with dead. 
So dreadful a carnage, consid- 

ring the length of time and 
the numbers engaged, has sel- 
lom been recorded. Two thou- 
^and, at the lowest estimate, 

ressed the earth, besides such 
>f the wounded as were not 
ible to escape. The loss of the 
\mericans did not exceed seven 
killed, and sis wounded. Mili- 
tary annals do not furnish a 
more extraordinary instance of 
lisparity in the slain, between 
the victors and vanquished. 
The entire British force en- 
.jaged in this attempted reduc- 
tion of New Orleans, amounted 
to twelve thousand men ; the 
Anting., J numbered some six thousand, 
chiefly militia. 



172 



TKOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



Pakenham, the distinguished leader of 
the British forces, was a brother-in-law of 
the great Ihike of Wellington, had long 
been in high repute for military skill and 
personal bravery, and on this occasion 
numbered among his troops those who had 
won laurels of victor^' on the battle-fields 
of Europe. But, that he felt convinced of 
the magnitude and hazard of his present 
undertaking, as distinguished from all 
previous ones, is evident. When an officer 
leads his troops on a forlorn attempt, he 
not unfrequently places before them allure- 
ments stronger than either authority or 
duty. According to General Eaton's his- 
torical statements, a positive charge is 
made against General Pakenham, in this 
respect, — inducements having been lield 
out by him, than which nothing more 
inviting could be offered to an infuriated 
soldiery. By this gallant but misguided 
general, there was promised to his soldiers 
— to excite their cupidity — the wealth of 
the city, as a recompense for their gal- 
lantry and desperation ; while, with brutal 
licentiousness, they were to revel in lawless 
indulgence, and triumph, uncontrolled, 
over female innocence. The history of 
Europe, since civilized warfare began, may 
be challenged to afford an instance of such 
gross and wanton outrage. The facts and 
circumstances which were developed at the 
time, left no doubt on the minds of the 
American officers, but that ' Bootij and 
Beautij' was the British watchword of the 
day. The information was obtained from 
prisoners, and confirmed by the books of 
two of their orderly sergeants taken in 
battle. 

Jackson was well aware, frcmi the first, 
of the bold and reckless character of the 
enemy he had to deal with. With patri- 
otic indignation he declared: "The red- 
coats will find out whom they have to deal 
with. 1 will smash them, so help me 
God 1 " And the spirit with which he led 



his men forward may be easily judged of 
from his emphatic exclamation — •' Remem- 
ber, our watchword is ' Victor// or Deaf Ji /' 
We will enjoy our liberty, or perish in the 
last ditch ! " Never before did a general 
bring upon his troojss such a spell of 
enthusiastic devotion to himself, and to 
the demands of the hour. So, too, in the 
flush of triumph, he did not forget mercy 
and magnanimity. " General Jackson," 
saj's Blackwood's Magazine, of London, 
" behaved with humanity ?nd generosity 
to all his prisoners, which did him as great 
honor as his conduct in the defense. We 
do not hesitate to call him a great maii." 
Such was the encomium bestowed upon 
him by the pen of an enemy, — one of 
the most influential organs of British 
opinion. 

At this time, the person of General 
Jackson is described as being neither 
robust nor elegant. He was six feet and 
one inch high, remarkably straight and 
spare, and weighing about one hundred 
and forty-five pounds. His physique 
appeared to disqualify him for hardship ; 
yet, accustomed to it from early life, few 
were capable of enduring fatigue to the 
same extent, or with less injury. His 
dark blue eyes, with brows arched and 
slightly' projecting, possessed a marked 
expression; but when from any cause 
excited, the^^ sparkled with peculiar luster 
and penetration. In his manners he was 
pleasing — in his address commanding. 
His countenance, marked with firmness 
and decision, yet beamed with a strength 
and intelligence that struck at first sight. 
In his deportment, he was eas}-, affable, 
familiar, and accessible to alL 

The annunciation of the triumphant 
defense of New Orleans was hailed, in 
every section of the country, with accla- 
mations of delight, and won for Jackson 
the title of " the conqueror of the con- 
querors of Napoleon." 



XVII. 
THE EYER-MEMORABLE SEPTEMBER GALE.— 1815. 



Its Violence and Destructiveness Without a Parallel Since the Settlement of the Country. — Terror 
Excited by Its Sudden and Tumultuous Force. — Unprecedented Phenomena of Tempest, Deluge and 
Flood. — One Hour of Indescribable Havoc on the Land and Sea. — Premonitory Indications. — Heavy 
North-east Kains. — Sudden and Violent Changes of Wind. — Its JRapidity and Force Indescribable — 
DemoUtion of Hundred,s of Buildings. — Orchards and Forests Instantly Uprooted. — Raging and 
Foaming of the Sea. — Its Spray Drives Like a Snow-storm over the Land. — Tremendous Rise in the 
Tides. — Irresistible Impetuosity of the Flood. — Several Feet of Water in the Streets. — Innumerable 
Fragments Fill the Air. — Flight for Safety to the Fields. — The Whole Coast Swarms with Wrecks. 
— Perils, Escapes, Fatalities. — Peculiar Meteorological Facts. — Bright Skies in the Midst of the Tem- 
pest. — Suffocating Current of Hot Air. — Sea Fowls iu the Depths of the Interior. — Effect Upon 
Lands, Crops, and Wells. — All New England Desolated. — Comparison with Other Gales. 



— •' still overhead 
The miriBling tempest wears Its gloom, and ktill 
The deluge deepens; till the fields around 
Lie sunk and Hutted in the sordid wave. 

All that the winds had spared, 
In one wild moment ruined." 




CJDGING from all the information, historical 

luiil traditional, relating to the great American 
gales (luring the last hundred years, it would 
apjiear that the one which occurred in New 
iMigland, on the 23d of September, 1815, was 
and is still without a jsarallel, in its extraordi- 
nary characteristics of violence and destruc- 
tiveness. In the history of the countr}', 
dating back to its earliest annals, there is no 
account of any gale or hurricane equaling 
this, in its various phenomena of suddenness, 
severity and power. As distinguishing it, 
therefore, above all others of its class, this 
has ever since been called the Great Septem- 
her Gale. 

The observations of the character, course 
and effects of this wonderful storm, made hy 
Professor Farrar and others, for the latitude 
of Boston, show that it was there preceded by 
rain, which continued to fall for about twenty-four hours with a moderate wind 
from the north-east. Early in the morning of the twenty-third, the wind shifted 
to the east, and began to lilow in gusts accompanied with showers. It continued 



DEsrUUCTION BV THE GI!E.\T GALE AND FLOOD. 



174 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



to change toward the south and to increase 
in violence while the rain abated. Be- 
tween nine and ten o"clofk in the fore- 
noon, it began to excite alarm. Chiinne3's 
and trees were blown over both to the 
west and north ; but shingles and slates, 
that were torn from the roofs of buildings, 
were carried to the greatest distance in the 
direction of about three points west of 
north. 

Between half-past ten and half-past 
eleven o'clock, the greatest destruction 
took place. The rain ceased about the 
time the wintl shifted from south-east to 
south ; a dear sky was visible in many 
places during the titmost violence of tlie 
tempest, and clouds were seen flying with 
great rapidity in the direction of the wind. 
The air had an unusual appearance. It 
was considerably darkened by the exces- 
sive agitation, and tilled with the leaves 
of trees and other liglit substances, which 
were raised to a great height and whirled 
about in eddies, instead of being driven 
directly forward as in a common storm. 
The rivers raged and foamed like the sea in 
a storm, and the spray was raised to the 
height of sixty or one hundred feet in the 
form of tliin white clouds, which were 
drifted along in a kind of wave form, like 
snow in a violent snow-storm. Travelers 
were frequently driven back by the force 
of the wind, and were obliged to screen 
themselves behind fences and trees or to 
advance oblicjuely. It was impossible for 
even the stoutest man to stand firm in a 
place exposed to the full force of the wind. 
The pressure of the wind was like that- 
of a rapid current of water; pedestrians 
could with great difficulty hear each other 
speak at the distance of two or three 
yards; and they moved about almost as 
awkwardly as if attempting to wade in a 
strong tide. 

In Boston harbor, the sea had risen 
unusually high, two hours before the calen- 
dar time of high water. But the direction 
of the wind at this time tended to coun- 
teract the tide, and thus secured the port 
from that awful calamity which threatened 
it. Great losses, however, were sustained 



from the wind alone ; many buildings 
were blown down, great numbers were 
unroofed or otherwise injured, and few 
entirely escaped. The most calamitous 
destruction befell the trees, — orchards and 
forests exhibiting a scene of desolation, 
i the like of which had never before been 
witnessed in America. The roads in many 
places were rendered impassable, not only 
through woods, but in the more cultivated 
towns, where they happened to be lined 
with trees ; and the streets in Boston and 
neighboring towns were strewed with the 
ruins of innumerable gardens and fruit- 
yards. A considerable proportion of the 
large and beautiful trees in Boston mall, 
and in other public walks, some of which 
trees measured from eight to twelve feet 
in circumference, were torn wp hy the 
roots and prostrated. Apple trees, in 
especial, being separated at a considerable 
distance from each other, were overturned 
in great numbers ; no less than five thou- 
sanil ice.re thus destroyed in the town of 
Dorchester alone. In this same town, 
also, seventeen houses were unroofed, sixty 
chimneys blown over, and about forty 
barns demolished. 

Rhode Island felt the full force of this 
remarkable gale, Providence suffering to 
the amount of millions of dollars, accom- 
panied with a fearful loss of life, as in 
other places. This was owing to the wind 
blowing directly np the river on which the 
place is built, unbroken by the cape or 
Long Island, and in sweeping over such 
an extent of water it accumulated a dread- 
ful and most destructive tide, so that 
cessels irerc actually driven over the 
irharces tnid throuyh the streets. Early 
in the morning, the wind was north-east, 
but, at about eight, it shifted to south-east, 
and soon began to blow violently, continu- 
ing to increase until ten, when it became 
a luirricane. All was now confusion and 
disma^f in the exposed region. The tide, 
impelled by the tempest, overflowed the 
wharves; vessels, broken from their moor- 
ings in the stream, and their fastenings at 
the wharves, were seen driving with dread- 
ful impetuosity towards the bridge, which 



THE EVEE-MEMORABLE SEPTEMBEE GALE — 1815. 



175 



they swept away, without a moment's 
check to their progress, and passed on to 
the head of the basin, where they drove 
high up tlie bank. Everj^ exertion to 
protect property, was rendered futile by 
the violence of the wind, the rapid rise of 
the water, and the falling of trees ; indeed, 
these, with the crashing of chimnej's, 
tumbling upon the houses and descending 
into the streets, together with tiles and 
railings from the tops of buildings, and 
many other s]iecies of dangerous missile 
flying through the air, rendered it perilous 
tc appear in the streets. All considera- 
tion of property, however, was soon for- 
gotten in the more important one of self- 
preservation. The tempest stiU raged 



elements, were seen removing the panic- 
stricken inmates; and on the east side, an 
awful torrent rolled through the main 
street, in depth nearlj- to a man's waist, 
and by which boats, masts, bales of cotton, 
and immense cjuantities of property of 
every description, were driven along with 
resistless force. It was an aicful and te)"- 
rific scene. Everj' store below, on the 
east side, was either carried away or com- 
pletely shattered ; and every building on 
the opposite side and on the wharves, were 
swejJt from their foundations — so that all 
the space, where, an hour or two before, 
were so many valuable wharves and stores 
crowded with shipping and merchandise, 
was now one wide waste of tumultuous 




THE EVER-3IEM(1UAIU 



with increasing violence ; the flood was 
overwhelming the lower parts of the town ; 
stores and dwelling-houses were tottering 
on their foundations, and then, plunging 
into the deluge, blended their shattered 
remains with the wrecks of vessels, — the 
whole passing, with irresistible impetuos- 
ity, in full view, on the current to the head 
of the cove, to join the already accumu- 
lated mass of similar wrecks. 

By this time, the water on the west side 
of the river had risen nearly to the tops of 
the lower windows of the houses, and boats 
and scows, struggling with the maddened 



water. Only two small vessels, of all that 
were in the harbor, succeeded in riding 
out the gale, all the rest having drifted 
ashore, or been carried high up on the 
wharves. It was such a scene of wide- 
spread ruin and desolation, as beggars all 
description — vessels of all kinds and in 
every position, blended promiscuousl}', 
with carriages, lumber, wrecks of build- 
ings of every variety, furniture, and tens 
of thousands of fragments from far and 
near, all told the story of universal havoc 
and destruction. Women and ch ildren were 
saved in boats from ehamber-windows. 



17G 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



One flistressing and peculiar scene, 
which took phxce among tlie shipping, will 
serve as a description of a thousand otlier 
cases which occurred during tlie storm. A 
hrig, loaded and reaily for sea, with live- 
stock, drove against the end of a wharf, 
and her head rested on it ; here she hung, 
appearing every moment as if she would 
upset, and plunge her crew into the raging 
flood. The men were seen clinging to her, 
awaiting their fate, as no soul could ven- 
ture to their succor, — the whole distance 
between the vessel and the houses being 
filled with roofs and parts of stores tum- 
bling with the violence of the tempest. 
Expecting every moment to be precipitated 
into the torrent, they determined at last 
upon the final Init perilous attempt to quit 
the vessel and gain the houses. Strug- 
gling with the violence of the gale, and 
with the rolling and bounding materials, 
in endeavoring to get a foothold, they at 
last reached the rear of the houses, where 
some were taken intc the second story, 
and others, unable to be reached, succeeded 
in braving the waves until they swam to a 
place of safety. 

liut it would be absolutely impossible to 
giv>^ an extended detail of the disastrous 
scenes pertaining to each sejjarate locality, 
although some of the incidents and items 
of the gale's destructive effects deserve to 
be cited for their very marvelousness. 
Mention has already been made of the 
devastation in Dorchester, near Boston, — 
unparalleled since its settlement, — result- 
ing in seventeen houses hehig unroofed, 
sixtij chimneys irrostrated, forUj hams 
demolished, and more than Jive thousand 
trees destroyed. The number of buildings, 
large and small, destroyed in Providence, 
was estimated at five hundred, and about 
fifty vessels wrecked. In many instances, 
majestic oaks, which had braved the tem- 
pests an hundred years or more, were 
thrown down, or twisted into shreds ; and 
in Danvers, Mass., tbe venerable pear tree, 
imported and transplanted by Governor 
Endicott, was made terrible havoc with. 
In Chelsea, not far from Danvers, the 
great Elm tree, seventeen feet in girth. 



and which had a jjortico built upon its 
limbs, capable of holding thirty persons, 
was among the wrecked. In the little 
town of Acton, about twenty miles from 
Boston, the damage amounted to forty 
thousand dollars. At Stonington, Conn., 
tlie tide rose seventeen feet higher than 
usual, all the vessels going ashore or sink- 
ings and all the wharves and manj' build- 
ings being destroyed. The fate of one 
citizen of this town was almost as disas- 
trous as that of Job of yore : His house, 
ropewalk, blacksmith's shop, and other 
buildings, with all their contents, were 
swept away, and, melancholy to relate, his 
wife, daughter, wife's mother, and a 
young lady visitor, all perished in the 
billows. All along the New England 
coast, and as far as New York, the damage 
done to the shipping was immense, hun- 
dreds of vessels with their cai'goes being 
wrecked ; and almost every seajiort as well 
as inland town suffering to some degree, 
— in many instances, almost irreparable, in 
kind and extent. Innumerable churches 
were wholly or partially ruined, and the 
number of cattle killed was very great. 
The gale was also severely felt by 
vessels off Cape Hatteras, in the gulf 
stream, off the capes of Delaware, at Sand}' 
Hook, Nantucket Shoals, Cape Ann, Cape 
Henlupen, etc. 

The course of the gale, as ascertained 
from data procured from various points, 
furnishes facts of peculiar meteorological 
interest. Thus, in Philadelphia, there 
was, during most of the night of the 
twenty-second, a gale from the north-east, 
with heavy rain. Early the next day, the 
wind veered to the north-west, the gale 
continuing, with torrents of rain, for sev- 
eral hours. Between eight and nine 
o'clock, the wind slackened, the rain 
ceased, and clouds broke away in the west 
and south. Aliout noon, the weather was 
clear and mild, with a gentle westerly 
breeze. During the greater jjart of the 
afternoon, the sun was obscured with fly- 
ing clouds from the west and north-west. 

In New York, a violent north-east storm 
of wind and rain commenced at night, on 



THE EVER-MEMORABLE SEPTEMBER GALE — 1815. 



177 



the twenty-first ; about two o'clock, tlie 
wind suddenly shifted to the north and 
north-west, blowing with increased vio- 
lence. On the twenty-second, there was a 
gale all day, from the north-east and east, 
■with heavy and incessant rain. The gale 
increased in the evening, continuing until 
four o'clock the next afternoon, though 
most violent at nine o'clock the same fore- 
noon, the wind being north to north-west. 
At New London, Connecticut, the storm 
commenced on Friday, the twenty-second, 
a heavy rain falling during that day and 
night, the wind north-east. Next morn- 
ing, the twenty-third, the wind became 
very violent, and soon after almost a hur- 
ricane. The tide, which commenced flood 
about six o'clock, had, by ten, risen three 
or four feet liigher than was ever known 
before. The rise was so rajsid, too, that 
some of the dwellings were deluged before 
the inhabitants knew of their danger, and 
not more than thirty minutes elajised after 
they thus realized their peril, before the 
waves rose four to six feet in the streets ! 
Stores were soon seen falling before the 
terrible jjower of the tempest, buildings 
were unroofed, giant trees fell. But this 
awful scene of destruction was short. 
Soon after eleven o'clock, the wind shifted 
to the westward and abated ; the sea 
returned with the velocity it came in, 
though it should have run flood until 
twelve ; and the storm ceased. The show- 
ers which fell over the city and neighbor- 
hood were of salt water ; and the leaves of 
the tender fruit-trees and shrubs and of 
many forest trees, without frost, shrunk in 
a few hours after the gale as though they 
had been scorched. Brooks and wells in 
the town and neighborhood became brack- 
ish ; and during the strength of the wind, 
in the eddies, the air was extremely hot 
and suffocating. 

Far into the interior, the tempest swept 
and raged with unparalleled fury. Early 
i.n Saturday morning, the wind became 
very violent, and torrents of rain descended, 
continuing with but short intermissions 
until about half-past ten in the forenoon ; 
at this time, the rain abated, and the wind, 
12 



suddenly shifting to the south-east, blew a 
hurricane, tlte terrible deoustatioii o/ivhic/o 
covered a column or area of sixty miles in 
width. A suffocating current of air as, 
from a hot bath, accompanied the middle 
stage of the tempest. Flocks of gulls, 
from the far-off ocean, were seen after the 
storm in the Worcester meadows, and, as 
evening apjsroached, they flew toward the 
sea. 

Along the seaboard, the effect of the 
tide upon the soil and its productions was 
very marked. Grass was entirely killed. 
There was not a green blade to be seen, in 
anj' place, over which the flood had passed. 
In a few sjDots, near running springs, some 
new shoots appeared in the course of the 
autumn ; but on uplands, none grew until 
aziother season, and then it was not the 
same kind of grass which grew there 
before, excejjting in a verj^ few instances. 
Several cedar-swamps were filled with sea 
water, which, having no outlet, soaked 
into the ground. The trees in these 
swamps perished forthwith, the leaves 
withering and falling off in a verj' short 
time. In the trees cut from these swamj^s 
during the winter following the storm, the 
sap-wood had turned nearly black ; and 
there was scarcely an instance in which a 
cedar-tree survived the effect of the flood 
Pme and oak trees suffered a similar fate, 
excepting a verj' few, which stood near 
the shore, — these latter, perhaps, having 
grown accustomed to the influence of salt 
water, and could better endure the ordeal, 
— though a ver}' great proportion even of 
these perished in a short time. Most of 
(he shrubs and bushes, over which the tide 
passed, perished similarly. It was ob- 
served, however, that one or two species 
of laurel, and the common bayberry, were 
but little if at all injured, and some of 
the swamp whortleberry -bushes survived. 
Apple trees were, generally, on such high 
ground, that the tide did not reach them ; 
only a few were surrounded hy the water, 
and none of them were so situated that the 
■water could remain about them for any 
length of time. They were, nevertheless, 
as much exposed as manj' of the cedars 



378 



TUO'Sl COIOXY TO WORLD POWEE. 



(vhicli died ; but the apple trees continued 
to live, though considerably stinted in 
their growtli. With these excejitions, the 
destruction of vegetable life iu localities of 
this exposure, was very general, if not 
universal. 

Wherever the i-ultivatcd Ltiids were in 
low places near the shore, tliey were of 
course overflowed. In fields wliere Indian 
corn was standing, the roots wcri-, in most 
cases, tor]i out of the grouiul ; ami where 
tliis did not take place, tlie stalks were 
wrenched and twisted, and the spikes 
broken off. The corn, where it had pre- 
viously grown hard or ripe, was fit for 
food, but where the grain had not already 
hardened, it failed to do so, and either j)er- 
isbed in the husk, or very soon after it 
was taken out. It was a common remark, 
that no ])artof the plant could be dried by 
any means, and therefore by far the 
greater part of the harvest was lost, not 
being yet ri])e. Potatoes, an<l other 
vegetable roots, if left in the ground, 
perished ; Imt. where they li:i,<l rii)ened, 
and were taken up within a few days 
after the flood, and well drie I, they were 
good. 



which the tide water did not run, were so 
infected with the taste and cpialities of sea 
water, as tii be totally unfit for domestic 
purposes The inhabitants were obliged 
therefore to transport this necessary article 
for houseb ild uses, from a great distance; 
and travelers who needed it were glad to 
receive it in a measure of tlie smallest 
capacity. In some wells near the shore, 
the water formerly rose and fell with the 
tide, still remaining fresh; but the severe 
and jieculiar discipline of this flood so 
changed their habit, that the water in 
them became of a fixed height, and saltish. 
^Vhe^ the vast and tremendous tide was 
sweeping over the land, the spray arising 
from it w.is very great, over a wide surface 
of country, extending to the furthermost 
of the interior of the northern states. It 
is spoken of as having resembled a drii-iiu/ 
snoiv-storm, tlireiigh which objects could 
be discerned only at short distances. In 
the more northerly regions it was observed, 
immediately after the storm, that a singu- 
lar effect had been produced upon the 
leaves of the trees by the spray ; their 
vitality was destroyed, and they exhibited 
an appearance similar to that which 




>K TlTr. WHIKLW tVl) [11 ItuCGHOCT NKW i:N'r,L.\ND. 



Fresh water, along the se:ilMiai-'i. was, accompanies frost, except that they 

for a long time, a rarity of price, the wells I'etained more of their original color, and 

having been generally overflown and left in some instances they assumed a dark 

full of sea water. Watering-places for red hue, as if they had been well scorched, 

cattle suffered a similar fate ; and so Ibit in other sections along the shore, the 

extensive was the influence of the flood, leaves did not exhibit this pecidiar dis- 

that many wells, pools and streams, into coloration; those which were destroyed by 



rilE EVEE-:iIE:\[OEABLE REPTE:\rBER GALE — 18] f 



179 



tlie flood, bore every mark of death, but 
not of having been burnt, — neither was 
there any thin coating of salt on tlie win- 
dows in these regions, as on tliose in the 
neighborhood of Boston and elsewhere. 

In multitudes of instances, the saltness 
of tlie wells and watering-places continued 
unabated for six months, or until the first 
week of the following March. The winter 
had been severe, and the ground frozen 
very deep until the middle of February, 
wlifci: there were several weeks of moderate 
weather, with soft rains, whicli dissolved 
the snows and opened the ground ; shortly 
after wliich, it was discovered that several 
of tiie wells and ponds were fr".sh. As 
the water in the.- ■ had been tasted but a 
few days previously and was found still to 
retain its disagreeableness, the freshness 
must have taken place suddenly. After 
successive spells of dry weather, these 
wells grew salt again, but not to the same 
degree as before ; and, on the other hand, 
they would l)e fresh, after heavy rains, and 
then become salt again after dry weather, 
the degree of saltness diminishing from 
time to time. This peculiarity continued 
for sevei-al years, in some localities, being, 
of course, a great inconvenience to man 
and beast. 

The center or the limits of this great 
and memorable tempest, scientific investi- 
gators were unable to determine. It was 
very violent at places separated by a con- 
siderable interval from each other; while 
the intermediate region suffered much less. 
Its course through forests was, in some 
instances, marked almost as definitely, as 
where the trees have been newly cut down 
for a road. In these cases, it appears to 
hari- hf'dii a moi'ivg vortc.r, and not the 
rushing forward of the great body of the 
atmosphere. There seems to have been 
no part of the coast of New England which 
escaped its fury, though in Vermont and 
the western parts of New Hampshire its 
severity was much less ; yet still further 
west, on the St. Lawrence, the gale was so 
great as to render it extremely dangerous 
to be upon the river. And what is still 
more remarkable, the storm began to grow 



violent at this place about the same time 
that it commenced near the Atlantic, and 
subsided about the same time. 

As to the direction of the wind, at the 
several places where the storm prevailed, 
Professor Farrar's account states, that, on 
the twenty-second, the wind was pretty 
generally from the north-east. The storm 
commenced to the leeward; but when the 
wind shifted from north-east to east and 
south, along the coa.st of New England, it 
veered round in the opposite direction at 
New York, and at an earlier period. It 
reached its greatest height at this latter 
place about nine o'clock on the morning of 
the twenty-third, wlien it was from the 
north-west; whereas, at Boston, it became 
mo.st violent and devastating about tw-o 
hours later, and blew from the opposite 
quarter of the heavens. At Montreal, the 
direction of the wind was the same as at 
New York, but did not attain its greatest 
height so soon by several hours. The 
barometer descended very fast during the 
morning of the twenty-third, and, when 
the wind was highest, had fallen about 
half an inch. It began to rise as the wind 
abated, and recovered its former elevation 
by the time the air was restored to its 
usual tranquillity. 

According to the investigations made 
by others, and the observations recorded 
at the time, in different places, the follow- 
ing facts are believed to be established, 
namely : That the hurricane commenced 
in the West Indies, and moved northward 
at the rate of twelve or fifteen miles an 
liour. Its course from St. Barts was about 
west-north-west to Tiu'ks Island, and 
thence to Boston — nearl_y on the same 
meridian — it was a curve convex to the 
we.st. Previous to the arrival of the hur- 
ricane in New England, a north-east storm 
had prevailed along the Atlantic coast for 
more than twenty-four hours. For some 
hours previous to the hurricane, there was 
a great and rapid condensation of vapor, 
producing a heavy fall of rain in the line 
of the north-east storm. The hurricane, 
or violent blow, was mostly from the south- 
east, blowing into and at right angles to 



180 



FRO:\r COLOXY TO WOPJ.D POWER. 



the north-east storm, at its soutliern ter- 
mination. As the south-east wind ap- 
proaclied tlie line of tlie north-east storm, 
it was deflected into an east wind. Tlie 
general form of the liurrirane, in and about 
New England, was tliat of an eccentric 
ellipse, with its longest diameter north- 
east and south-west ; wind blowing north- 
east on the north-west side; north-north- 
west, and west-north-west, at its south 
end; south-east on its south-east side, 
curving into an east wind at its junc- 
tion withj the north-east current; wind 
blowing from south at the easternmost 
part of the hurricane. The whole body 
of the hurrii^ane, in the form thus 
described, moved to the north nearly on 
the meridian. 

It is universally admitted, that there is 
no account of a storm or gale in all respects 
so remarkable in its plienomena as this, to 
be found in the history of the United 
States. Other hurricanes there have been, 
]a\'ing waste whatever came in their v:ay, 
but they have been comparatively limited 
in their extent and destruetiveness. 
Morton, in his New England Memorial, 
gives a description of the violent tempest 
that took place soon after th.e first settle- 
ment at Pl^'uiouth. It began on the 
morning of August fifteenth, 1635, very 
suddenly, '■ blew down houses, uncovered 
divers others, divers vessels were lost at 
sea ; it caused the sea to swell in some 
jjlaces so that it arose to twenty foot right 
up and down, and made many Indians to 
climb into trees for their safety ; blew 
down many hunrlred thousands of trees," 
•etc. The tremendous gales of 1723, 1804, 
1818, 1821, 1836, 1841, 1851, 1859, 
:186!>, 186".'. and some others, will long 



be remembered in certain localities, for 
their severity and the loss of life 
and property, on land and sea. which 
attended them ; but neither the memory 
of mail, iwr the annuls of the country, 
from its first settlement down to the 
present time, furnish any parallel to 
the jjeculiur character of the (jreat gale 
of Scjjtemher, 1815. 

Of the storms and floods which occurred 
during the last half of the century, those 
of September and Octolier, 1869, were per- 
haps the most memorable. The devasta- 
tion by the latter embraced the whole 
country between the Nova Scotia coast and 
the Mi.'.issippi, and from the north limits 
of the Canadas to the cotton states. The 
rain fell in torrents for about iovty consec- 
utive hours, the dense clouds descending 
in vast sheets, and a moaning wind accom- 
panying the powerful outpouring. A 
stronger storm was beyond conception. In 
some places, the rain-gauge showed that 
four inches of rain fell in the course of 
twentj'-nine hours, and, during the suc- 
ceeding six hours, 3.34 inches additional, 
— the total fall of water during the storm, 
over a vast region of country, reaching the 
enormous amount of 8.05 inrbe.-. The 
resulting floods on all the streams were 
beyond any ever recorded. The storm was 
so sudden arid unexpected, that no pre-, 
cautions could have been taken, and none 
were. Railroads, telegraph wires, streets, 
bridges, dams, manufactories, houses, lands, 
crops, were utterly or partially' ruined, 
over a wide extent of country ; and such 
an embargo on travel was never known 
before. The pecuniary losses reached 
millions of dollars, and many lives were 
iost. 



XVIII. 

VISIT OF LAFAYETTE TO AMERICA, AS THE GUEST 
OF THE REPUBLIC— 1824. 



His Tour of Five Thousand Miles Tlirough tlie Twenty-Four States. — A National Ovation on the 
Grandest Scale — Cities, States, Legislatures and Governors, Vie in Their Demonstrations of Respect. 
— The Venerable Patriot Enters the Tomb and Stands Beside the Remains of His Great Departed 
Friend, Washington. — Noble Qualities of the Marquis. — A Favorite of Louis XVL — Hears 
of the Battle of Bunker Hill. — Pleads the Cause of the Americans. — Resolves to Join Tlieir 
Army — Freely Consecrates His Vast Wealth. — Equips a Vessel and Embarks. — Introduced to 
General Washington — Admiration of Him by the Chieftain. — One of Washington's Military 
Family. — A Major-General in His Nineteenth Year. — Heroic Fidelity During the War — Subse- 
q lint Vicissitudes in France. — America's Heart-Felt Sympathy. — He Leaves Havre for New York. — 

Enthusiasm Excit- 
ed by His Pres- 
ence. — Incidents, 
Interviews, Fetes. 
— Greetings with 
Old Comrades. — 
— Memories, Joys, 
and Tears — De- 
parts in the United 
States Ship Lafay- 
ette. —His Death 
in 1834. — National 
Grief. 




"Fortunate, fortunate man ! 
I leaven eawtit to ordain tliat 
the electric Bparlt of liberty 
-houldbe condiicted.throuph 
I .afavette, from tiie New 
World totheOld."— Danikl 
Webstek. 



WO names are most intimately and indissolubly associated with 

ts=i=.^i6t«<ire,i I M the dramatic train of military events which led to the establish- 

^^^Wi^^f^,'^ ment of the United States as a nation and government, namely, 
those of Washington and L.\fayette. No two names are, 
down to the present day, more fresh in the love and gratitude of the American people, 
and, until time shall be no more, a test of the fidelity with which that people hold to 
the principles of republican wisdom and virtue that gave them birth, will be their 
admiration of the names of those patriots and heroes. To understand, therefore, 
the significance of that spontaneous outburst of popular enthusiasm which greeted 
Lafayette on his visit to America in 1824, and which made that year one of the mo.st 



182 



FRO:\f COLOXY TO WORLD POW 



memorable in tlie nation's historj-, it will 
only be necessary to glance at the services, 
military ami civil, rendered us liy this 
large-hearted patriot, during the opening 
years of our national existence. Those 
services and that reception form, indeed, a 
national romance. 

Wlien only tliirteen j'ears of age, Lafay- 
ette was left an orphan, and in full posses- 
sion of valualile estates, and master of his 
own affairs. Being for a tinii' at the col- 
lege in Paris, his associations hrouglit him 
into notice at the court of King Louis, and 
he became ijuite a favorite witli that mon- 
arch. He was appointed one of the 
queen's pages, and througli her agency 
received a commission at tlie early age of 
fifteen. He formetl an early attachment 
to a daughter of tlie noble family of 
Noailles, witli wliom he was united in 
marriage at tlie age of sixteen. Adopting 
the profession of a soldier, Lafayette, at 
nineteen, was stationed, as captain of dra- 
goons, at Metz, one of the garrisoned 
towns of France. Here, in 1776, Lafay- 
ette's attention was direi;ted to the conflict 
of liberty in America — the hostilities 
between Britain and her colonies ; and 
while ill conversation with the Duke of 
Gloucester, brother to George the Third, of 
England, lie elicited facts that led him to 
see the whole merits of the case. The 
battle of Bunher Hill and the Declaration 
of Independence fired his heart! Before 
rising from the dinner-table at wjiich this 
interview occurred, Lafayette had resolved 
to leave his home, and offer himself and 
his services to the rising i-epublic, whose 
cause he regarded as just and noble. From 
that hour he could think of nothing but 
this chivalrous enterprise, though awai-e 
that it would cut him off from the favor 
of that brilliant court-circle in which he 
shone so conspicuously, and that he would 
also have to tear himself away from his 
young, beautiful, and fondly attached 
wife, who alone, among all his associates, 
approved of his intention. 

Proceeding to Paris, he confided his 
scheme to two young friends, Count Segur 
and Viscount Noailles, and proposed that 



tliey sliould join him. Tliey entered with 
enthusiasni into Ins views, but, owing to 
obstacles put ill their way through family 
interference, tliey were prevented from 
following out their course, but faithfully 
kept their comrade's secret. He nest 
explained his intention to Count Broglie, 
who advised him to abandon it at once as 
in the highest degree chimerical and haz- 
ardous. The count assured him that his 
confidence was not misplaced; but, said 
lie— 

"I have seen your uncle die in the wars 
ot Italy, I witnesscil your father's deatli at 
the battle of Mindeii, and I will not be 
accessory to the ruin of the only remaining 
branch of the family." 

But, .so far from being disheartened by 
the unpromising reception which Lafay- 
ette's plan met with from those to whom 
ho nia.de known his purposes, liis ardor 
was rather increased in the pursuit of his 
object. '■ My zeal and love of liberty," 
said he, " have perhaps been hitherto the 
jjrevailing inotives ; but now 1 see a 
chance for usefulness, which I had not 
anticipated. I have money ; I nill pur- 
chase a ship, which sliall convey to Amer- 
ica myself, my companions, and the freight 
for I'ongress." All this, as the sequel will 
show, he nobly and self-sacriPcingly car- 
ried out. 

This design was now made known liy 
Laf.ayette to Messrs. Franklin, Lee, and 
Deane, the American commissioners at 
Paris ; and to a proposal so disinterested 
and generous they could, of course, make 
no objection, — could only admire, indeed, 
the spirit which actuated it ; and he hast- 
ened immediately to put it into execution. 
After surmounting the many difliculties 
which from time to time interrupted the 
progress of his plans, he at last set sail, 
the ISaron de Kalb and eleven other offi- 
cers of various ranks, in pursuit of em- 
jiloyment in the American army, consti- 
tuting his retinue. In due time they 
approached the shore near Georgetown, 
South Carolina, having fortunately escaped 
two British cruisers, and soon proceeded 
to Charleston harbor, where a niagnificeiit 



THE VTRTT OY LAFAYETTE TO AMERICA — 1824. 



183 



reception was given them. The vessel 
was subsequentl\' loaded with rice for the 
French market, but it foundered in going 
out of the harbor, and both the vessel and 
the cargo became a total loss. 

But Lafayette had not j'et reached his 
destination. As soon, however, as all 
things were in readiness, the part^' left 
Charleston and traveled *^o Philadelphia, 
where congress was then sitting. On 
iirriving there, he put his letters into the 
hands of Mr. Lovell, chairman of the com- 
mittee on foreign affairs. He called the 
next day at the hall of congress, and Mr. 
Lovell came out to him and said, that so 
many foreigners had offered themselves for 
employment, that congress was embar- 
rassed with their apjjlication, and he was 
sorry to inform him there was very little 
hope of his success. Lafayette suspected 
that his papers had not been read, and he 




immediately sat down and wrote a note to 
the president of congress, in which he 
desired to be permitted to serve in the 
American army on two conditions : first, 
that he should receive no pay ; second, 
that he should act as a volunteer. These 
terms were so different from those de- 
manded by other foreigners, and presented 
so few obstacles on the ground of any 
interference with American officers, that 
they were at once accepted. His rank, 



zeal, perseverance, and disinterestedness, 
overcame every objection, and he was 
appointed a major-general in the American 
arnij' before he had reached the age of 
twenty. 

But he was yet to stand before the face 
of the great American chieftain. Wash- 
ington was at head-quarters when Lafay- 
ette reached Philadelphia, but, being daily 
expected in the city, the young general 
cuneluded to wait his arrival, instead of 
presenting himself at camp. The intro- 
duction of the youthful stranger to the 
man on whom his career depended was, 
however, delayed only a few days. It 
took place in a manner peculiarly marked 
with the circumspection of Washington, 
at a dinner-party, where Lafayette ^vas 
one among several guests of consideration. 
Washington was not uninformed of the 
circumstances connected with Lafayette's 
arrival in this country ; and it may well 
lie supposed that the eje of the father of 
his country was not idle during the re- 
past. But that searching glance, before 
which pretense or fraud never stood 
undetected, was completely satisfied. 
When they were about to separate, 
Washington took Lafayette aside, spoke 
to him with kindness, complimented 
liim upon the noble spirit he had shown 
and the sacrifices he had made in favor 
of the American cause, and then told 
him that he should be pleased if he 
would make the quarters of the com- 
nuinder-in-chief his home, establish him- 
' self there whenever he thought proper, 
and consider himself at all times as one 
of his familj', — adding, in a tone of pleas- 
antry, that he could not promise him the 
luxuries of a court, or even the con- 
veniences which his former habits might 
have rendered essential to his comfort, but, 
since he had become an American soldier 
he would doubtless contrive to accommo- 
date himself to the customs, manners and 
privations of a republican armj'. Such 
was the reception given to Lafaj'ette, by 
the most sagacious and observant of men ; 
and the personal acquaintance, thus com- 
menced, ripened into an intimacy, a con- 



J 84 



ir.OM COJ.OXY lO WOliJ.l) rOAVEll. 



Bdence, and an affection without bounds, 
and never fur one nionient interrupted. If 
there lived a man wlioni Washington 
loved and admired, it was Lafayette. 

Gloriously did Lafayette fulfill, in his 
military cai'eer, the high hopes which 
swelled the liearts of American patriots, in 
the heroic courage which he displayed at 
Br;indywine, wliere he received a ball in 
his leg ; his success in Jersey, before he 
had recovered from his wounds, in a battle 
wliere he commanded militia against Brit- 
ish grenadiers; in the liriiliant retreat, 
by which he eluded a combined maneuver 
of the whole British force ; by his great 
services in the enterprise against Rhode 
Island, and his successful movements 
against Cornwallis; — all these proofs of 
his patriotism and military shill, together 
with his warm and unsullied friendshiiJ 
for Washington, through all the varying 
fortunes of war, endeared him forever to 
every American. 

After the fall uf Cornwallis, Lafayette 
sailed for Franc(>, but revisited America 
in 1784. He was received with enthusi- 
asm wherever he went. Returning to 
France, he found himself the object of 
immense popularity, and took his seat with 
the notables, convoked in 17S7. In 17S9, 
he boldly proposed, in the national convo- 
cation, the Declaration of Rights, which 
he had brought from the free soil of Amer- 
ica, as the preliminary of a constitution. 
Proclamation of this world-renowned doc- 
ument was made July 22, audit furnished 
the French people with the metaphysical 
reasons for the '' sacred right of insurrec- 
tion." Meanwhile the Bastile had been 
taken, July 14, the national guard organ- 
ized, and Lafayette appointed to the com- 
mand. In this capacity he rode a white 
charger, and shone the impersonation of 
chivalry, and twice the royal family owed 
their preservation to his address and cour- 
age. When the popular enthusiasm lulled, 
he returned to his native fields; the 
national guard, on his retirement, present- 
ing him with a bust of Washington, and 
a sword forged from the bolts of the Bas- 
tile. Subsequently, having denounced the 



bloodthirsty Jacobins, he was hurned in 
etfigy by the sans-culottes of Paris, and, 
fleeing from the guillotine which there 
awaited him, he finally fell into the bands 
of the Austriaus, and was by them sub- 
jected to a long and cruel imprisonment in 
the fortress at Olniutz. His release, so 
earnestly but unsuccessfully solicited by 
Washington, was peremptorily demanded 
by Napoleon, and obtained, in September, 
1797. In the year ISIS, he became a 
member of the chamber of deputies, and, 
resuming his career as an advocate of con- 
stitutional principles, succeeded at last in 
elevating Louis Philijipe to the throne of 
France. 

By this time, Lafayette had grown old 
in the services he had rendered to America 
and France. Though bis 3'ears were now 
nearly three score and ten, he could not 
think of meeting death until lie had once 
more seen that land of liberty across the 
wide Atlantic, which was as dear to him as 
his native country. In its infancy, and 
for its freedom, he had, fifty years ago, 
contriljuted his wealth and shed his blood, 
sharing the bosom confidence of the greal 
Washington as did no other human being. 
That struggling little republic had now 
become a giant nation; the thirteen states 
constituting the original galaxy, had be- 
come almost double that number, and vast 
as the empires of antiquity in territory. 
Remembering his magnificent services, in 
1824 the congress of the United States 
voted unanimously a resolution requesting 
President Monroe to invite Lafayette to 
visit the United States, as the nation's 
guest, — an honor never before accorded a 
foreign nobleman, — and tendering a ship 
of the line for his conveyance. This invi- 
tation was extended to the great French 
p.atriot in President Monroe's most happy 
manner, and was duly accejjted, though 
the offer of a war-ship was declined. 

On the twelfth of July. 1824, Lafayette, 
accompanied by his son, George Washing- 
ton Lafayette, and his secretary, M. Levas- 
seur, sailed from Havre for America. He 
arrived in New York, August fifteenth, 
and landed on Staten Island. One of the 



THE VISIT OF LAFAYETTE TO AMEEICA — 1S21. 



185 



first to greet him was Jose])li Bonapartf, 
brother of the great Napoleon. Josejjh 
then resided at Bordeutown, New Jersey ; 




SWORD OF HOMOR VRESENTED TO LAFAYETTE. 

he .lau always cherished a high regard for 
the Marquis, and greatly valued his 
friendship. The interview between the 
two was attended n ith the warmest emo- 
tions ; and whoever has seen Sully's por- 
trait of the great French patriot can form 
some adequate conception of the chieftain's 
magnificent bearing on this occasion. 

The announcement of his arrival sent a 
thrill of joy to every American heart and 
home, and the great pageant of his recep- 
tion commenced in the city where he first 
set foot forty years before. As the fleet 
arrived off the battery at New York, a mili- 
tary line composed of thousands of veter- 
ans was formed, and the people, crowding 
the battery and all the adjacent streets, 
swelled the throng to the number of forty 
thousand. The patriot was deeply affected 
when he exchanged congratulations with 
his old companions and friends. Shout 
after shout went up in long and loud 
acclaim, while the bands of music played 
a triumphant welcome to the hero. His 
stay m the cit3' was one unbroken succes- 



sion of high honors and civic laudation, 
such as liings might envy ; at Albany, he 
was received by Vice-President Tompkins. 
Ou proceeding to New England, the same 
enthusiasm was exhibited in every city, 
town, and village. From the residence of 
Hon. William Eustis, the governor oi 
Massachusetts, in Eoxburv, he was es- 
corted by a large cavalcade and almost the 
entire population, to Boston, where a 
dense assemblage awaited his appearance. 
Arriving at the line, he was greeted by 
the mayor of the city and the people, 
through whom he passed in a superb car- 
riage, under df>afening cheers. The streets 
were lined with sjiertators to the entrance 
of the beautiful common. There, the 
children of the public schools formed two 
lines, the girls being dressed in spotless 
white, and the boys in white pants and 
blue jackets, and all wearing appropriate 
badges. A little girl sprang forward from 
the line as Lafayette was passing, and, at 
her request to speak to him, was lifted 
into the carriage, when she gracefully pre- 
sented him with a wreath of flowers, which 
the venerable hero received with affecting 
courtesy. While going from town to town, 
he found in every jilace some of the 
descendants of 1776, ready to give him 
the heartiest of welcomes. Thus, when 
visiting Marblehead, in Massachusetts, the 
marquis manifested much curiosity at so 
many ladies being mingled with the male 
citizens, who had been deputed to receive 
him. The spokesman of the occasion, 
perceiving the pleasant surprise of the 
marquis at this jaeculiar feature, said to 
him — 

" These are the widows of those who 
perished in the revolutionar3' war, and the 
mothers of children for whose liberty you, 
illustrious sir! have contended in the field 
of battle. They are now here in the 
places of their husbands, many of whom 
were once known to you." 

It may here be remarked, that Marble- 
head was the " banner town " for furnish- 
ing soldiers, in the revolutionary war, 
there being a larger proportion to the 
whole number of inhabitants from that 



186 



FR0:\1 COLOXV TO WORLD POWEE. 



to.vn than hjiv otlier jilace in tlie United 
States. The Britisli armed vessels llo^•e^- 
iiit>' on tlie i-oast destroyed tile eoastiiig 
and fishing business, and thus the loss of 
men in the war fell heavily upon the small 
■iea[)Ort towns ; for, lieing out of emplny- 
.nent, nearly all the young and old men 
shouldered their muskets and joined the 
army. 

At Philadelphia he was welcomed with 
almost idolizing enthusiasm; for tender 
and thrilling indeed were the assoc-iations 
which linked together the history of the 
past and present nf that city, in the person 
and services of Lafayette ; the hospitali- 
ties of tlie state were appropriately dis- 
jieiisi-d liy Governor Shultze. On landing 
at ISaltimore. he was conducted to the 
'tent of Washington,' and the freedom of 
the state and city confi'rred upon him in 
an address hy Governor Stevens. For 
some time Lafayette i-mild not jn'ecisely 
understand the conipliuient conveyed in 
the selection of the tent — especially one of 
that construction — for 
such proceedings. It 
w IS soon ni ide plain, 
ho\\e\ei foi, ginning 
xiound he iKogni/ed 
a poition ot \\ islinig- 




liim, he said, in a voice tremulous with emo- 
tion, "/ rcmi'mhev!" Proceeding to 
AVashington, Lafayette was received with 
open arms by President Monroe, at the 
executive mansion. Congress had just 
assenililed in regular session, at the capitol. 
He was introduced to both houses, and was 
formally and elegantly addressed by Mr. 
Clay, speaker of the house of representa- 
tives, the two branches unanimously unit- 
ing in their legislative honors to the 
nation's guest. At this session the sum 
of two hundred thousand dollars, together 
with a "township, consisting of twenty- 
four tliousand acres of fertile land, was 
voted by congress to General Lafayette, as 
an e.xpression of the grateful memory with 
which the peojijle of America regarded his 
services in their behalf. A few of the 
members felt themselves constrained, from 
some doubts resjiecting its constitution- 
ality, to vote against this appropriation. 
Lafayette, taking one of them by the 
hand, said to him with considerable feel- 
ing: 

" I appreciate your views. If I hac 
been a member, I sliould have voted with 
you, not only because I partake of the sen- 
timents which determined your votes, but 
also because I think that the American 
nation has (hme too much for me." 
Most characteristic of Lafayette's 
disinterestedness and magnanim- 
ity was that remark ! 

At this time, Governor Pleas- 
ant was chief magistrate of the 
•Old Dominion,' and warmly wel- 
comed the na- 
■(^•^^ tion's guest. The 
-\ . ■ - 'f- emotions experi- 
Sj' a, enced by Lafax- 
*§■*" fH ette, as he once 
;'^> , ?■■' '"'' more trod the bat- 
/'ifeti-'-v'"-., tie-fields of Vir- 
c a n o f 



,^,,,vi;v;<'%i*fr\ ffinia, 

"-A^l'lIiAV ^ 1 Ji 1 

,.>,^?' -^ y course hardly be 

described. York- 



town, distinguish- 
ton's personal equipage i ed for the surrender of Cornwallis, 
during the war; and I which event gave the finishing blow- 
turn ing to one near I to the war, presented a vast field 



THE VISIT OT LAi'AYETTE TO AMEKICA — IbiH, 



lb: 



of tants at the reception of Lafayette. 
Tlie same liouse occupied by Coniwallis, as 
his head-quarters in 1781, was still stand- 
ing. The general appearance of the place 
gave evidence of a deserted village. The 
ileuses of yore, which had been riddled 
with balls and blackened with smoke, still 
retained the marks of battle. In many 
parts of the ground were seen broken 
shells, and gun-carriages, with various 
implements of war, — some on rocks, and 
others Jialf buried in the earth ; every 
arrangement having been made to give the 
town, on Lafayette's arrival, the appear- 
ance of a place taken and occupied after a 
severe contest in battle. One of tlie tents 
erected on this occasion, was the one used 
bj^ Washington at the time of the siege, 
togetlier with others which had furnished 
temporary' apartments for weary soldiers 
during the eventful campaign. An arch, 
bearing the names of Lafayette, Hamilton, 
and Laurens, was erected on the very spot 
where the redoubt stood which was stormed 
b}- Lafayette ; an obelisk was also erected, 
bearing the names of distinguished French- 
men. And on the same spot it is said 
that the orator of the occasion was design- 
ing, at the close of his address, to place a 
blended civic crown and national wreath 
in honor of Lafayette, who, while he 
acknowledged the unique compliment, 
gracefully averted its consummation, and, 
taking the symbolic garland in his hand, 
called for Colonel Fish, the only survivor 
of the attack upon the redoubt, and 
declared that half the honor belonged to 
him. AVashingt(ni's marquee was erected 
on the plain, just out of the village. Be- 
ing escorted to this tent, Lafayette gave 
an affecting welcome to the officers of the 
militia. Two old veterans were there, who 
had faced the enemy in war, and stood firm 
in the midst of the roar of the cannon ; 
but as they pressed the hand of Lafayette 
on this occasion, the old heroes wept and 
fainted. Some of the servants who were 
present discovered in an obscure corner of 
a cellar a large box of candles, bearing 
marks of belonging to Cornwallis'.s military 
stores — having remained uudisturlu'd for 



forty-thi-ee years. They were lighted fof 
the evening, and notwithstanding the 
fatigues of the day, some of the old .soldiers 
remained till the last vestige of these Brit- 
ish candles had expired in the sockets. 

Taking Camden, South Carolina — Gov- 
ernor Richard J. Manning, — in his tour. 
Lafayette assisted in laj'ing the corner- 
stone of a monument erected to the name 
and memory of Baron de Kalb, a German 
by Ijirth, who came over in the same vessel 
with Lafayette, in 1776, and volunteered 
his services in the American army for 
three years. He fell while bravely en- 
gaged in the battle at Camden, pierced 
with eleven deadly wounds. It is said 
that Washington, visiting the baron's 
grave many years after his death, sighed 
as he looked upon it, and exclaimed, 
"There lies the brave De Kalb, the gener- 
ous stranger, who came from a distant 
land to fight our battles, and to water with 
his bloo<l the tree of Lil)erty. Would to 
God he had lived to share with us in its 
fruits ! " At Savannah, Georgia, after 
being welcomed bj^ Governor Troup, Lafa}-- 
ette united in the same service connnemor- 
ative of Generals Greene and Pulaski. 
On the seventeenth of June, Lafayette 
witnessed the laying of the corner-stone of 
Bunker Hill monument, at Charlestown, 
Massachusetts; he was the only surviving 
major-general of the revolution who was 
present at this ceremony-. Colonel Francis 
K. Huger participated in the patriotic 
services — the man who, when a lad, walked 
with Lafayette over his father's grounds, 
and who, some thirty years before this 
seventeenth of June, risked his life in 
attempting to aid the escape of Lafa^^ette 
from the castle of Olmutz. The people of 
(Jharlestown not only welcomed Huger, 
but gave him a seat by the side of Lafay- 
ette, in the carriage which moved in the 
procession, and also one near him at the 
festive board. Daniel Webster was the 
orator for the day ; it was the fiftieth anni- 
versary of the battle ; and everything con- 
spired to render the day memorable. As 
the procession passed, Lafayette was con- 
tinually liailed with demonstrations of love 



]S8 



T"RO:\r COLONY TO WORLD TOWER. 



and gratitude. The procession was sev- 
eral miles long, and, on arriving at the his- 
toric spot, the impressive rite of laying the 
corner-stone was performed by the grand 
master of the Freemasons, the ]>i'o?idfiit of 



"^ "w. she ^ as w ilLing out in the for- 




the Monument Association, au<l (General 
Lafayette, in the presence of a vast con- 
course of people. The assembly then 
moved to a spacious amphitheatre, wliere 
the oration was ]ironounced by iNIr. Web- 
ster, before as great a multitude as was 
ever, perhaps, assembled within the sound 
of a human voice. 

There was one place — Kaskaskia, on the 
route of Lafa_yette's tour, at wliich. though 
no preparations had been made to receive 
him, he paused a short time; and here it 
was that a most affecting incident oc- 
curred. Curiosity induced one of his com- 
panions to go and look at an Indian 
encampment, a short distance from the 
town. He there met with an educated 
Indian woman, who spoke the French lan- 
guage tolerably well, and who expressed a 
desire to see Lafayette, and to show him a 
relic which she always carried with her, 
and which was "very dear to her."' She 
wished to show it to Lafayette, as proof of 
the veneration with which his name was 
regarded among their tribes. It was a 
letter written by Lafayette in 1778, and 
addressed to her father, I'anisciowa, a 



chief of one of the si.x nations. This letter 

expressed the hearty thanks of Lafayette 

for the faithful services of that chief in the 

American cause. The name of this only 

child of the old chief was Mary, who, at 

the decease of her mother, was 

plai ed undei the care of an 

'^■'■^i f^^ -'^"" ^'" ^'i' igent, by whom she 

*•(■ J!»^^ ^Ms nistuKted and kindly treat- 

'%^\ 4^:.J ^"'^ ed SIk becxmeaChristiam As 

" ^ " in 

est, aliout five 
vears after, an 
lian warrior 
\ 'Ttook her and 
M formed her that 
j iier father was dy- 
ing, and wished 
i- to see her. She 
soon started off, 
traveled all night, 
lid in the morn- 
ing reached his 
liut, which was 
situated in a narrow valley. As she came to 
his liedside, he took from his pouch a paper 
wrapped in a dry skin, and gave it to her, 
with a charge to jireserve it as a precious 
gift, saying : " It is a powerful charm ta 
interest the pale-faces in your favor. I 
received it from a great French warrior, 
whom the English dreaded as much as the 
Americans loved him, and with whom I 
fought in my youth." The chief died the 
next day. Mary returned to her white 
friends, and soon after married the young 
warrior, who was lier father's friend and 
companion. She had the pleasure of 
showing the letter to Lafayette, who rec- 
ognized it, and listened with great respect 
and deep feeling to her touching story. 

Another most interesting episode was that 
which transpired at Lafayette's reception 
in Nashville, Tenn., Governor Carroll pre- 
siding at the state ceremonies. There had 
come from different parts of the country 
about forty officers and soldiers of the rev- 
olution. Among the number was an aged 
man who had traveled one hundred and 
fifty miles. His name was Hagu_y, a 
German, and he was one of those who 



THE VISIT OF LAFAYETTE TO AMERICA — 1S24. 



1S9 



embarked in the same vessel witli Lafay- 
ette for this countrj', nearly fifty years 
back, and served under him during the 
whole war. The old veteran, clasping 
Lafayette's hand with affectionate 
warmth, the tears rolling down his 
cheeks, said : 

"I have come many miles to see tlie 
' young general.' I have had two hajipy 
days in uij' life — one, when I landed with 
you on the American coast, nearly fifty 
years ago, and to-day when I see your face 
again. I have lived long enough." The 
sensation produced by this scene, in that 
great throng, was for a time completely 
overpowering: 

Not less interesting was the interview, 
at Buffalo, between Lafayette and ' Eed 
Jacket,' the old chief of the Seneca tri1)e 
of Indians. They had botli met in I'ouncil 
at Fort Schuyler, in 1784. Red Jacket, 
in conversation with General Lafayette, 
made some allusions to that famous coun- 
cil, and to those who participated in its 
proceedings, when Lafayette inquired with 
some curiosity — 

" Where is the young warrior, I wonder, 
wlio opposed the burying of the toma- 
hawk ? '■ 

'' He is liere before you," instantly re- 
plied the aged chief. 

" Ah, I see," replied the general, " time 
has changed us. We were once young 
and active." 

" But," said the chief, " time has made 
less change on you than on me." 

Saying this he uncovered his head, and 
exhibited his entire baldness. The gen- 
eral wore a wig, and, not wishing to 
deceive Red Jacket, took it from his liead, 
to the no small amusement of the aston- 
ished Indian. 

A visit to the tomb of Washington was 
one of the most notable events in Lafay- 
ette's tour. His arrival there was an- 
nounced by the firing of cannon, which 
brought to his memory the din of war, — 
the scenes of the revolution, — when he, 
with the great but now lifeless chieftain, 
v/ere side by side in battle. Standing for 
awhile upon the consecrated ground rrad 



amidst tlie solemn stillness of the place, 
he descended alone into the tomb with his 
head uncovered. There he remained in 
solitary contemplation for some time — the 
living aged veteran communing with the 
illustrious dead. He returned witli his 
face bathed in tears, and, taking his son 
and Levasseui', the secretary, by the hand, 
led them into the tomb. He could not 
speak, but pointed mutely to the coffin of 
Washington. They knelt reverently by 
it, kissed it, and. rising, threw themselves 
into the arms of Lafayette, and for a few 
moments wept in silence. Lafayette was 
now' presented, by the hand of Mr. Custis, 
one of the surviving family connections of 
Washingto]!, with a massive finger-ring 
containing a portion of the hair of his 
departed friend. He was also the recipi- 
ent of some otlier personal memorials of 
the '• Father of his Country." 

During this tour Lafayette visited every 
one of the tvvent3'-four states of the Union, 
and traveled over five thousand miles. In 
nearly every region which he visited, 
towns or counties, and literarj', scientific 
or civic associations, named in honor of 
him, still preserve his memory. Indeed, 
one of the foremost of the great colleges of 
the Middle states dates from the same 
period. At Easton, in Pennsylvania, 
the citizens convened on the 27th of 
December, 1824, and resolved to estab- 
lish L.\FAYETTE CoLLEGE, an eminent 
institution of learning, in memory of 
and " as a testimony of respect for the 
talents, virtues and signal sevices, of 
General Lafayette, in the great cause of 
Freedom." 

When the time which he had allotted 
for his tour had expired, Lafayette re- 
paired to Washington, to pay his parting 
respects to the chief magistrate of the 
nation, John Quincy Adams, who had suc- 
ceeded President Monroe. This took 
place at the presidential mansion, on the 
sixth of September, 1825. The farewell 
address from the president, in behalf of 
the whole American people, was a most 
affecting tribute to the lofty character and 
patriotic services of Lafayette, during his 



21)0 



FROM COLOXY TO WOliLD POWEE. 



long and eventful career, and closed with 
tlu- following words : 

'• Vou ;ire ours by that unshaken senti- 
ment of gratitude for your services which 
is a precious portion of our inheritance ; 
ours hy that tie of love, stronger than 
death, which has liidced j-our name for the 
endless ages of time with the name of 
AVasliiiigton. At the painful moment of 




parting with you 
.v^-.. ,,, jI? we take comfort 

in tlie thought 
that, wherever you may be. to the last jud- 
sation of your heart, our country will ever 
be present to your affections : and a cheer- 
ing consolation assures us that we are not 



called to sorrow — most of all, that we 
shall see your face no more, — for we 
shall indulge the pleasing anticipation 
of beholding our friend again. In the 
name of the whole people of the United 
States, I bid you a reluctant and affec- 
tionate farewell." 

To this parting address from the lips of 
the nation's distinguished chief magistrate, 
Lafayette replied in a strain of i)atriotic 
and impassioned eloquence never to be 
forgotten. 

On the same day he embarked for 
France, on board the Brandywine, a new 
' ij:ate, named 
IS in comjili- 
iMiit to Lafay- 
; tc, who, on the 
iiiiiks of that riv- 
1. was wounded 
II his first battle 
or American 
icdom. In the 
» li ole range of 
M>tory, ancient 
or modern, tliere 
is no instance of 
similar Honors being paid to any hero, by 
the united and spontaneous will of a great 
people ; and when, nine years after, he paid 
the debt of nature, that same great people 
gave vent to universal grief, and every 
tongue spoke words of eulog\' to the mem- 
ory of America's most illustrious friend. 



XIX. 

FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY AND CELEBRATION OF THE 
INDEPENDENCE OF THE REPUBLIC— lS:i6. 



Sudden and Simultaneous Death of Ex-Presidents Jolni Adams and Thomas Jefferson, its Two Most 
Ilhistrious Founders — The Day of Resouiuiiiig Joy and Jubilee Chaufied to One of Profound 
National Sorrow. — No Historical Parallel to Such a Remarkahle Coinci'lence — Wirld-Itenowiied 
Career of t:iese Statesmen. — E.xtraordinary Preparations for the Day. — Adams and .Jefferson then 
Alive — Sires and Patriarchs of the Nation — Their Names HousehoM Words. — Invited to Share 
in the Festivities — They Hail the filorious Morn — Great Rejoicint's, Death's Summons. — Jefferson's 
Distinguisliing Honor. — Adams's Patriotic TiUster — Their Imperishable Deeds — Calm yet Hif;li 
Enthusiasm — Hostile Leaders in Alter-Life — Kacy and Piquant Anecdote. — Crisis Point in Adams's 
Fortunes — His Last Toast for His Country, — " Independence Forever." — Two Sages in Old Age — 
Serenity, Wisdom, Dignity — Fotnier Friendshi]) Revived. — Letters of Mutual Attachment. — Euro- 
pean Admiration Excited. — Reverence to their Colossal Fame. 



" Such pnBti nwny: hut they lervi- 
All hope, or love, or truth. "or I.IBEHTY.— 
WhoBefomiB th'ir iri.ghly fiiiirit;* could conceive. 
To be a rule aud low lo ii.e8 thot survive " 




'iOY'OUS, painful, liy sudden and strange transition, to the Ameri- 
can poople, was the Fourth of July, 1826, — the anniversary of the 
hrst half-i-entury of their national existence, and, as it proved, the 
day on which the two chief founders of the repuhlic passed, 
simultaneou.sly, from the scenes of their earthly career to the 
repose anil the rewards of another world; — one of the most remarkaVde coincidences 
that has ever occurred in the history of nations. It was the half-ceutcnniai Juliilee of 
American Independence, and preparations had been made in every jiart of the Union to 
celebrate the august day witl> extraordinarj' demonstrations and observances. John 
Adams and Thomas Jefferson, two illustrious sages, whose names and lives were pre- 
eminently identified with the formation of the government, and. for so many years, 
ft'itli its history and administration, so much so as to have liocome household names 
everywhere, in the nation, were, on this most memorable day, — amid the rejoicings of 
the people, the peals of artillery, tlie strains of music, the exultations of a great 
nation in the enjoyment of freedom, peace, and happiness. — releaseil from the toils 
of life. 

In the personal and public career of these two great patriots, there were many 
points of similarity. In the enumeration of these similarities by Mr. Webster, their 
eloquent eulogist, it appears that they belonged to the same profession, both 
being learned and able lawyers. They were natives and inhabitants, respectively, 
••f those two of the colonies, Massachusetts and Virginia, whiih, at the time of the 



192 



FEOM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



revolution, were the largest and most pow- 
erful, and which naturally had a lead in 
the political affairs of the times. When 
the colonies became in some degree united, 
by the assembling of a general congress, 
they were brought, at an early period, to 
act together in its deliberations. Each 
had already manifested his attachment to 
the cause of the country, as well as his 
ability to maintain it, by jn-inted addresses, 
public speeches, extensive corresjiondence, 
and whatever other mode could be adopted 
for the purpose of exposing the encroach- 
ments of the British parliament, and ani- 
mating the people to a manly resistance. 
Both were not only decided, but early, 
friends of independence. While others 
yet doubted, they were resolved; where 
others hesitated, they pressed forward. 
They were both members of the committee 
for preparing the Declaration of Independ- 
ence, and they constituted the sub-com- 
mittee apjjointed by the other members to 



versary of American liberty — in the very 
midst of the festivities which commem- 
orated the nation's half-centennial jubilee ! 
Wherever the tidings of their decease 
could be flashed, on that eventful day, the 
voices of festivity and mirth were changed 
to those of wonder and mourning. 

Jefferson's imperishable renown consists 
in his having penned the Declaration of 
Independence, rather than in the fact of 
his having filled the highest offices, state 
and national, culminating with that of 
president of the republic. 

On the other liand. to have been fore- 
most among those who foresaw and broke 
the way for the birth of a new nation ; to 
have been the mover of numerous decisive 
acts, the undoubted precursors of the great 
consummation ; to have been among the 
many and towering spirits then engaged 
in defying the mightiest throne in Chris- 
tendom, by acknowledgment unsurpassed 
in zeal, and uneijualed in ability; to have 




THE .lEFFERSON MA20ION AT MOXTrCELLO. 



make the draft. Jefferson was the author 
of that noblest production of statesman- 
ship; Adams was its chief parliamentary 
expositor and triumphant advocate in the 
'assembly of the mighty.' They left their 
seats in congress, being called to other 
public employment, at periods not remote 
from each other. Both became public 
ministers abroad, both vice-presidents, and 
both presidents. All these remarkable 
parallels and coincidences were at last most 
singularly crowned and completed : They 
died together — and they died on the anni- 



been exclusively associated with the au- 
thor of the Declaration ; and then, with a 
fervid and overwhelming eloquence, to 
have taken the lead in inspiring the con- 
gress unanimoush- to adopt and proclaim 
it, — this is the glory of John Adams. 

Mr. Adams connnenced the practice of 
the law in his native town of Quincy. At 
the age of twenty-eight, he was married to 
Abigail Smith, a country clergyman's 
daughter, and an excellent woman with 
whom he lived in wedlock more than fifty 
years. At the age of thirty, he published 



FIFTIETH ANNIVEKSAKY OF INDEPENDENCE — 1S26. 



11)3 



a dissertation on Canon and Feudal Law, 
in wliicli he explained the Puritan princi- 
ples of religion and government, and 
brought them to bear upon the disputes 
between Great Britain and the colonies. In 
1766, he removed to Boston. His profes- 
sional standing was now so high, that, in 
1768, Governor Bernard offered him the 
post of advocate-general of the court of 
admiralty. But Mr. Adams had ranked 
himself decisively with the friends of the 
people ; and had he accepted a lucrative 
oflSce under the crown, although no condi- 
tions were annexed, his course would not 
have been the same as heretofore. In 
truth, the offer must have been intended 
quite as much to silence his political oppo- 
sition, as to secure his legal services. He 
therefore declined it, but gave a noble 
evidence, not long afterwards, that no liase 
subserviency to the people, any more than 
to the government, could make him swerve 
from his own ideas of right. Tl.ls truth 
was shown in 1770, b}' his conduct in ref- 
erence to the Boston massacre, as the 
following account will show. 

The scene of bloodshed in King street, 
Boston, was a natural consequence of the 
relative positions of the soldiery and the 
people. No good feeling could possibly 
exist between them. On the part of the 
troops, the haughty consciousness that 
Britain had made them keepers of the 
province, together with a sense of the 
odium in which they were held, produced 
a contemptuous antipathy towards the 
colonists. 

At the sight of their own blood, shed by 
a hireling soldiery, the ferment of the 
people became terrible, and was shared, 
for a time, by the calmest patriots in New 
England. A multitude, computed at ten 
or twelve thousand, assembled at Faneuil 
Hall, and adjourned thence to the Old 
South Church. There went a rumor, that 
the tragedy in King street had been pre- 
meditated, and was but the prelude to a 
general massacre. For defense against 
this exaggerated, yet not altogether shad- 
owy danger, a militar}* guard was enrolled, 
and the town put itself under martial law 
13 



No British officer or soldier could have 
walked the streets with safety to his life. 

Such was the state of affairs, when John 
Adams, himself the foremost patriot of all, 
and a member of the people's military 
guard, was solicited to undertake the 
defense of Captain Preston, and the sol- 
diers who had tired the fatal vollej', against 
the charge of murder. It was a singular 
compliment to liis integrity, that the 
imprisoned soldiers should have sought the 
aid of a man so situated. 

It does not appear that the confidence 
of Mr. Adams's countrymen in him was 
shaken bj' this act of personal and profes- 
sional indejiendence ; or, if so. it was only 
for the moment. In 1773, he was chosen 
a member of the provincial council, but 
was rejected by the torj- Governor Hutch- 
inson, and afterwards by General Gage. 

In the year 1775, John Adams, as a 
delegate in congress, nominated George 
Washington to the post of commander-in- 
chief of the American armies. The glory 
of originating this choice ajjpears to be- 
long principally to Mr. Adams, and, did 
he need a secondary' reputation, this 
would have been claim enough to his 
country's gratitude. The service cannot 
be too highly estimated. Washington's 
character was of such a nature, that, if 
some sagacious individual had not pointed 
him out, he probabl3' would not have been 
the foremost figure in the public eye. 
Had the selection fallen u[ion another, no 
one can conjecture what would have been 
the result. 

As alreadj' stated, Mr. Adams was one 
of the committee to draft the Declaration 
of Independence; and the calm, yet high 
enthusiasm of the letter in which he 
announced that event to a friend, and 
prophesied that its anniversary would 
become a national festival, must be famil- 
iar to every American. He had a share 
in all the weightiest business of congress, 
and bore the burden of much that was less 
imjiortant, being a member of no less than 
ninety committees, and chairman of twen- 
ty-five. In 1777, he was appointed com- 
missioner to France, to supersede Deane, 



194 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



who was the colleague there of Benjamin 
Franklin and Arthur Lee ; returning home 
in 1779, he was again sent out, in the 
autumn of that year, with powers to con- 
clude a treaty of peace and commerce. In 
1786, the distinguished honor fell to him 
of being appointed the first minister from 
the United States to the court of St. 
James; and, in tliis capacity, was duly 
presented to his long-time political enemy. 
King George the Third. In 1788, he 
returned home. He sulisequently assisted 
in forming the constitution of his native 
state. During the eight years presidency 
of Washington, Mr. Adams was vice-pre.s- 
ident, and, when the former retired from 
ofHce, Mr. Adams, after a hard political 
contest with Jefferson and Thomas Pinck- 
ney, became president of the United 




^/^-^rTZ, 



States. At the end; however, of the first 
four years, Mr. Jefferson canu' in by a tri- 
umphant majority', and President Adams 
retired to domestic life. This was in 1801, 
when he had reached the age of sixty-six. 
His long course of public services was 
now ended. At the iseriod of his retire- 
ment, he did not enjoy the unreserved and 
cordial approbation of any party. Some 
of his measures had gone far towards alien- 
ating tlie federalists by whom he had oeeii. I 
chosen president, and he had bitter ene- i 



mies. Being a man of warm passions, 
Mr. Adams was not slow to resent, nor 
cautious to hide his resentment. He once 
observed, pointing to his own portrait, 
" That fellow could never keep his mouth 
shut!" But he was always frank, and 
inflexibly honest, as is most plainly shown 
by the incidents given in his biography, 
written by Hon. Charles Francis Adams. 

As showing from what accidental cir- 
cumstances often spring the most import- 
ant changes in the lives and fortunes of 
men, the following anecdote is well worthy' 
of a place in this narrative: 'When I was 
a boy,' sa_ys John Adams, ' I had to study 
the Latin grammar, but it was dull, and I 
hated it. My father was anxious to send 
me to ■■ollege, and therefore I studied the 
grammar till I could bear with it no longer, 
and, going to my father, I told him I did 
not like study, and asked for .some other 
employment. It was opposing his 
wishes, and he was quick in bis answer. 
' Well, John,' said he, 'if Latin gram- 
mar iloes not suit you, you may try 
ditching; perhaps that will. My 
meadow yonder needs a ditch, and you 
may jiut liy Latin and try that.' This 
seemed a delightful change, and to the 
meadow I went. But I soon found 
ditching harder than Latin, and the first 
forenoon was the longest I ever expe- 
rienced. That day I ate the bread of 
labor, and glad was I when night came 
on. That night I made some compar- 
ison between Latin grammar and ditch- 
ing, but said not a word about it. I 
dug the next forenoon,' and wanted to 
return to Latin at dinner ; but it was 
humiliating, and I could not do it. At 
night, toil conquered pride, and I told 
my father — one of the severest trials of 
my life — that, if he chose, I would go back 
to Latin grammar. He was glad of it; 
and if I have since gained any distinction, 
it has been owing to the two daj's' labor 
in that abominable ditch.' 

Declining farther and farther into the 
vale of years, and now long removed from 
the dust of contending narties, the hoary 
sage drevr towards his sepulchre. Fot 



FIFTIETH ANNIVERSAKY OF INDEPENDENCE — 1826. 



195 



several days before the fourth of July on 
which he expired, he had been fast failing, 
though, in reply to an invitation to partici- 
pate in the celebration of that day, he 
wrote a patriotic note, full of the fire of 
his best days. Being desired to furnish a 
toast for the occasion, he gave — ' Inde- 
pendence Forever ! ' He was asked if 
anything should be added to it. He imme- 
diately replied, "Not a word!" This 
toast was drank at the celebration in 
Quincy, about fifty minutes before the 
departure of the venerated statesman from 
earth. On the morning of the fourth, 
which was ushered in b}' the ringing of 
bells and firing of cannon, he was asked if 
he knew what day it was ? — " yes," he 
replied, ''it is the glorious fourth of July 
— God bless it ! — God bless j'ou all ! " In 
the course of the day he said, " It is a 
great and glorious day." The last words 
he uttered were, "Jefferson survives!" 
But the spirit of Jefferson had already 
left the body. Among Adams's pall- 
bearers, were President Kirkland, Judge 
Story, Judge Davis, and Lieutenant 
Governor Winthrop. 

Mr. Jefferson, the illustrious comfjeer of 
Adams, was born in Albemarle county, 
Virginia, in 1743, and was entered a stu- 
dent in the college of William and Mary. 
On leaving this seminar^', he applied him- 
self to the study of the law, under the 
tuition of the celebrated George Wythe, 
and was called to the bar in 1766. He 
soon occupied a high stand in his profes- 
sion, and, at the early age of twenty-five, 
entered the house of burgesses of his 
native state. In 1774, he published a 
Summary View of the Rights of British 
America, a bold but respectful pamphlet 
addressed to the king. In 1775, he was 
elected a member of the continental con- 
gress, and in the following j^ear drew up 
the Declaration of Independence, the most 
remarkable document that has ever, in the 
ages of the world, proceeded from an 
uninspired pen. 

Of the committee appointed to draft the 
momentous Declaration, Jefferson, though 
the youngest, was unanimously made 



chairman, his colleagues being John 
Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Frank- 
lin of Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman of 
Connecticut, and Robert R. Livingston of 
New York. Jefferson's draft was taken 
up, in committee of the whole, on the first 
of July, the chair being filled by Benjamin 
Harrison, father of William Henry H:,?- 
rison, president of the United States in 
1840. The great manifesto w-as debatsd,. 
and, after some slight modifications, vas 
agreed to in the course of a three days' 
session. No record of that thrilling debate 
has come down ; only some fragmentary 
reminiscences of the participants of the 
drama. Edward Rutledge, of South Caro- 
lina, is said to have exclaimed, "I should 
advise persisting in our struggle for liberty 
and independence, though it were revealed 
from Heaven that nine hundred and ninetj'- 
nine were to perish, and only one of a 
thousand were to survive and retain his 
liberty." The Declaration was adopted, 
by a unanimous vote, a little past noon, on 
the fourth of July. " Now, gentlemen," 
.said the quaint Dr. Franklin to his col- 
leagues, " we must all hang together, or 
we »\\i\\\ surely hang separately." 

Though what maj' be termed bitter 
political rivals for a long period, — leading, 
respectively, the two great opposing par- 
ties, — time's mellowing iniluence changed 
all this, and the two patriarchal statesmen 
and ex-presidents cultivated a mutually 
warm and generous friendship in theii old 
age. In a letter written by Jefferson to 
Adams, in June, 1822, he says : 

" It is very long, my dear sir, since I 
have written to you. My dislocated wrist 
is now become so stiff, that I write slowly, 
and with pain ; and therefore write as 
little as I can. Yet it is due to mutual 
friendship, to ask once in a while how we 
do ? I have ever dreaded a doting old 
age ; and my health has been generally so 
good, and is now so good, that I dread it 
still. The rapid decline of my strength 
during the last winter, has made me hope, 
sometimes, that I see land. During 
summer, I enjoy its temperature, but I 
shudder at the approach of winter, ajid 



19G 



TROM rOLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



wish I could sleep tlu-ougli it, with the 
dormouse, and only wake with him in 
spring, if ever. They say that Starke 
could walk ahout his room. I am told you 
walk well and firmly. I can only reach 
my garden, and that with sensible fatigue. 
I ride, however, daily ; but reading is my 
delight. I should wish never to put jien 
to paper ; and the more because of the 



Europe, where it excited much commenda- 
tion, on account of the contrast it afforded 
between an old age thus dedicated to 
virtue, temperance, and philosoj)h3-, and 
the heart-sickening details so often per- 
taining to the lives of those who sit upon 
thrones. 

Thougli lie had for some time past been 
failing in his General health, it was not 







THE ADAMS MANSION AT yCINl V. 



treacherous practice some people have, of 
publishing one's letters without leave ; " 
— etc., etc. 

In his reply to the pleasant and cordial 
letter, from which the above few sentences 
are extracted as specimens, Mr. Adams 
says, among other friendly and felicitous 
expressions : 

" Half an hour ago I received, and this 
moment have heard read, for the third or 
fourth time, the best letter that ever was 
written by an octogenarian, dated June 
1st. My sight is very dim, hearing pretty 
good, memory i)oor enough. In wishing 
for your health and happiness, I am veiy 
selfish ; for I hope for more letters. This 
is worth more than five hundred dollars to 
me ; for it has already given me, and will 
continue to give me, more pleasure than a 
thousand ; " — etc., etc. 

This correspondence between the once 
rival presidents of the greatest republic of 
the world, was republished in full, in 



until the first of July 
was confined tu his be 
continued to sinl 



that Mr. Jefferson 
d. On the third, he 
ear the middle of the 



night he asked tnc hour ; and on being 
told that it was near one o'clock, he 
expressed his joy. He expressed an earn- 
est de.jire that he might live to behold the 
light of the next day — the fiftieth anni- 
versary of the independence of his coun- 
try. His prayer was answered. At fifty 
minutes past meridian, July fourth, 1826, 
TJiomas Jefferson ceased to breathe. 

Tlius, these two most illustrious fathers 
of the republic, — associates, rivals, friends, 
— took their flight together to the other 
world, on the most memorable day since 
the birth of the nation, and all classes and 
parties, forgetting the animosities of the 
past, united in paying their common trib- 
ute of reverence to the magnificent fame 
of Adams and Jeffei'son. In the words of 
Webster, their great eulogist, " their 



NAME LIVBTU EVERMORE! 



1" 



XX. 

THE "GREAT DEBATE" BETWEEN WEBSTER AND 
HAYNE, IN CONGRESS.— 1830. 



Vital Constitutional Issues Discussed — Unsurpassed Power and Splendor of Senatorial Eloquence. — 
Webster's Speech Acknowledged to be the Grandest Forensic Acliievement in tlie Whole Range of 
Modern Parliamentary Efforts — Golden Age ot American Oratory. —Unprecedented Interest and 
E.\citenient Produced In the Public Mind — N.i American Debate Comparable with This. — Known as 
the " Battle of the Giants " — Inflamed Keeling at the South. — Hayne's Brilliant Championship. — His 
Speech Against the North — Profound Impression Created — lis Dasli, Assurance, Severity — Bitter 
and Sweeping Charges. — His Opponents Wonder-Struck —Webster has the Floor to Reply. — .^n 
Ever-Memorable Day. — Intense Anxiety to Hear Him. — Magnificent Personal Appearance. — His 
E.xordium. all Hearts Enchained. — Immense Intellectual Range — Copious and Crushing Logic. — 
Accumulative Grandeur of Thought — TlirUling Apostrophe to the Union. — The Serious, Comic, 
Pathetic, etc — Hayne's Argument Demolished — Reception Accorded the Speech. — Rival Orators; 
Pleasant Courtesies. 



•' It has been my fortune to hear some of the ablest epeechen of the greatest living orators on both sides of the water, but I must confess I 
never heard anythinir whict> so rompletely realized my conception of what Demosthenes was when he delivered the Oration for the Crown." 

^EllWARD EVEKETT ON WEBSTER'S SPEECH. 




'Jv.'^i^^ , \^ \,^ = "^^^7/=^ HE remark made by a distinguished public man. 
<*,^u^.rr /x,.>>;>^:3~,-,v<A r kjf^t. rj'i tliat. to have lieard tlie great national debate ill tlie 

senate of the United States, between Webster of 
Massachusetts and Hayne of South Carolina, "con- 
tsM'T" ^^'^^^S^''' ""c" Y^^W'^Sy-'^ stituted an era in a man's life," is an expression 
^IM\ f""^/>~'''°.tP''°''/il^Bjbw^ worthy of being expanded into the far more com- 
mensurate statement that the debate in question 
constituted an era of far-reaching influence and 
importance, in the political history of the nation. 
It was, indeed, the greatest forensic exhibition this 
country has ever witnessed, and, though nearly 
a century has elapsed since its occurrence, and the immediate participants and their 
official contemporaries have, almost all of them, long since passed to the sphere of 
aiKither existence, the occasion still furnishes, and will continue tn fui'uish to future 
generations, one of the most instructive chaiJters in the annals of national affairs. 
Well has the debate been called ' the battle of the giants.' 

Fortunately for those who would wish, in after time, to inform themselves with ref- 
erence to the principles involved and the chief netors engaged m this great debate. 



THE victor's wreath. 



198 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD TOWER. 



the memorials of the occasion furnislieJ 
by Mr. Marcli, and, subsequently, by Mr. 
Lanuian, Dr. Teti't, Louis GaylorJ Clark, 
Edward Everett, and others, leave nothing 
to be supplied. Mr. March's notes are 
adopted by Mr. Everett, in his memoirs of 
Mr. Webster, and, in au abridged form, 
are given below, in connection with the 
perspicuous statements of Tefft and others 
relating to the general issue. The sjseech 
was also reported by Mr. Joseph Gales, 
at the request of Judge Burnett, of Ohio, 
and other senators. On canvas, too, Hea- 
ley, the master-painter, has commem- 
orated in an enduring manner, the orator 
and the occasion. 

The subject of discussion before the 
senate, in the persons of these two intel- 
lectual gladiators, grew out of a resolution 
brought forward by Senator Foot, of Con- 
necticut, just at the close of the previous 
year, with a view to some arrangement 
concerning the sale of tlie public lauds. 
But this immediate question was soon lost 
sight of in the discussion of a great, vital 
j)rinciple of constitutional law, namely : 
the relative powers of the states and the 
national government. Upon this, Mr. 
Benton and Mr. Hayne addressed the 
senate, condemning the policy of the east- 
ern states, as illiberal toward the west. 
Mr. Webster replied, in vindication of 
New England and of the policy of the 
government. It was then that Mr. Hayne 
made his attack — sudden, unexpected, and 
certainly une.xamiiled, — on Mr. Webster 
personally, upon Massachusetts and the 
other northern states politically, and upon 
the constitution itself; in respect to the 
latter, Mr. Hayne taking the position, that 
it is constitutional to interrupt the admin- 
istration of the constitution itself, in the 
hands of those who are chosen and sworn 
to administer it, by the direct interference, 
in form of law, of the states, in virtue of 
their sovereign capacity. All of these 
points were handled by Mr. Hayne with 
that rhetorical brilliancy and power which 
characterized him as the oratorical cham- 
pion of the south, on the floor of the 
senate ; and it is not saying too much. 



that the sjjeech produced a jirofound im- 
pression. 

Mr. Ha3'ne's great effort appeared to be 
the result of premeditation, concert and 
arrangement. He selected his own time, 
and that, too, peculiarly inconvenient to 
Mr. Webster, for, at that moment, the 
supreme court were proceeding in the 
hearing of a cause of great importance, in 
which he was a leading counsel. For this 
reason, he requested, through a friend, a 
postponement of the debate ; Mr. Hayne 
objected, however, and the request was 
refused. The time, the matter, and the 
manner, indicated that the attack was 
made with a design to crush so formidable 
a political opponent as Mr. Webster had 
become. To this end, jiersonal history, 
the annals of New England and of the 
federal 2J'ii't"yj were ransacked for materi- 
als. It was attempted, witli the usual 
partisan unfairness of political harangues, 
to make him responsible, not only for what 
was his own, but for the conduct and opin- 
ions of others. All the errors and delin- 
quencies, real or supposed, of Massachu- 
setts, and the eastern states, and of the 
federal party, during the war of 1812, and, 
indeed, prior and subsequent to that 
period, were accumulated uj)on him. 

Thus it was, that Mr. Hayne heralded 
his speech with a bold declaration of war, 
with taunts and threats, vaunting antici- 
pated triumph, as if to paralyze by intimi- 
dation ; saying that he would carr\' the 
war into Africa, until he had obtained 
indemnit_v for the past and security for the 
future. It was supposed that, as a distin- 
guished representative man, Mr. Webster 
would be driven to defend what was inde- 
fensible, and to ujihold what could not be 
sustained, and, as a federalist, to oppose 
the popular resolutions of '98. 

The severe nature of Mr. Haj-ne's 
charges, the ability with wbirh he brought 
them to bear upon his opjjonents, his great 
reputation as a brilliant and powerful 
declaimer, filled the minds of his friends 
with anticipations of comjilete triumph. 
For two days, Mr. Hayne had the control 
of the floor. The vehemence of his Ian- 



GREAT DEBATE BETWEEN WEBSTEK AXD HAYXE — 1S;JU. 



lii') 



guage and the earnestness of liis manner 
gave added force to the excitement of the 
occasion. So fluent and melodious was his 
elocution, that his cause naturally begat 
sympathy. No one liad time to deliberate 
upon his rapid words, orcanva.ss his sweep- 
ing and accumulated statements. The 
dashing nature of the onset ; the assurance, 
almost insolence, of its tone; tlie serious 
character and apparent truth of the accu- 
sations, confounded almost every liearer. 
The immediate impression from the speech 
was most assuredly disheartening to the 
cause Mr. Webster upheld. Congratula- 
tions from almost every quarter were show- 
ered upon the speaker. Mr. Benton said, 
in the full senate, that much as Mr. Hayne 
had done before to establish his reputation 
as an orator, a statesman, a patriot, and a 
gallant son of the south, the efforts of tliat 
day would eclipse and surpass the whole. 
Indeed, the speech was extolled as the 
greatest effort of the time, or of other 
times, — neither Chatham, nor Burke, nor 
Fox, had surpassed it, in their jmlmiest 
days. 

Satisfaction, however, with the speech, 
even among the friends of the orator, was 
not unanimous. Some of the senators 
knew, for they had felt, Mr. Webster's 
power. The}- knew the great resources of 
his mind; the immense range of his intel- 
lect; the fertility of his imagination; his 
copious and fatal logic; the scathing sever- 
ity of his sarcasm, and his full and electri- 
fying eloquence. Mr. Webster's own 
feelings with reference to the speech were 
freely expressed to his friend, Mr. Everett, 
the evening succeeding Mr. Hayne's clos- 
ing effort. He regarded the speech as an 
entirely unprovoked attack upon the north, 
and, what was of far more importance, as 
an exposition of a system of politics, 
which, in Mr. Webster's opinion, went far 
to change the form of government from 
that which was established by the consti- 
tution, into that which existed under the 
confederation, — if the latter could be called 
a government at all. He stated it to be 
his intention, therefore, to put that theory 
to rest forever, as far as it could be done 



by an argument in the senate-chamber. 
How grandly he did this, is thus vividly 
portrayed by i\lr. March, an ej'e-witness, 
and whose account has been adopted by all 
historians: » 

It was on Tuesday, January the twenty- 
sixth, 1830, — a da\' to be hereafter forever 
memorable in senatorial annals, — that the 
senate resumed the consideration of Foot's 
resolution. There was never before in the 
city, an occasion of so much excitement. 
To witness this great intellectual contest, 
multitudes of strangers had for two or 




ROBERT Y HAVXE. 



three daj-s previous Ijeen rushing into the 
city, and the hotels overflowed. As early 
as nine o'clock in the morning, crowds 
poured into the capitol, in hot haste ; at 
twelve o'clock, the hour of meeting, the 
senate-chamber, — its galleries, floor, and 
even the lobbies, — was filled to its utmost 
capacity. The very stairways were dark 
with men, who hung on to one another, 
like bees in a swarm. 

The house of representatives was early 
deserted. An adjournment would hardly 
have made it emptier. The sjieaker, it is 
true, retained his chair, but no business of 
moment was, or could be, attended to. 
Members all rushed in, to hear Mr. Web- 
ster, and no call of the house, or other par- 
liamentary proceedings, could compel them 
back. The floor of the senate was so 



200 



.FEo:\r roLoxY to v;oKLn powee. 



densely crowded, tlint persons once in 
could not get out. nor cluinge their posi- 
tion. In the re;ir of the vice-president's 
chair, the crowd was particularly dense; 
Hon. Dixon II. Lewis, then a representa- 
tive from Alahania, became wedged in 
here. From his enormous size, it was 
impossible for him to move without dis- 
jilacing a vast portion, of the multitude; 
unfortunately, too, for him, he was 
jammed in directly f.ehind tlie (duiir of the 
vice-president, where he could not see, and 
could hardly hear, the speaker-. By slow 
and laborious effort — p.ausing occasionally 
to breathe — he gained one of the windows, 
which, constructed of painted glass, flanked 
the chair of the vice-president on eitlier 
side. Here he paused, unable to make 
more headway. But determined to see 
Mr. Webster, as he spoke, with his knife 
he made a large hole in one of the j)anes 
of glass. The courtesy of senators ac- 
corded to the fairer sex room on the floor 
— the most gallant of them, their own 
seats. 

Seldom, if ever, has speaker in this or 
any other country, had more powerful 
incentives to exertion ; a sidiject, the 
determination of which involved the most 
important interests, and even duration, of 
the republic ; comijetitors, unequaled in 
reputation, ability, or position ; a name to 
make still more renowned, or lose forever ; 
and an audience, comprising not only 
American citizens most eminent in intel- 
lectual greatness, Init representatives of 
other nations, where the art of eloquence 
li.id flourished for ages. 

]Mr. Weljster perceived, and felt equal 
to, the destinies of the moment. The very 
greatness of the hazard exhilarated him. 
I lis spirits rose with the occasion. He 
awaited the time of onset with a stern and 
impatient joy. He felt, like the war-horse 
of the scriptures, who ' paweth in the 
valley, and rejoiceth in Ifis strength : who 
goetli on to meet the .armed men, — who 
sa3-eth among the trumpets, ha, ha! and 
who smelleth the battle afar off, the thun- 
der of the captains and the shouting.' A 
confidence in his resources, springing from 



no vain estimate of his pow'er, but the 
legitimate offspring of previous severe 
mental discipline, sustained and excited 
him. He had gauged his opponents, his 
subject, and fiinisi'/f. He was, too, at this 
period, in the very prime of manhood. He 
had reache<l middle age — an era in the life 
of man, when the faculties, physical or 
intellectual, may be supposed to attain 
their fullest organization, and most perfect 
development. Whatever there was in 
him of intellectual energj' and vitality, the 
occasion, his full life and high ambition, 
might well bring forth. 

He never rose on an ordinary occasion 
to address an ordinary' audience more self- 
possessed. There was no tremulousness in 
liis voice nor manner; nothing hurried, 
nothing simulated. The calmness of supe- 
rior strength was visible everywhere ; in 
countenance, voice, and bearing. A deep- 
seated conviction of the extraordinary 
character of the emergency, and of his 
ability to control it, seemed to possess him 
wholly. If an oliserver, more than ordi- 
narily keen-sighted, detected at times 
something like exultation in his ej'e, he 
presumed it sprang from the excitement of 
the moment, and the anticipation of 
•(•ictory. 

The anxiety to hear the speech was so, 
intense, irrejsressible, and universal, that 
no sooner had the vice-president assumed 
the chair, than a motion was made and 
unanimously carried, to postpone the ordi- 
nary preliminaries of senatorial action, and 
to take up immediately the consideration 
of the resolution. 

Mr. Welister rose and addressed the 
senate. His exordium is known by heart 
everywhere : " Mr. President, when the 
mai-iner has lieen tossed, for many days, in 
thick weather, and on an unknown sea, he 
natur.ally avails himself of the first pause 
in the storm, the earliest glance of the 
sun, to take his latitude, and ascertain how 
far the elements have driven him from his 
true course. Let us imitate this prudence ; 
and before we float further, on the waves 
of this debate, refer to the point from 
which we departed, that we maj-, at least, 



GREAT DEBATE BETWEEN WEBSTEK AXD llAYA'E — ls30. 



lU] 



be able to form some conjecturo wliere we 
now are. I ask for tlie reading of the res- 
olution." Calm, resolute, impressive, was 
this opening utterance. 

There wanted no more to enchain the 
attention. There was a spontaneous, 
though silent, expression of eager approba- 
tion, as the orator concluded these opening 
remarks. And while the clerk read the 
resolution, many attempted the impossibil- 
ity of getting nearer the speaker. Every 
head was inclined closer towards him, 
every ear turned in the direction of his 
voice — and that deep, sudden, mysterious 
silence followed, which always attends full- 
ness of emotion. From the sea of up- 
turned faces before him, the orator beheld 
his thoughts reflected as from a mirror. 
The varying countenance, the suffused eye, 
the earnest smile, and ever-attentive look, 
assured him of the intense interest excited. 
If, among his hearers, there were those 
who affected at first an indifference to his 
glowing thoughts and fervent periods, the 
difficult mask was soon laid aside, and 
profound undisguised, devoted attention 




DANIEL WEBSTER. 

followed. In truth, all, sooner or later, 
voluntarily, or in spite of themselves, were 
wholly carried away by the spell of such 
unexampled forensic eloquence. 

Those who had doubted Mr. Webster's 
ability to cope with and overcome his 



opponents were fully satisfied of their- 
error before he had proceeded far in his 
speech. Their fears soon took another 
direction. When they heard his sentences 
of powerful thought, towering in accumu- 
lative grandeur, one above tlie other, as 
if the orator strove, Titan-like, to reach 
tlie very heavens themselves, the^' were 
giddy with an apprehension that he would 
break down in his flight. Tlie^- dared not 
believe, that genius, learning, — any intel- 
lectual endowment, liowever uncommon, 
that was simply- mortal, — could sustain 
itself long in a career seemingly so jierd- 
ous. They feared an Icarian fall. 

No one, surely, could ever forget, who 
was present to hear, the tremendous — the 
awful — burst of eloquence with which the 
orator apostrophized the old Baj- State 
which Mr. Hayne had so derided, or the 
tones of deep pathos in which her defense 
was pironounced : " Mr. President, I shall 
enter on no encomium upon Massachusetts. 
There she is^behold her and judge for 
yourselves. There is her history; the 
world knows it by heart. The past, at 
least, is secure. There is Boston, and 
Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill, 
— and there they will remain forever. 
The bones of her sons, falling in the great 
struggle for independence, now lie min- 
gled with the soil of every state, from New 
England to Georgia ; and there they will 
lie forever. And, sir, where American 
liberty raised its first voice, and where its 
youth was nurtured and sustained, there it 
still lives, in the strength of its manhood 
and full of its original spirit. If discord 
and disunion shall wound it — if part}'- 
strife and blind ambition shall hawk at 
and tear it — if folly and madness — if uneas- 
iness under salutary and necessarj' re- 
straint, — shall succeed to separate it from 
that Union, by which alone its existence 
is made sure, it will stand, in the end, by 
the side of that cradle in which its infancy 
was rocked : it will stretch forth its arm 
with whatever of vigor it may still retain, 
over the friends who gather round it ; and 
it will fall at last, if fall it must, amidst 
the proudest monuments of its own glory, 



202 



FEO:\r COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



and on the very sjiot of its origin.'' No 
New Engliind heart but tlirobbej with 
vehement, absorbed, irrepressible emotion, 
as Mr. Webster thus dwelt upon New 
England sufferings, New England strug- 
gles, and New England triuniplis, during 
the war of the revolution. There was 
scarcely a dry eye in the senate ; all hearts 
were overcome ; grave judges, and men 
grown old in dignified life, turned aside 
their lieads, to conceal the evidences of 
their emotion. 

In one corner of tlie gallery was clus- 
tered a group of Massachusetts men. 
Tlie}' had hung from the first moment 
upon the words of the speaker, with feel- 
ings variously but always warmly excited, 
deepening in intensity as he ]>roceeded. 
At first, while the orator was going 
througli hi.s exordium, they held tlieir 
breath and Iiid tlieir faces, mindful of the 
fierce attack upi>n him and New England, 
and the fearful odds against any one 
standing u]) as a chamjiion of the latter; 
as he went deeper into his speech, they 
felt easier; when he turned Hayne's flank 
on " IJanquo's ghost " — that famous rhe- 
torical figure used b}' the South Carolinian, 
— they breathed freer and fuller. lUit 
anon, a- ne alluded to Massachusetts, their 
feelings were strained to the utmost ten- 
sion ; and when the senator, concluding 
his passages upon the land of their birth, 
turned, intentionally or otherwise, his 
burning eye upon them, tears were falling 
like rain adown their cheeks. 

No one who was not present can under- 
stand the excitement of the scene. No 
one, wlio was, can give an adequate de- 
scription of it. No word-painting can 
convey the deep, intense enthusiasm, — the 
reverential attention, of that vast assem- 
bly, — nor limner transfer to canvas their 
earnest, eager, awe-struck countenances. 
Tliuugli language were as subtle and flex- 
ible as thought, it still would be impossi- 
ble to represent the full idea of the occa- 
sion. 

Much of the instantaneous effect of the 
s])eech arose, of course, from the orator's 
delivery — the tones of his voice, his coun- 



tenance, and manner. These die mostly 
with the occasion ; they can only be 
described in general terms. '■ Of the 
effectiveness of Mr. Webster's manner, in 
many parts," says Mr. Everett, himself 
almost without a jieer, as an orator, "it 
would be in ^ain to attempt to give any 
one not present the faintest idea. It has 
been my fortune to liear some of the ablest 
speeches of the greatest living orators on 
both sides of the water, but I must confess 
I never heard anything which so com- 
pletely realized my conception of what 
Demosthenes was when he delivered tlie 
Oration for the Crown." There could be 
no higher praise than this. Kean nor 
Kend)le, nor any other masterly delineator 
of the human passions, ever jjroduced a 
more powerful imjiression upon an audi- 
ence, or swayed so comjdetely their hearts. 

No one ever looked the orator, as he did, 
— in form and feature how like a god ! His 
countenance spake no less audiblj' than his 
words. His manner gave new force tojiis 
language. As he stood swaying his right 
arm, like a huge tilt-hammer, up and 
down, his swarthy countenance lighted up 
with excitement, he appeared amid the 
smoke, the fire, the thunder of his elo- 
quence, like Vulcan in his armory forging 
thoughts for the gods ! Time had not 
thinned nor bleacluMl his hair; it was as 
dark as the raven's jdumage, surmounting 
his massive brow in ample lolds. His eye, 
always dark and deep-set, enkindled by 
some glowing thought, shone from beneath 
his somber, overhanging brow like lights, 
in the blackness of night, from a sepul- 
chre. No one understood, better than Mr. 
Webster, the philosophy of dress ; — what a 
powerful auxiliary it is to speech and 
manner, when harmonizing with them. 
On this occasion he appeared in a blue 
coat, a buff vest, black pants, and white 
cravat, a costume strikingly in keeping 
witli his face and expression. 

The hunum face never wore an expres- 
sion of mure withering, relentless scorn, 
than when the orator replied to Hayne's 
allusion to the " murdered coalition," — a 
piece of stale political trumpery, well 



GREAT DEBATE BETWEEN WEBSTEK AXD HAYXE — 1S30. 



•203 



understood at that day. " It is," said Mr. 
Webster, '• tlie very cast-off slough of a 
polluted and shan>eless press. Incapable 
of further mischief, it lies in the sewer, 
lifeless and despised. It is not now, sir, 
in the power of the honorable member to 
give it dignity or decency, by attempting 
to elevate it, and introduce it into the 
senate. He cannot change it from what 
it is — an object of general disgust and 
scorn. On the contrary, the contact, if he 
choose to touch it, is more likely to drag 
him down, down to the place where it lies 
itself!" He looked, as he spoke these 
words, as if the thing he alluded to was 
too mean for scorn itself, and the sharp, 
stinging enunciation, made the words still 
more scathing. The audience seemed 
relieved, — so crushing was the expression 
of his face which they held on to, as 'twere, 
spell-bound, — when he turned to other 
topics. 

But the good-natured yet provoking 
irony with which he described the imagin- 
ary though life-like scene of direct collision 
between the marshaled army of South 
Carolina under General Hayne on the one 
side, and the officers of the United States 
on the other, nettled his opponent even 
more than his severer satire; it seemed so 
ridiculously true. With his true Southern 
blood, Hayne inquired, with some degree 
of emotion, if the gentleman from Massa- 
chusetts intended any personal imputation 
by such remarks ? To -which Mr. Web- 
stc replied, with perfect good humor, 
" Assuredly not — just the reverse ! " 

The variety of incident during the 
speech, and the rapid fluctuation of pas- 
sions, kept the audience in continual 
expectation, and ceaseless agitation. The 
speech was a complete drama of serious, 
comic, and pathetic scenes ; and though a 
large portion of it was strictly argumenta- 
tive — an exposition of constitutional law, 
— yst, grave as such portion necessarily 
must be, severely logical, and abounding 
in no fancy or episode, it engrossed, 
throughout, undivided attention. 

The swell of his voice and its solemn 
roll struck upon the ears of the enraptured 



audience, in deep and thrilling cadence, as 
waves upon the shore of the far-resound- 
ing sea. The Miltonic grandeur of his 
words was the fit expression of his great 
thoughts, and raised his hearers up to his 
theme ; and his voice, exerted to its utmost 
power, penetrated every recess or corner 
of the senate — penetrated even the ante- 
rooms and stairways, as, in closing, he 
pronounced in deepest tones of pathos 
these words of solemn significance: 
"When my eyes shall be turned to behold, 
for the last time, the sun in heaven, may 
I not see him shining on the broken and 
dishonored fragments of a once glorious 
Union ; on states dissevered, discordant, 
belligerent; on a land rent with civil 
feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal 
blood ! Let their last feeble and lingering 
glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign 
of the republic, now known and honored 
throughout the earth, still full high 
advanced, its arms and trophies streaming 
in their original luster, not a strij)e erased 
nor polluted, not a single star obscured, 
bearing for its motto no such miserable 
interrogator}- as, "What is all this worth ?" 
— nor those other words of delusion and 
folly, " Liberty first and Union after- 
wards : " but everywhere, spread all over 
in characters of living light, blazing on all 
its ample folds, as they float over the sea 
and over the land, and in every wind 
under the whole heavens, that other senti- 
ment, dear to every American heart, 
"Liberty and Uniox, now and for- 
ever, ONE AND INSEPARABLE ! " 

The speech was over, but the tones of 
the orator still lingered upon the ear, and 
the audience, unconscious of the close, 
retained their positions. Everywhere 
around seemed forgetfulness of all but the 
orator's presence and words. There never 
was a deeper stillness ; silence could almost 
have heard itself, it was so supernaturally 
still. The feeling was too overpowering, 
to allow expression by voice or hand. It 
was as if one was in a trance, all motion 
paralyzed. But the descending hammer 
of the chair awoke them, with a start ; and 
with one universal, long drawn, deeu 



204 



FEOM COLOXY TO WOELD POWER. 




WKBSTER'S REPLY TO HAYNE. 



breath, with which tlie ovt'i-charijcil lirart 
seeks relief, the crowded assembly broke 
up and departed. 

New England men walkeil down Penn- 
sylvania avenue that day, after the speech, 
with a firmer step and bolder air — ' pride 
in their port, defiance in their eye.' They 
devoured the way in their stride. They 
looked every one in the face they met, 
fearing no contradiction. They swarmed 
in the streets, having become miraculously 
multitudinous. Tliey clustered in parties 
and fought the scene over one hundred 
times that niglit. Their elation was 
the greater, by reaction. Not one of 
them but felt ho had gained a personal 
victory. 

In the evening, General Jackson held a 
presidential levee at the AVhite House. It 
was known, in advance, that Mr. Webster 
would attend it, ami hardly had the hos- 
pitable doors of the mansion been thrown 
open, when the crowd that had filled the 
senate-chamber in the morning rushed in 



and oc<'upied the rooms, leaving a vast 
and increasing crowd at the entrance. 
On all previous occasions, the general 
himself had been the observed of all 
observers. His receptions were always 
gladly attended by large numbers ; and 
to these lie himself was always the chief 
object of attraction, on account of his 
great military and personal reputation, 
official position, gallant bearing, and 
courteous manners. 

But on this occasion, the room in which 
he received his company was deserted, as 
soon as courtesy to the president permitted. 
Mr. Webster w-as in the East Room, and 
thither the whole mass hurried. He stood 
almost in the center of the room, pressed 
upon by surging crowds, eager to paj' him 
deference. Haj'ne, too, was there, and, with 
others. went ujiand complimented Mr. Web- 
ster on his brilliant effort. In a subsequent 
meeting between the two rival debaters, 
Webster challenged Hayne to drink a glass 
of wine with him, saying, as he did so, — 



GEEAT DEBATE BETWEEN WEBSTER AND IIAYXE — 1S30. 205 



" General Hajnie, I drink to your health, 
and I hope that you may live a thousand 
j'ears." 

'• I shall not live more than one hundred, 
if you make another such speech," Ha^-ne 
replied. 

To this day, Webster's speech is re- 
garded as the masterpiece of modern elo- 
quence, — unsurpassed bj- even the might- 
iest efforts of Pitt, Fox, or Burke, — a 
matchless intellectual achievement and 
complete forensic triumph. It was to this 
great and triumphant effort, that Mr. 
Webster's subsequent matchless fame as a 
statesman was due ; and, that he was 
eqTial to comp)rel)ending the true principles 
of international, as well as those of inter- 
nal, justice and poliej-, is abundantly 
proved by his diplomacy with Great Brit- 
ain, to which the highest credit is awarded 
by Eliot, the accomplished historian, in his 
foncise and admirable review of public 
affairs during this period. An insurrec- 
tion (says Mr. Eliot) having broken out 
in Canada, it was immediately supported 
by American piarties, the insurgents being 
in favor of reform or independence. One 
of these American jiarties, in company 
with some Canadian refugees, after pillag- 
ing the New York arsenals, seized upon 
Navy Island, a British possession in the 
Niagara river. Mr. Marcy was governor 
of New York at this time. The steamer 
Caroline, engaged in bringing over men, 
arms, and stores to the island, was de- 
stroyed, though at the time on the Ameri- 
can shore, by a Britsh detachment. The 
deed was instantlj' avowed by the minister 
of Great Britain at Washington as an act 
of self-defense on the British side. One 
of the chief characters in these exciting 
movements was William M'Kenzie. In 
November, 1840, one Alexander M'Leod, 



sheriff of Niagara, in Canada, and as such 
a particijjator in the destruction of the 
Caroline, was arrested in New Y'ork on 
the charge of murder, an American having 
lost liis life when the steamer was de^ 
strnyed. The British government de- 
manded his release, in doing which they 
v.cre sustained by the United States 
administration, on the ground that M'Leod 
was but an agent or soldier of Great Brit- 
ain. But the authorities of New York 
liekl fast to their prisoner, and brought 
him to trial. Had harm come to liini, his 
government stood pledged to declare war ; 
but he was acquitted for want of proof. 
The release of M"Leod did not, however, 
settle the affair of the Caroline ; this still 
remained. There were, or there had been, 
other difficulties also, — namely, upon the 
Maine frontier, where the boundary-line 
had never yet been run. Collisions took 
place, between the Maine militia and the 
British troops, and others had been but 
just prevented. On Mr. Webster's acces- 
sion to the state department, our govern- 
ment projiosed, through Mr. Webster, to 
the British cabinet, to take uj) the north- 
eastern boundary question. The offer was 
accepted by the British, who sent, as spe- 
cial envoy. Lord Ashburton, to whom was 
committed the boundary and other contro- 
verted questions. The consultations be- 
tween Mr. Weoster and Lord Ashburton 
led to a treat}'' which settled the boundary, 
put down the claim to visit our vessels, 
and provided for the mutual surrender of 
fugitives from justice. For the affair of 
the Caroline, an ai^ology was made by 
Great Britain. 

The fame of IVIr. Webster, as an 
orator, a statesman, and an expounder oi 
p'jblic law, thus became world-wide and 
unrivaledo 



XXI. 

STRUGGLE FOR THE RIGHT OF PETITION IN CON- 
GRESS.— 1836. 



John Quincy Adams, the " Old Man Eloquent," Carries on a Contest of Eleven Days, Single-Handed, 
in its Defense, in the House of Representatives — Passage of tlie " Gag Rule."— Expulsion and Asshs- 
eination Threatened. — His Unquailing Courage. — A Spectacle Unwitnessed Betore in the Halls of 
Legislation — Triumph of His Master Mind — The Right and Petition a Constitutional One. — Indiscrim- 
inate ami Unrestricted. — Anti-Slavery Petitions. — Mr. Adams Their Champion. — An Unpopular Posi- 
tion. — He Defies every Menace — His Bold and Intrepid Conduct. — The North and South at Variance. 
Monster Petitions Pour In — A Memorial from Slaves. — Wild Tumult in the House, — Cries of " E.xpel 
the Old Scoundrel!" — Proposal to Censure and Disgrace Him — Mr. Adams Unmoved Amidst the 
Tempest — Eloquence and Indomitableness — A Petition to Dissolve the Union. — Increased E.xasper- 
ation. — Violent and Denunciatory Dehate — Sublime Bearing nf Mr. Adams. — Vindicated and Vic- 
torious at Last. — What He Lived to See — Honor from His Opponents. 



" Though flged, he was bo iron of limb. 
None of tile •■cmtli c<iuld cope with him; 
And the f<.<ii wliinii he Hinglv kei>t at bay. 
Outnumbered hi*, huirs ol white and l^ray." 



NERABLE in years, and laden witli political 
honors — such as a king might he ])roiul of, John 
Quincy Adams took his seat as a member of the 
house of representatives at Washington, in 1831. 
It was about this time, that the anti-slavery socie- 
ties of the North began to petition congress for the 
abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, the 
inhiliition of the inter-state slave-trade, and kin- 
dred measures. Though comparatively few at the 
outset, the petitioners for these objects increased 
greatly in numbers during the next four or five 
years, until they reached, in one congress, three- 
fourths of a million. But not all of these petition- 
ers were 'abolitionists,' in the then commonly- 
accepted meaning of that term. In the defense of 
the untrammeled right of petition, as also that of 
MONSTiiB i-KimoN TO CONGRESS. t'l^ frecdom of speech and of the press, it became 

evident to considerate men, of aU parties, that not alone was the right to discuss and 
petition in regard to slavery involved, but that vital constitutional principles were at 
stake, and that these must be defended, irresjicctive of the merits of the particular sub- 
ject over which the battle was waged. It was upon this broad ground that Mr. Adams, 




STRUGGLE FOR THE EIGHT OF PETITION — 183G. 



12 (J7 



'the old man eloquent,' as he was famil- 
iarly called, became at once the champion 
of freedom of debate and the right of peti- 
tion in the national legislature, making 
not America only, but the civilized world, 
resound with the clash of the conflict. Of 
the long and eventful life of this extraor- 
dinary man, the chapter covering the 
events here recorded may perhaps be 
regarded as the most striking and brilliant. 
The exalted positions he had held, almost 
from the very foundation of the govern- 
ment, his multifarious learning, his world- 
wide renown, lent luster to the cause ; 
while his exhaustless resources, his skill in 
debate, his dauntless courage and indomit- 
able will, were a tower of strength to its 
friends, and, as the sequel will show, a 
source of mortification and discomfit- 
ure to its foes. No threats and no tu- 
mults could for a moment cause him to 
quail or waver in his heroic determina- 
tion. 

On the twelfth of December, 1831, Mr. 
Adams, then at the very outset of his con- 
gressional career, presented fifteen peti- 
tions, all numerously signed, from inhabi- 
tants of Pennsylvania, praying for the 
abolition of slavery and the slave-trade in 
the District of Columbia. In presenting 
these petitions, Mr. Adams remarked, that 
although the petitioners were not his 
immediate constituents, he inferred, from a 
letter which accompanied the petitions, 
that they came from members of the Soci- 
ety of Friends, or Quakers, — a body of 
men, he declared, than whom there was no 
more respectable and worthy- class of citi- 
zens in the whole country. At the same 
time, while he considered that the petitions 
for the abolition of the slave-trade in the 
District related to a proper subject for the 
legislation of Congress, he did not approve 
of those which prayed for the congressional 
abolition of slavery there. 

Similar petitions were constantly for- 
warded from different parts of the land, 
during successive terms of congress, for 
Mr. Adams to present, the parties well 
knowing that they could rely upon his 
scrupulous fidelity to them in the high 



places of power, and that, against all men- 
aces or blandishments, he would intrepidly 
advocate that most sacred privilege of free- 
men — the right of jjetition. 

ISecomiug alarmed at these demonstra- 
tions, the southern members of congress 
determined to arre.st them, and, on tlie 
eighth of February, 1836, a committee of 
the house was appointed to consider wiiat 
disposition should be made of petitions and 
memorials of this nature. The report of 
this committee consisted, in substance, of 
three resolutions, as follows : First, that 
congress could not constitutionally inter- 
fere with slaverj' in any of the states ; 
second, that it ought not to interfere with 
slavery in the District of Columbia ; third, 
that all petitions, propositions, or papers of 
an_y kind, relating to the subject, should, 
if brought before congress, be laid upon 
the table, without liberty of debate, and 
receive no further action. Tliis repoH 
was the casting of the die. Well was it 
called the "Gag Rule." 

When the first of these resolutions was 
taken up, Mr. Adams said, if the house 
would allow him five minutes' time, he 
would prove the resolution to be untrue. 
His request was denied. On the third 
declaration, Mr. Adams refused to vote, 
and sent to the speaker's chair the follow- 
ing protest, demanding that it should be 
placed on the journal of the house, there 
to stand to the latest posterity : 

" I hold the resolution to be a direct vio- 
lation of the constitution of the United 
States, of the rules of this house, and of 
the rights of my constituents." 

Notwithstanding the rule embodied in 
this resolution virtually trampled the right 
of petition into the dust, yet it was adopted 
by the house, by a large majority. But 
Mr. Adams was not to be baffled by this 
arbitrary restriction. Petitions on the 
subject of slavery continued to be trans- 
mitted to him in increased numbers, some 
of them of monster size, bearing thousands 
of signatures. With unwavering firmness 
— against a bitter and unscrupulous oppo- 
sition, exasperated to the highest pitch by 
bis unconquerable pertinacity — amidst a 



108 



FROM COLONY TO WOltLD rOvv'Elt. 



perfect tempest of vituperation and abuse 
— lie persevered, unvanqiiished, in present- 
ing these petitions, one b^y one, to the 
amount sometimes of two hundred in a 
day, and demanding tlie attention of the 
house on each separate petition. His 
position in tliese scenes, — advocating, 
amidst scorn and derision, and threats of 
expulsion and assassination, the inalienable 




right of petition for the poorest and hum- 
blest in the land, — was in the highest 
degree illustrious and sublime ; a spectacle 
unwitnessed before in the halls of legisla- 
tion. 

On the sixth of January, 1837, Mr. 
Adams ])reseiited the petition of one hun- 
dred and fifty women, whom he stated to 
be the wives and daughters of his immedi- 
ate constituents, praying for the abolition 
of slavery in the District of Columbia; 
and he moved that the petition be read. 
Objection was maile, whereupon Mr. 
Adams remarked tliat, understanding that 
it was not the petition itself which was 
laid upon the table, but the motion to 
receive, he gave notice that he should call 
up that motion, for decision, every day, so 
long as freedom of speech was allowed to 
him as a member of the liouse. Being 
called to order at this stage of proceedings, 
Mr. Adams said he would then have the 
honor of presenting to the house the peti- 
tion of two hundred and twenty-eiglit 
women, the wives and daughters of his 



immediate constituents; and, as a part of 
the speech which he intended to make, he 
would take the liberty of reading the peti- 
tion, which was not long, and would not 
consume much time. Objection being 
made to the reception of the petition, Mr. 
Adams at once proceeded to read, that the 
petitioners, inhabitants of South Wey- 
mouth, in the state of Massachusetts, 
"im])ressed witli the sinfulness of slavery, 
and keenly aggrieved by its existence in 
a part of our country over which con- 
gress " 

Here Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina, 
I'ose to a question of order, and, after a 
brisk colloquy in the house, the sjjeaker 
ruled that Mr. Adams must confine him- 
self to stating the contents of the petition. 

Mr. Adams. — I am doing so, sir. 

The SpeaJca: — Not in the opinion of 
the chair. 

JJi: Ad'Hii.'i. — I was at this point of the 
petition: "Keenly aggrieved by its exist- 
ence in a jiart of our country over which 
congress possesses exclusive jurisdiction 
in all cases whatsoever " 

Loud cries of '• Order," "Order ! " 

])fr. Aihniis. — "])o most earnestly peti- 
tion your honorable body " 

Mr. Chambers, of Kentucky, rose to a 
point of order.' 

Mr. Adams. — "Immediately to abolish 
slavery in the District of Columbia " 

Mr. Chambers reiterated his call to 
order, and the Speaker directed Mr. 
Adams to take his seat. 

Mr. Adams proceeded, however, with 
great rapidity of enunciation, and in a 
very loud tone of voice — "And to declare 
evert/ Inima II being free iidio sets foot upoti 
its .w/V ./ " 

The confusion in the hall at this time 
was verj' great. The speaker decided that 
it was not in order for a member to re.ad a 
petition, whether it was long or short. 

Mr. Adams appealed from any decision 
which went to establish the principle that 
a member of the United States house of 
representatives should not have the power 
to read what he chose. He had never 
before heard of such a thing. If the hith- 



STRUGGLE FOK THE RIGHT OF PETITION — 1S30. 



209 



erto invariable practice was to be reversed, 
let the decision stand ujjon record, and let 
it appear how entirely the freedom of 
speech was suppressed in this house. If 
the reading of a paper was to be suppressed 
in his person, so help him God, he would 
only consent to it as a matter of record. 
Saying this, he instantly resumed and 
finished the reading of the petition, that 
the petitioner.s 

" respectfully announce their inten- 
tion to present the same petition yearly 
before this honorable body, that it might 
at least be a memorial in the holy cause of 
human freedom, that they had done what 
they could." 

These words were read by Mr. Adams, 
at the tojJ of his voice, amidst tumultuous 
cries of "order" from every part of the 
house. The petition was finally received, 
and laid upon the table. 

One month after this, namely, on the 
seventh of February', after Mr. Adams had 
offered some two hundred or more aboli- 
tion petitions, he came to a lialt. and, with- 
out yielding the floor, employed himself in 
packing up or arranging his budget of 
documents. He was about resuming his 
seat, when, suddenl}' glancing at a paper 
on his desk, he took it up, and exclaimed, 
in a shrill tone — 

"Mr. Speaker, I have in my possession, 
a petition of a somewhat extraordinary 
character ; and I wish to inquire of the 
chair if it be in order to present it." 

The Speaker rejjlied, that if the gentle- 
man from Massachusetts would state the 
character of the petition, the chair would 
probably be able to decide on the subject. 

"Sir," ejaculated Mr. Adams, "the 
petition is signed by eleven slaves of the 
town of Fredericksburg, in the county of 
Culpepper, in the state of Virginia. It is 
one of those petitions which, it has oc- 
curred to my mind, are not what they 
purport to be. It is signed partly by per- 
sons who cannot write, by making their 
marks, and partly by persons whose hand- 
writing would manifest that they have 
received the education of slaves. The 
petition declares itself to be from slaves, 
U 



and I am requested to present it. I will 
send it to the chair." 

The speaker, Mr. Polk, who habitually 
extended to Mr. Adams every courtesy 
and kindness imaginable, was taken by 
surprise, and found himself involved in a 
dilemma. Giving his chair one of those 
hitches which ever denoted his excitement, 
he said that a petition from slaves was a 
novelty, and involved a question that he 
did not feel called on to decide. He 
would like to take time to consider it ; and, 
in the meantime, would refer it to the 
house. The house was very thin at the 
time, and but little attention was paid to 
what was going on, till the excitement of 
the speaker attracted the attention of Mr. 
Dixon- H. Lewis, of Alabama, who impa- 
tiently, and under great excitement, rose 
and inquired what the petition was. The 
speaker furnished the required informa- 
tion ; whereupon Mr. Lewis, forgetting all 
discretion, whilst he frothed at the mouth, 
turned towards Mr. Adams, and exclaimed, 
in thunder-tones — 

" Bi/ , sir, this is 7iot to he endured 

any longer!" 

"Treason ! treason ! Expel the old scoun- 
drel ; put him out ; do not let him disgrace 
the house any longer," screamed a half 
dozen other members. 

" Get up a resolution to meet the case," 
exclaimed a member from North Carolina. 
Mr. George C. Dromgoole, who had ac- 
quired quite a reputation as a parliamen- 
tarian, was selected as the very man who, 
of all others, was most capable of drawing 
\\\) a resolution that would meet and cover 
the emergenc3'. He produced a resolution 
and preamble, in which it was stated, sub- 
stantially, that, whereas the Hon. John 
Quincy Adams, a representative from Mas- 
sachusetts, had j)i'esented to the house a 
petition signed by negro slaves, thus 
" giving color to an idea " that bondmen 
were capable of exercising the right of 
petition, it was " Resolved, That he be 
taken to the bar of the house, and be cen- 
sured by the speaker thereof." 

A still more stringent resolution was 
introduced by Hon. Waddy Thompson, 



210 



riiOM COLONY TO WOHLD POWER. 



namel}-, tliat Mr. Adams, '•having been 
guilty of gross disrespect to tlie liouse, be 
instantly Li'ought to the bar, to receive 
the severe censure fif the speaker." Sev- 
eral other resolutions and j'l'opositions, 
from members of slave-holding states, were 
submitted, but none proved satisfactory 
even to themselves. The idea of bringing 
the venerable ex-president to the bar, like 
a culprit, to receive a reprimand from a 
comparatively j-outliful speaker, was equal- 
ly disgraceful and absurd. Mr. Adams, 
however, entirelj' immoved by the tempest 
which raged around him, defended him- 
self, and tlie integritj- of his i)urpose, with 
his accustomed ability and eloquence. 

" In regard to the resolutions now 
before tiie house," said he, "as the}' all 
concur in naming me, and in charoinsr me 
with high crimes and misdemeanors, and 
in calling me to the bar of the house to 
answer for my crimes, I have thought it 
was m_y dut}- to remain silent, until it 
should be tlio jileasure of tlie house to act 
either ou (lue or the other of these resolu- 
tions. I su])])ose that if I sliall be brought 
to the bar of the house, I shall not be 
struck mute liy tlie previous question, 
before I have an opportunity to say a word 
or two in my own defense." 

"Now, as to the fact what the petition 
was for." said Mr. Adams, in another por- 
tion of his speech, "I simply state to the 
gentleman from Alabama, who has sent to 
the table a resolution assuming that this 
petition was for the abolition of .slavery — 
I state to him that lie is mistaken. He 
must amend liis resolution; for if the 
house should choose to read this petition, 
I can state to them they would find it. 
something very much the reverse of that 
which the resolution states it to be. And 
if the gentleman from Alabama still 
chooses to bring me to tlie bar of the 
house, he must amend his resolution in a 
very important particular; for he may 
probably have to put into it, that my crime 
has been for attempting to introduce the 
petition of slaves tliat slavery should not 
be abolished." 

Reiterating the principle, that tlv r'':;bt 



of petition belongs to nil, Mr. Adams said 
that he felt it a sacred duty to present any 
petition, couched in respectful language, 
from any citizen of the United States, be 
its object what it might, — be the prayer of 
it that in which he could concur, or that to 
which he was utterly opposed ; no law 
could be found, even in the most abject 
despotism, which deprives even the mean- 
est or most degraded, of the right to sup- 
plicate for a boon, or to pray for mercy ; 
there is no absolute monarch on earth, who 
is not compelled to receive the petitions of 
his people, whosoever they may be, — not 
even the sultan of Turkey can walk the 
streets and refuse to receive petitions from 
the lowest and vilest of the land. 

When southern members saw that, in 
their haste, they had not tarried to ascer- 
tain the nature of the petition, and that it 
prayed for the jicrpetiififinii, instead of the 
a/jo/itioi) of slavery, their position became 
so ludicrous, that their exasperation was 
greatly increased. At the time the 
petition was announced liy Mr. Adams, 
the house was very thin ; but the excite- 
ment that was produced soon filled it; 
and, besides, the sergeant-at-arms had been 
instructed to arrest and bring in all absen- 
tees. The excitement commenced at about 
one o'clock, and continued until seven 
o'clock in the evening, when the house 
adjourned. Mr. Adams stood at his desk, 
resolutely refusing to be seated till the 
matter was disposed of, alleging that if 
he were guilty, he was not entitled to a 
seat among high and honorable men. 
When Mr. Dromgoole's resolution was 
read to the house, for its consideration, 
Mr. Adams yielded to it one of those sar- 
castic sneers which he was in the habit of 
giving, when provoked to satire; and said 
— "Mr. Speaker, if I understand the reso- 
lution of the honorable gentleman from 
Virginia, it charges me with being guilty 
of 'giving rtj/or to an idea .'"' The whole 
house broke forth in one common, irrepres- 
sible peal of laughter, at this capital double 
entendre ; and the Dronigoole resolution 
was actually hiughed out of existence. 
The house now found that it had got itself 



STEUGGLE FOR THE EIGHT OF PETITION — 1880. 



211 



in a dilemma — that Mr. Aclnm.s \vas too 
much for it; and, at last, adjourned, leav- 
ing the affair in the position in which 
they found it. 

For several days this subject continued 
to agitate the house — and the nation. Mr. 
Adams not only warded off the virulent 
attacks made upon him, but carried the 
war so effectually into the camp of his ene- 
mies, that, becoming heartily tired of the 
contest, they repeatedly endeavored to get 
rid of the whole subject by laying it on 
the table. To this Mr. Adams objected. 
He insisted that it should be thoroughly 
canvassed. Immense excitement contin- 
ued, and call after call of the house was 
made. At length, the subject was brought 
to a termination by the passage of a pi-e- 
amble and resolution — much softened 
down, in comparison with what was at first 
proposed — declaring that the paper cannot 
he received, and that slaves have no right 
to petition. 

The slave petition in question is believed 
to have been a counterfeit, manufactured 
by certain members of congress from 
slave-holding states, and was sent to Mr. 
Adams by way of experiment — with the 
double design of ascertaining if he could 
be imposed upon ; and, if the deception 
succeeded, those who got it up were curi- 
ous to know if the venei-able statesman 
would redeem his pledge, and present a 
petition, no matter who it came from. He 
was too wily not to detect the plot at the 
outset ; he knew that all was a hoax ; but 
he resolved to present the paper, and then 
turn the tables upon its authors. 

His success in thus defeating his oppo- 
nents on their mad intention of censure, 
was one of the most signal instances of 
personal and parliamentary triumph. In 
vain did they threaten assassination, 
indictment before the grand jury, and 
other proceedings, to seal his lips in 
silence. In vain, too, did they declare 
that he should "be made amenable to 
anotlier tribunal (mob law), and, as an 
incendiary, be brought to condign punish- 
ment." "My life on it," said a southern 
member, "if he presents that petition from 



slaves, we shall yet see him within the 
walls of the penitentiary." Firm stooa 
the white-haired sage of more than seventy 
winters, and with withering rebukes 
repelled his hot-blooded assailants. His 
clarion voice rang defiantly through the 
hall, as he said — 

" Do the gentlemen from the south 
think they can frighten me by their 
threats ? If that be their object, let me 
tell them, sir, they have ju'eciscly mistaJcen 
their man. I am not to be frightened 
from the discharge of a sacred duty, by 
their indignation, by their violence, nor, 
sir, b}' all the grand juries in the universe. 
I have dene only my duty; and I .shall do 
it again, under the same circumstances, 
even though they recur to-morrow." 

On the twenty-fourth of January, 1842, 
Mr. Adams presented the petition of forty- 
five citizens of Haverhill, Massachusetts, 
praying that congress would immediate!}' 
take measures j^eaceably to dissolve the 
Union of the States : First, because no 
union can be agreeable which does not 
present prospects of reciprocal benefits ; 
second, because a vast jjroportion of the 
resources of one section of the Union is 
annually drained to sustain tlie views and 
course of another section, without any 
adequate return; third, because, judging 
from the history of past nations, such a 
union, if persisted in, in the present course 
of things, would certainly overwhelm the 
whole nation in utter destruction. 

Mr. Adams moved that the petition be 
referred to a select committee, with in- 
structions to report an answer showing the 
reasons wh}' the praj^er of it ought not to 
be- granted. 

Immediate and wild excitement fol- 
lowed the presentation of this petition. 
Mr. Hopkins, of Virginia, moved to burn 
it in presence of the house. Mr. Wise, of 
the same state, asked the speaker if it was 
in order to move to censure anj' member 
for presenting such a petition. Mr. 
Gilmer, also of Virginia, moved a resolu- 
tion, that Mr. Adams, for presenting such 
a petition, had justl}' incurred the censure 
of the house. Mr. Adams said he hoped 



019 



FEOM CULOXY TO WUi^LD TOWEK. 




JOHN QUIXCY ADAMS DEFENDING THE RIGHT OF PETITION IN CONGRESS, 



that the resolution would be received and 
discussed. Angry debate continued, until 
the house adjourned. 

The next day, the whole body of south- 
ern members came into the house, appar- 
ently resolved to crush Mr. Adams and his 
cause — the right of petition — forever. 
They gathered in groups, conversed in 
whispers, and the wliole aspect of tlieir 
conduct at twelve o'clock indicated the 
approach of some high-handed proceeding. 
Thomas F. Marshall, of Kentucky, who 
had been selected as spokesman for tlie 
occasion, rose, and, having asked and 
received of Mr. Gilmer leave to offer a 
substitute for his resolution of censure 
which was pending at the adjournment, 
presented three resolutions, which had 
been prepared at a caucus, the night 
before, and which declared that the peti- 
tion in question involved a proposition to 
the house to commit perjury and high 
treason, and that Mr. Adams, for offering 
it, receive the severest censure of that 
body. 

Assuming a manner and tone as if he 



felt the historical imjjortanco of his posi- 
tion, he spoke with great coolness and 
solemnity, — a style wholly unusual with 
him; exhibited, too, a magisterial air, and 
judicial consequence, as if he thought that 
he was about to jiour down the thunder of 
condemnation on the venerable objei't of 
his attack, as a judge pronouncing sentence 
on a convicted culprit, in tlie sight of 
approving men and angels. The vast 
audience before whom he spoke were not 
to be left in any doubt of his eminent 
capacity to act the part he had assumed, 
of ])rosecutor, judge, and executioner. 

When !Mr. Marshall concluded, the 
chair announced to Mr. Adams that his 
position entitled him to the floor ; bringing 
up to the imagination a jsarallel scene — 
■Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Thou art 
permitted to speak for thyself.' 

Up rose, then, that bald, gray olil man, 
his hands trembling with constitutional 
infirmity and age, upon whose consecrated 
head the vials of partisan wrath had been 
outpoured. Among the crowd of slave- 
holders who tilled the galleries he could 



STRUGGLE FOR THE RIGHT OF PETITION — 1836. 



213 



seek no f i-iends, and bnt a few among those 
immediately around him. Unexcited, he 
raised liis voice, high-keyed, as was usual 
with him, but elear, nntremulous, and 
tirm. In a moment his intirmities disap- 
peared, although his shaking hand could 
not but be noticed ; trembling not with 
fear, but with age. At first there was 
nothing of indignation in his tone, manner, 
or words. Surprise and cold contempt 
were all. The thread of his great discourse 
was mainly his present and past relations 
to Virginia and Virginians. After grate- 
fully acknowledging his infinite obligations 
to the great Virginians of the first age of 
the federal republic, he modestly and 
unpretendingly recounted the unsought, 
exalted honors, heaped upon him by Wa.sh- 
ington, Madison, and Monroe, and detailed 
with touching simplicity and force some of 
his leading actions in the discharge of 
these weigiity trusts. In pursuing his 
remarks, he chanced to fix his eye upon 
Marshall, who was moving down one of 
the side-aisles. Instantly, at the sugges- 
tion of the moment, he burst forth in a 
touching appeal to the hallowed memory 
of IMarshall, the venerated and immaculate 
Virginian, through a long career of judi- 
cial honor and usefulnes.s. With a flash 
of withering scorn, Mr. Adams struck at 
the unhappy Marshall of another day. A 
single breath blew all his mock-judicial 
array into air and smoke. In a tone of 
insulted majesty and reinvigorated spirit, 
Mr. Adams then said, in reply to the auda- 
cious charge of high treason, 

"I call for the reading of the first jiara- 
graph of the Declaration of Independence. 
Read it! read it! and see what tliat says 
of the right of a people to reform, to 
change, to dissolve their government." 

The look, the tone, the gesture, of the 
insulted patriot, at that instant, were most 
imposing. He seemed to have renewed his 
youth like the eagles, and his voice was 
that of sovereign command. The burthen 
of seventy-five winters rolled off, and he 
rose above the puny things around him. 
When the passage of the Declaration was 
read which solemnly proclaims the right 



of reform, revolution, and resistance to 
oppression, the grand old man .thundered 
out — 

"Head that ayain!" 

Looking proudly around on the listen- 
ing audience, he heard his triumphant 
vindication sounded forth in the glorious 
sentences of the nation's Magna Charta. 
written by Mr. Jefferson, a Virginian. 
The sympathetic revulsion of feeling was 
intense, though voiceless ; every drop of 
free, honest blood in that vast assemblage 
bounded with high impulse, every fiber 
thrilled with excitement. The members 
of the house were all gathered around him, 
even his persecutors paying involuntary 
triliute to the 'old man eloquent.' Lord 
Morjjeth was an attentive spectator and 
auditor ; and so were governors, senators, 
judges, and other high officials, innumera- 
ble. A strong exhibition of the facts in 
the case, mostly in cold, calm, logical, 
measured sentences, concluded Mr. Adams's 
effort, and he sat down, vindicated, victo- 
rious. 

Intemperate debates, with violence undi- 
minished, succeeded, in which all the 
topics of party censure, from the adoption 
of the constitution, were collected and 
heaped upon Mr. Adams, by Marshall, 
Wise, Gilmer, and others. No description 
can do justice to the effective eloquence of 
Mr. Adams in reply, — including amusing 
particulars of missives he had received 
from the south threatening him with 
assassination ; among other kindly hints, 
of this sort, sent through the post-office, 
being a colored lithograph portrait of him- 
self, with the picturesque annotation of a 
rifle-ball on the forehead, and a promise 
that such a remedy would "stop his 
music." 

On the eleventh day of this debate, Mr. 
Adams, in opening his defense, stated it 
as his intention to go over the whole affair, 
and that he should require a great deal 
more time, in addition to what had already 
been consumed ; but he was willing to 
forego it all, provided it could be done 
without sacrificing his rights, the rights 
of his constituents, and those of the peti- 



■J.U 



i'KOil COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



tioners. He tlien stated, that if auy 
gentleman would make a motion to lay the 
wliole subject — tliat ai which Marshall 
had been made the champion — on the 
table, he would forbear to proceed with 
liis defense. This motion was at once 
made by Mr. Botts, of Virginia, and car- 
ried by a vote of one hundred and six to 
ninety-three. The petition from Haverhill 
was then refused to be received, three- 
fourths of the bouse voting against it. 

It would appear well-nigli incredible, 
that a venerable man like Mr. Adams 
should be able to carry on, for eleven 
days, almost single-handed, so great a con- 
test. That this was due, in no small 
degree, to his consummate skill as a i)ar- 
liamentarian, cannot be questioned. The 
following memorable instance of his power 
in this respect, will form a fitting close to 
this chapter. 

At the opening of the twenty-sixth con- 
gress, the clerk began to call the roll of 
the members, according to custom. AVhen 
he came to New Jersey, lie stated that 
five seats of the members from that state 
were contested, and that, not feeling him- 
self authorized to decide the question, he 
should pass over those names, and proceed 
w'ith the call. This gave rise to a general 
and violent debate on the steps to be pur- 
sued under such circumstances. Innumer- 
able questions were raised, and proposi- 
tions made, but the house could not agree 
upon the mode of proceeding, and, from 
the second to the fifth day, the house 
remained in a perfectly disorganized state, 
and in inextricable confusion, the clerk 
acting as the tool of his party. But the 
Hour of disenthrallment was at hand ; a 
scene was to be presented which would 
send the mind back to those days when 
Cromwell exclaimed, " Sir Harrj' Vane ! 
woe unto you, Sir Harry Vane ! " — and in 
an instant dispersed the famous rump par- 
liament. 

Mr. Adams, from the opening of this 
scene of confusion and anarchy, had main- 
tained a profound silence. He appeared 
to be engaged most of the time in writing. 
To a common observer he seemed to be 



reckless of everything around him. But 
nothing, not the slightest incident, escaped 
him. 

The fourth day of the struggle had 
now commenced. Mr. Hugh A. Garland, 
the clerk, was directed to call the roll 
again. He commenced with Maine, as 
usual in those days, and was j)roceeding 
towards Massachusetts. Mr. Adams was 
now observed to be holding himself in 
readiness to get the floor at the earliest 
moment possible. His eye was riveted 
on the clerk, his hands clasped the front 
edge of his desk, where he always placed 
them to assist him in rising. He looked, 
in the language of Otway, like a ' fowler 
eager for his prey.' 

"New Jersey!" ejaculated Mr. Hugli 
Garland, " and the clerk has to repeat 
tliat " 

Mr. Adams sprang to the floor ! 

" I rise to interrupt the clerk," was his 
first ejaculation. 

" Silence, silence ! " resounded through 
the hall. "Hear him, hear him! Hear 
what he has to say ! Hear John Quincy 
Adams!" was vociferated on all sides. 

In an instant, such profound silence 
reigned throughout the vast chamber', that 
the fall of a leaf of paper might have been 
heard in any part of it; and every eye was 
riveted on the venerable Nestor of Massa- 
chusetts, — one of the purest of statesmen 
and noblest of men ! He paused for a 
moment, and, having given Mr. Garland 
a withering look, he proceeded to address 
the dense throng. 

"It was not my intention," said he, "to 
take any part in these extraordinary pro- 
ceedings. I had hoped that this house 
would succeed in organizing itself; tliat a 
r.peaker and clerk would be elected, and 
that the ordinary business of legislation 
would have been progressed in. This is 
not the time, or place, to discuss the 
merits of the conflicting claimants for 
seats from New Jersey ; that subject 
belongs to the house of representatives, 
which, by the constitution, is made tlie 
ultimate arbiter of the qualifications of its 
members. But what a spectacle we here 



STRUGGLE FOE THE EIGHT OF PETITIOX — 1S36. 



215 



present ! We degrade and disgrace our- 
aelves; we degrade and disgrace our con- 
stituents and our country-. We do not, 
and cannot organize ; and why ? Because 
the ■■.lerk of this house, the mere clerk, 
whom we create, whom we employ, and 
whose existence depends upon our will, 
usurps the throne, and sets us, the repre- 
sentatives, the vicegerents of the whole 
American people, at defiance, and holds us 
in contempt! And what is this clerk of 
yours ? Is he to control the destinies of 
sixteen millions of freemen ? Is he to 
suspend, by his mere negative, the func- 
tions of government, and put an end to 
this congress ? He refuses to call the 
roll ! It is in j-our power to compel him 
to call it, if he will not do it voluntarily." 

Here he was interrupted by a member, 
who said that he was authorized to say 
that compulsion could not reach the clerk, 
who had avowed that he would resign, 
rather than call the state of New Jersey. 

" Well, sir," continued Mr. Adams, 
"then lat him resign, and we may possibly 
discover some way by which we can get 
along, without the aid of his all-powerful 
talent, learning, and genius. If we cannot 
organize in any other way — if this clerk 
of yours will not consent to our discharg- 
ing the trusts confided to us by our con- 
stituents, then let us imitate the example 
of the Virginia House of Burgesses, which, 
when the colonial governor, Dinwiddle, 
ordered it to disperse, refused to obey the 
imperious and insulting mandate, and, like 
men " 

The multitude could not contain or 
repress their enthusiasm any longer, but 
saluted the eloquent and indignant speaker, 
and intercepted him with loud and deaf- 
ening cheers, which seemed to shake the 
capitol to its center. The very Genii of 
applause and enthusiasm seemed to float 
in the atmosphere of the hall, and every 
heart expanded with indesci-ibable pride 
and exultation. The turmoil, the dark- 
ness, the very chaos of anarchy, w'hich had 
for successive days, pervaded the American 
congress, was dispelled by the magic, the 
talismanic eloquence of a single man ; and, 



once more, the wheels of government and 
of legislation were j)ut in motion. 

Having, b^- this powerful appeal, brought 
the yet unorganized assembly co a percep- 
tion of its real position, he submitted a 
motion requiring the acting clerk to pro- 
ceed in calling the roll. This and similar 
motions had alreadj' been made bj- other 
members. The difficulty, indeed, was just 
this, that the clerk declined to entertain 
them. Accordingly, Mr. Adams was 
immediately interrupted by a burst of 
voices demanding, " How shall the ques- 
tion be put ? " " Who will put the ques- 
tion ? " The voice of Mr. Adams was 
heard above all the tumult, " / intend to 
put the question nnjself.'" That word 
brought order out of chaos. There was 
the master mind. 

As soon as the multitude had recovered 
itself, and the excitement of long and loud 
resounding plaudits had abated, Mr. 
Richard Barnwell Ehett, of South Caro- 
lina, leaped upon one of the desks, waved 
his hand, and exclaimed : 

"I move that the Honorable John 
Quincy Adams take the chair of the 
speaker of this house, and officiate as pre- 
siding officer, till the house be organized 
by the election of its constitutional officers ! 
As many as are agreed to this will say uij ; 
those " 

He had not an opportunity to complete 
the sentence, " those who are not agreed 
will say no," — for one universal, deafen- 
ing, tremendous ay, responded to the 
nomination. 

Hereui)on, it was moved and ordered 
that Hons. Lewis Williams, of North 
Carolina, and Richard Barnwell Rhett, 
conduct John Quincy Adams to the chair. 
And well did Mr. Wise, of Virginia, say 
to him : 

" Sir, I regard it as the proudest hour 
of your life ; and if, when you shall be 
gathered to your fathers, I were asked to 
select the words which, in my judgment, 
are best calculated to give at once the 
character of the man, I would inscribe 
upon your tomb this sentence : / iniend 
to put the question myself." 



216 



TROM COLONY TO WORLD PO\YER. 



Thj brave old man lived not only to 
see the odious "gag rule" rescinded, but to 
listen to that magnificent speech from one 
of his colleagues, Dr. Palfrey, on the 
" inalienable rights of man," at the con- 
clusion of which, Mr. Adams characteris- 
tically exclaimed, "God be praised; the 
seals are broken ; the door is open ! " 

Dying in his country's capitol, in the 
midst of his public duties, in February, 
1848, his illustrious career shone brightly 
to the end. As secretary of state under 
Mr. Monroe, and subsequently as presi- 



dent, liis cabinet and other political asso- 
ciates consisted of such eminent statesmen 
as Crawford, Shelby, Crowninshield, 
Thompson, Southard, Meigs, McLean, 
Rush, Wirt, Barbour, Porter, Van Renssel- 
aer ; nor was his political ability hardly less 
appreciated by those master leaders in the 
ranks of his o])punents. A whole nation 
deplored the loss and united in rendering 
homage to the memory of the fearless 
" champion of the right of petition." His 
.successor in congress was Hon. Horace 
Mann, a kindred spirit. 



XXII. 

BKEAKING OUT OF THE TEMPERANCE REFORMA- 
TION.— 1840. 



Origin, Rapid Spread, Influence, and Wonderful History of the Movement. — Enthusiasm Attending the 
" Washingtonian " Era. — Its Pioneers Rise from the Gutter to the Rostrum, and Sway Multitudes by 
their Eloquence — Fatlier Mathew's Visit. — His 600,000 Converts. — Career of Hawkins. Mitchell, 
Gough, Dow, and Others. — First Temperance Society in the United States. — Singular Terms of 
Membership. — Social Customs in Former Times. — Unrestrained Use of Spirits. — Growing Desire for 
Reform. — Influential Men Enlisted. — Meetings, Societies, Agitation. — A Congressional Organization. 
— Origin of " Tee-Totalism." — Deacon Giles's Distillery. — " My Mother's Gold Ring." — Rise of 
" Washingtonianism." — Six Reformed Drunkards. — Cold Water Armies, Processions, etc. — Music, 
Banners and Badges — The Country All Ablaze — An " Apostle of Temperance." — Administering the 
Pledge. — Conflict Concerning Measures. — Anecdotes of Washington. — General Taylor's Whiskey 
Jug. — Farragut's Substitute for Grog. 



" I Ihall not close this letter without exhortinc you to refrain from spirituouB liquore; they will prove your ruin if you do not. Consider 
bow little a drunken mon differs from a beast; the latter is not endowed with reason, the forrner deprives himself of it."— OBlfBBAL Wash- 

IXOTON. 



jERHAPS it would be difficult to name the precise date when 
active public effoi-t.s were initiated in the United States to 
check the widespread evil of intemperance. It is not to 
be doubted, however, that the writings of that eminent 
man of science, Dr. Benjamin Rush, of Philadelphia, 
especially his " Inquiry into the Effects of Ardent Spirits 
upon the Human Body and Mind," issued as earlj' as 1804, 
did much to awaken an interest in the subject, on the part 
of the community. But not until 1808, was there any 
movement of an associated character, for public or indi- 
vidual abandonment of the use of intoxicating drinks. 

But it sounds somewhat strangely, in these later da3's of 
radical reform, that the initial movpinent ref-^rred to, and 
which was entitled " The Temperate Society of Moreau and Northumberland," (towns 
\n the county of Saratoga, N. Y.) originated by Billy Clarke, should be based upon 
regulations like the following : — 

"No member shall be intoxicated, under penalty of fifty cents. No member shall 
drink rum, gin, whiskey, wine, or any distilled spirits, or compositions of the same, or 
any of them, except by the advice of a physician, or in case of actual disease (also 
excepting wine at public dinners), under penalty of twenty-five cents ; provided that 
this article shall not infringe on any religious ordinance. No member shall offer any 
of said liquors to any other member, or urge any other person to drink thereof, 
under penalty of twenty-five cents for each offense." 




EFFECT OF EEri>R.MATI0N. 



218 



FEOM COLONY TO Vv'OliLD TUWEE. 



But the day of small beginnings, in a 
humane cause, is never to be despised, 
and, in a few years, the reform had 
enlisted the earnest co-operation of law- 
yers, divines, and otlier eminent men, such 
as Carey, Palfrey, Humphrey, Dexter, 
Marsh. Edwards, lieeeher, I'orter, Leavitt, 
Hewit. Day, and Kittredj^e. In 1813, 
there was formed the Massai-husetts Soci- 
ety for the 8ui)pression of Intemperance; 
one ill Coiiiiectirut. in 18-!'.); and, in ISl'G, 
the zVmcrican Temperance Union. The 
statistics of this period present the calcu- 
lation, that, out of a white population of 
ten millions, between three and four mil- 
lions were habitual spirit-drinkers, of whom 
three hundred and sevent^'-iive thousand 
drank daily on an average three gills of 
ardent .spirits, while an equal number con- 
sumed more than twice that quantity, and 
of course were drunkards. Making due 
allowance for the imperfectness of such 
statistical data, it was admitted bj' all, 
that the intemperate use of spirituous liq- 
uors, in every part of the land, had become 
alarmingly prevalent. 

The excellent rcsuiiii' of this movement, 
as given by Dr. Emerson Davis, himself 
one of its ablest and most efficient sup- 
porters, states that at this time the reform 
seemed to be simultaneous through the 
country. At the beginning of 1828, the 
custom, hitherto so general, of treating 
visitors with wine, cordials, and brandy, 
began to disappear. The sideboards of 
the rich and influential, which from time 
immemorial had groaned under a load of 
decanters, were relieved of their burdens, 
and a ver^' great change in the customs of 
society began to be apparent. At the 
close of 1828, the number of temperance 
societies reported in tlie temperance jour- 
nals was two hundred and twenty-tive. 
At the close of 1829, there were more 
than one thousand such societies, embrac- 
ing more than one hundred thousand 
members, pledged to total abstinence ; 
fifty distilleries had stopped, four hun- 
dred merchants had abandoned the traffic, 
and twelve hundred drunkards had been 
reclaimed. On the tirst of May, 1831, it 



appeared that more than three hundred 
thousand persons had signed the pledge, 
and not less than fifty thousand were sup- 
posed to have been saved from a drunkard's 
grave. Even at Washington, a congres- 
sional temperance society was organized, 
under the auspices of such men as Cass, 
Grundy, Bates, Wayne, Post, Durbin, and 
others ; and some of the most brilliant 
public men signed the pledge. 

A very common objection (adds Dr. 
Davis), made by many of the poor, was, 
that they could not afford to drink wine, 
and, therefore, that signing the pledge 
operated unequally; it took from them 
the use of all stimulants but cider and 
beer, but it left to the rich the use of wine, 
which was often about as strong as Cognac 
brandy. In order to obviate this objec- 
tion, it was found necessary to introduce 
a new pledge, prohibiting the use, not 
only of distilled, Init of fermented, liquors. 
The first society that adopted this pledge 
was the Eighth Ward Branch of the New 
York City Temperance Society. This 
was called the tee-total pledge, — a name 
first given to it in England, and which 
had its origin in the prolonged and inco- 
herent stuttering, by one who was taking 
the pledge, at the first letter in the word 
' ?otal.' This tee-total jjledge was intro- 
duced into this country in 1834, and in 
a short time many societies were formed 
on that principle. Many, however, who 
signed the old pledge, refused to sign the 
new ; and thus there was an apparent fall- 
ing off in the number of the members of 
temperance organizations. Some, too, who 
had delivered public addresses, and stood 
foremost in the ranks of reformers, were 
thrown into the background, and became 
silent spectators of passing events. 

Among the prominent promoters of the 
cause, appear the names of Delavan, Nor- 
ton, Keener. Gerritt Smith, Moses Grant, 
Loyd, Collins, Briggs, Walworth, Grundy, 
Hunt. Stewart, and Hoar, as speakers. 
Mr. L. M. Sargent contributed powerfully 
to the reform, by his unrivaled temper- 
ance tales, including that widely circulated 
and admired production, " J/y Mother's 



THE TEMPEEAXCE EEFOEMATION — 1S40. 



219 



Gold Ring." Pierpont inspired thousands 
by his quaint and tlirilling poems; and 
the letters, essays, and otlier writings, of 
such men as Woodward, Warren, Baird, 
Beman, Chapin, Kirk, Channing, and 
Barnes, added greatly to the impression 
upon the public mind. Among the inci- 
dents of this period, perhaps none created 
greater interest and excitement through- 
out the whole land, than the assault, prose- 
cution, and imprisonment, of Rev. George 
B. Cheever, of Salem, Mass., subsequently 
of Kew York. About the beginning of 
1835, he published in a Salem newspaper, 
a dream, descriptive of " Deacon Giles's 
Distillery," in which the liquors were 
graphically characterized as containing 
demons in an inferno. Deacon Giles was 
a veritable person, and the publication 
resulted in a violent assault upon Mr. 
Cheever, one night, by the foreman of the 
distillery, who inflicted upon the unarmed 
clergyman a number of severe blows with 
a raw hide, to which Mr. Cheever made no 
resistance. Mr. Cheever was also prose- 
cuted for libel, and sentenced to thirty 
days' imprisonment. He was regarded as 
a martyr to the cause of temperance, and 
his case helped rather than checked the 
progress of the reform. He continued to 
do valiant service, as before, with his pen 
and voice, ranking, in this respect, with 
such men as Clarke, Grimke, Fisk, Coffin, 
Woods, Williams, Merrill, Sewall, Pond, 
Thurston, Keese, Van Loon, Jewett, Buck- 
ingham. 

But a most stirring and enthusiastic 
impetus was yet to be given to the temper- 
ance movement, and that through the 
humblest personal instrumentality. This 
was the organization of the Washington 
Temperance Society, in Baltimore, in the 
month of April, 1840 ; its most remarka- 
ble convert being Mr. John H. W. Haw- 
kins, who joined the society the following 
June. 

It appears that six individuals, who 
were in the habit of associating together, 
were seated, as usual, on Friday evening, 
April 2, 1840, in Chase's tavern, in Lib- 
erty street, Baltimore, where they were 



accustomed to meet almost every evening, 
for the jjurpose of enjoying mutually all 
the benefits and conveniences which that 
establishment and each other's society 
could possibly afford. These were Wil- 
liam K. Mitchell, tailor ; John F. Hoss, 
carpenter ; David Anderson, blacksmith ; 
George Steers, blacksmith ; James McCur- 
ley, coach-maker ; and Archibald Camp- 
bell, silver-plater. A clergyman who was 
preaching in the city at that time, had 
given public notice that on that evening 
he would deliver a discourse on the sub- 
ject of temperance. Upon this lecture, 
the conversation of the six comrades pres- 
ently turned ; whereupon it was agreed 
that four of them should go and hear it, 
and report accordingly. So, after the ser- 
mon, they returned and conversed on its 
merits for some time; when one of the 
company remarked, ' After a-U, temperance 
is a good thing.' ' Oh,' said the host, 
' they're all a parcel of hypocrites.' 'Oh, 
yes,' replied McCurley, ' I'll be bound for 
you; it's your interest to cry them down, 
anyhow.' '/ tell you what, boys, let's 
form a society, and make Bill Mitchell 
president.' ' Agreed,' cried they. The 
idea seemed to take wonderfully, and the 
more they talked and laughed over the 
idea, the more were they pleased with it. 

After parting that night, they did not 
all meet again until Sunday, when they 
took a stroll, and, between walking and 
treating, they managed to arrange the 
whole matter to their entire satisfaction. 
It was agreed that one of them should 
draw up a pledge, and that the whole 
party should sign it the next day. Accord- 
ingly, on Monday morning, Mitchell wrote 
the following pledge: 'We whose names 
are annexed, desirous of forming a society 
for our mutual benefit, and to guard 
against a pernicious practice, which is 
injurious to our health, standing, and fam- 
ilies, do pledge ourselves as gentlemen, 
that we will not drink any spirituous or 
malt liquors, wine, or cider.' 

He went with this, at about nine o'clock, 
to Anderson's house, and found him still 
in bed, sick from the effects of his Sunday 



220 



FIJOM COLONY TO WOKJ.D roWEli. 



adventures. He arose, liowever, "dressed 
himself, and, after hearing tlie pledge read, 
went down to his shop with his friend for 
pen and ink, and there did himself the 
honor of being the first man to sign. 
After obtaining the names of the remain- 
ing four, the worthy jn-esident finished 
this noble achievement by adding his own. 
On the evening of that day, they met at 
the residence of one of their number and 
duh' formed themselves into a society, with 
the usual officers. Little did these six 
associates know of the fame and achieve- 
ments they were moulding ! 

Having thus got under way, they next 
turned their attention to obtaining mem- 
bers and devising means to defray the 
e.xpenses of their meetings ; it was there- 
fore agreed that each man should bring a 
man, and every one should pay twenty-five 
cents upon becoming a member, and 
twelve and a lialf cents, monthly, there- 
after. 

The next debate was as to the name 
they should give tt) their society. A num- 
ber were propo.sed, among them that of 
Jefferson ; when it was finally agreed that 
the president and secretary should be a 
committee to draft a constitution, and 
select a name. Tliis the}' did, giving to 
the association the name of the " Wash- 
ington Temperance Society," in iiouor f 
of the Father of his Country, and were | 
consequently known as rn/.v// /»(//«// /(';;s. ' 
It is a little singular, however, that this i 
name should have been chosen, for, 
though Washington was 
one of the brightest ^ 
examj)les of temperate: 
eating and drinking, be 
habitually used Hcjuor 
or wine himself, and 
provided it for his 
guests and laborer.*. 
The following curious 
document is in point: 

" Articles of Agree- 
ment made this twelfth 
day of April, Annn 
Domini, one thousand 
seven hundred and 



eighty-seven, by and between George 
AVashington, Esq., of the I'arish of Truro, 
in the County of Fairfax, (State of Vir- 
ginia, on the one jiart, and Philip Bater, 
Gardener, on the other. Jl'itiii'ss, that 
the said Philip Pater, for and in 
consideration of the covenants herein 
hereafter mentioned, doth promise and 
agree to serve the said George Wash- 
ington for the term of one year, as a 
Gardener^ and that he will, during said 
time, conduct liimself soberly, diligently 
and honestly — that he will faithfully and 
industriously perf(irm all and every jiart of 
his duty as a gardener, to the best of his 
knowledge and abilities, and that he will 
not. at any time suffer himself to be dis- 
guised with liquor, except on the times 
hereafter mentioned. In consideration of 
these things being well and truly per- 
formed on the part of the said Philip 
Bater, the said George Washington doth 
agree to allow him (the said Philip) the 
same kind and quantity of jJi'ovisions as he 
has heretofore liad : and likewise, annually, 
a decent suit of clothes, befitting a man in 
his station ; to consist of a coat, vest and 
breeches ; — a working-jacket, and breeches 
of home-spun besides; two white shirts; 
three checked do ; two linnen pocket-hand- 
kerchiefs, two [lair linnen u\erall» ; — as 




SIGNING THE PLEDGE. 



THE TEMPEKANCE EEFOEMATIOX — ISiO. 



221 



many pair of shoes as are actually neces- 
sary for liim ; — -four dollars at Christmas, 
ivith wliich lie may be drunk four days 
and four nights ; two dollars at Easter to 
effect the same "purpose; two dollars at 
Whitsuntide, to be drunk two days; — a 
dram in the morning and a Drink of Grog 
at Dinner at noon." 

The above is signed by the two con- 
ti'acting parties, and witnessed by George 
A. Washington and Tobias Lear. In 
another instance, Wasliington's fine in- 
stincts and principles are admirably dis- 
played : 

" I shall not close this letter," writes 
Washington to one of his overseers, 
" without exhorting you to refrain from 
spirituous liquors ; tlie}' will prove your 
ruin if you do not. Consider how little a 
drunken man differs from a beast ; the 
latter is not endowed with reason, the 
former deprives himself of it; and when 
that is the case, acts like a brute, anno}'- 
ing and disturbing every one around him ; 
nor is this all, nor, as it respects himself, 
the worst of it. By degrees it renders a 
person feeble, and not only unable to 
serve others, but to help himself; and 
being au act of his own, he falls from a 
state of usefulness into contempt, and at 
length suffers, if not perishes, in penury 
and want. Don't let this be your case. 
Shew yourself more of a man and a Chris- 
tian than to yield to so intolerable a vice, 
which cannot, I am certain, (to the great- 
est lover of liquor,) give more pleasure to 
sip in the poison, (for it is no better,) than 
the consequence of it in bad behavior at 
the moment, and tlie more serious evils 
produced by it afterwards must give pain." 

Great and wonderful were the results 
destined to flow from the ' Washington 
Temperance Society,' thus started by those 
six inebriates in the city of Baltimore. 
At their second meeting, they had two 
new members ; but, in a comparatively 
short time, the society increased so much 
that it became a question how they could 
employ their time so as to make their 
meetings interesting. The president there- 
upon suggested that each member should 



rise in his place and give his experience ; 
and, by way of commencement, he arose 
and told what be had passed throujih in 
the last fifteen years, and the advantages 
he had derived from signing the total- 
abstinence pledge. This was the origin of 
that most popular and efficient method 
which tlie Washington Society and all its 
auxiliaries adopted, for giving interest 
and effect to their gatherings. Signers 
were thus obtained, and the attention of 
the public was attracted, so that a class 
was reached which otherwise might not 
have been affected by the labors of those 
other good men who had for so nuxny 
years been engaged in promoting temper- 
ance in a different way. 

By Christmas, in 1840, the refoi'm had 
become so popular, that thousands bad 
flocked to' its standard, and enrolled them- 
selves as the friends of temperance. The 
wave had swept onward, and tidings of the 
great reformation reached distant cities. 
On invitation from New York, for a dele- 
gation of five men to hold experience 
meetings twice every da\' for one week, in 
that city, Messrs. Hawkins, Pollard, Shaw, 
Casey, and Mitchell, proceeded to that 
place, and there held the first Washing- 
tonian missionary temperance meeting 
ever known in the United States. It was 
a type of that success which was to 
accompany this new s^'stem in behalf 
of temperance, for, during each of the 
speeches, multitudes came forward and 
signed the j)ledge, and, taken altogether, 
such a scene had never before been wit- 
nessed in New York. 

But the most powerful among all the 
advocates of Washingtonian reform was 
Mr. Hawkins, who rose from the very gut- 
ter of drunkenness to the rostrum of im- 
passioned eloquence in advocacj' of reform, 
and with prodigious success. The pecu- 
liar circumstances of his history had an 
almost overpowering effect on his own 
feelings, whenever he spoke, and his au- 
diences listened now breathless!}', and 
anon with uncontrollable demonstrations 
of enthusiasm. He was a man of plain, 
good common sense, with a peculiar sin- 



•)-)0 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



cerity about him, and an easy way of 
working up his hearers to a state of sym- 
pathy with liim. He would at one time 
assume tlie melting mood, and picture the 
scenes of a drunkard's home — and that 
home his own — and the fountains of gen- 
erous feelings, in many hearts, gushed 
forth in tears ; and again, in a moment, 
as he related some ludicrous story, those 
tearful eyes glistened with delight, sighs 
changed to hearty shouts, and long faces 
were convulsed with broad grins an(i 
glorious smiles. Drunkards aud outcasts 
of the worst type, that swarm in the fes- 
tering purlieus and penetralia of New York, 
were reclaimed, and such was the over- 
whelming power of the movement, that, 
finally, immense meetings were held in the 
Park. In Boston, too, the old Cradle of 
Liberty rocked with tumultuous enthusi- 
asm for ' independence ' from the tyi-ant of 
strong driidc. Festivals, children's cold 
water armies, processions, banners, bands 
of musics, songs, etc., filled the whole land 
with the feast of reason and the flow of 
soul. 

Statistics might be indefinitely pre- 
sented, showing the vast results achieved 
by this wonderful moral enginery. Up- 
wards of twenty-two thousand names were 
obtained to the pledge by Messrs. Pollard 
and Wright, in a lecturing tour made by 
them through Central New York, New 
Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Messrs. Vicars 
and Small and Smith revolutionized Ohio 
and the West ; Hawkins, Bishop, John- 
son, Hayes, and Haydoek, labored from 
one end of the country to the other. Haw- 
kins alone, in less than twenty years, 
traveled more than two hundred thousand 
miles, lecturing between five and «ix thou- 
sand times. Latham, ^Madden, Snow, 
White, Gary, Leigh, Coffin, Brown, Riley, 
Bungay, Copway, Zug, Drinkard, Thomp- 
son, are names that will ever he remem- 
bered, too, as powerful and successful 
advocates of this reform, on the rostrum ; 
and those of Pierpont, Burleigh, Phillips, 
Tappan, and others, by their stirring 
songs and poems. But, chief and most 
powerful of the many advocates of the 



temperance reformation, is John B. Gough, 
who has proved himself in this arena, a 
wonderful orator. His eloquence, indeed, 
was of that electric quality which, striking 
a chord in ever}' heart and drawing tears 
from every eye, perfectly swaj'ed the vast 
multitudes that hung upon his words 
wherever he went. Every city, town, and 
village, throughout the country, felt the 
impress of his wonderful power in this 
great reformatory movement. Like Haw- 
kins, his condition was humble, but from 
this he had descended to the lowest depths 
of social and personal degradation until 
rescued by the interposition of a friendly 
hand. No data can adequately describe 
the extent and value of his labors from 
that time forth, for a quarter of a century 
and more. 

But a new and most interesting, as well 
as important chapter, in the history of 
temperance, is yet to be mentioned, namely, 
the visit of Father Mathew, the world- 
renowned 'Apostle of Temperance' in 
Ireland, to this country, in 1849. For 
ten years previously', he labored as a tem- 
perance agitator and reformer in Ireland 
and England. In five months, he obtained 
150,000 converts in Cork ; and in Galway, 
he administered the pledge to no less than 
100,000 in two days ! On his landing at 
New York city, the civil authorities ac- 
corded him the honor of a public recep- 
tion, — certainly well deserved, by one who 
had been tlie instrument, under divine 
guidance, of reclaiming 6,000,000 of his 
fellow-creatures. He visited the principal 
cities, north and south, and everywhere a 
hearty welcome was extended to him from 
all classes. He remained several days in 
Washington, where he was entertained 
at a grand dinner by the president of the 
United States, and received many dis- 
tinguishing marks of esteem from gentle- 
men highest in the offices of the govern- 
ment. He was honored, also, with a seat 
on the floor of the house of representa- 
tives, and within the bar of the United 
States senate. At Philadelphia, he re- 
ceived his welcome in Independence Hall ; 
and at Boston, the doors of Faneuil Hall 



THE TEMPERANCE EEFOEMATIOA' — 1540. 



223 




DISTIXOnSHED TRIMPERANCE APTOIATES. 



1^24 



PROM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEli. 



oj)ened to him on golden hinges of accla- 
mation, and where he administered the 
pledge to upwards of four thousand per- 
sons the first da}'. His metliod of admin- 
istering the pledge was somewhat novel, 
thongh at the same time quite affecting. 
The converts knelt in a semi-circle around 
him, and repeated the following words : 

'I promise, with divine assistance, to 
abstain from all intoxicating liquors, cor- 
dials, cider and fruit liquors, and to i)re- 
vent, as much as possible, intemperance in 
others, by advice and example.' 

To this. Father Mathew's response was, 
' May God bless you, my children. May 
he give you grace and strength to keep 
the pledge.' He then went to each indi- 
vidual and marked them with the sign of 
the cross ; but this latter ceremony, and 
the kneeling, were dispensed with in the 
case of Protestants. In this way, the 
venerable and devoted man traveled over 
almost the entire country, zealously ad- 
vocating his great principles, and ajjinurds 
of six hundred tliousand. persons enrolled 
themselves under his hanner of total 
abstinence. Upon descending the Missis- 
sippi, he administered in one of the towns 
situated on its banks, the pledge to seven 
hundred persons. He ascended it, after 
an interval of some months, and stopping 
at the same town, he had the gratification 
to find that among the converts there were 
but three instances of relapse. Though 
not possessed of the oratorical graces of 
eloquence, like those of Gough, he knew 
how to present truth with sucli force and 
sincerity, as to win almost irresistibly 
upon all hearers. The following anecdote 
will illustrate his peculiar forte: 

' Did you see Father Mathew lately ? ' 
said one friend to another, whom he haj> 
pened to meet. ' I did,' was the reply. 
' And I'll engage he made you take the 
pledge ! ' 'He did, indeed. But did you 
see him lately?' 'To be .sure I did.' 
' And did he make you take it too ? ' 
' Tliat he did ! ' ' There's no escaping 
him ; hut I am not sorry for it.' ' No. nor 
I neithe;-.' 

Personallj', Father Mathew was a little 



above the ordinary stature, with a full 
and well-proportioned figure, dark hair, 
soft blue eyes, ruddy and healthy com- 
plexion. 

Though characterized by periods of 
prosperitj' and declension, the temperance 
cause has proved itself ineradicable, even 
under circumstances seemingly the most 
untoward. Perhaps the greatest struggle 
through which it has passed, in later years, 
has been that which involved the enact- 
ment of state prohibitory laws, which 
visited stringent penalties upon those who 
sold spirituous liquors. The name of Neal 
Dow, the author and advocate of this kind 
of legislation, the discussion attending 
which has been one of the most important 
and exciting during the century, will for- 
ever be identified with the history of the 
American temperance reformation, as will 
also the names of Greeley and Miner, dis- 
tinguished champions of the same priu- 
cijile. 

It would be an easy task to fill a whole 
volume with distinguished testimonies to 
the value of temperance. As this, how- 
ever, would here be impossible, a few 
pleasant illustrative incidents will suffice 
the purpose. 

Towards the close of the revolutionary 
war. an officer in the American army had 
occasion to transact some business with 
General Washington, and repaired to 
Philadelphia for that purpose. Before 
leaving, he received an invitation to dine 
with the general, which was accepted and, 
upon entering the room he found himself 
in the company of a large number of ladies 
and gentlemen. As they were mostly 
strangers to him, and he was of a naturally 
modest and unassuming disjiosition, he 
took a seat near the foot of the table, and 
refrained from taking an active part in 
the conversation. Just before the dinner 
was concluded, Washington politely re- 
quested him, by name, to drink a glass of 
wine with him. 

'You will nave the goodness to excuse 
me, general,' was the reply, 'as I have 
made it a rule not to take wine.' 

All eyes were instantly turned upon the 



THE TEMPERANCE REFORMATION — 1840. 



young officer, and a murmur of contempt 
and surprise ran around the room. That 
a person should be so unsocial, not to say 
mean, as never to drink wine, was really 
too bad ; but that he should abstain from 
it on an occasion like that, and even when 
offered to him by Washington himself, 
was really intolerable ! Washington no- 
ticed at once the feelings of his guests, 
and promptly addressed them in his gra- 
cious and winning way, saying: 

' Gentlemen, Mr. is right. I do 

not wish any of my guests to partake 
of anything against their inclination, 
and I certainly do not wish them to 
violate any established principle in their 

intercourse with me. I honor Mr. for 

his frankness, for his consistency in thus 
adhering to an established rule which can 
never do him harm, and for the adoption 
of which, I have no doubt, he has good 
reasons.' 

General Taylor, the hero of the Mexi- 
can war, always gave the weight of his 
example in favor of temperance. A trav- 
eler in the west one day encountered an 
emigrant journeying with his family to 
the fertile regions beyond the Mississippi, 
all his worldly goods being packed on 
wagons, and on one load there hung a 
huge jug with the bottom broken out. 
The emigrant was asked his reason for 
carrying that with him. ' Why,' he said, 



'that is my Taijlor jug.' 'And what is a 
Taylor jug ? ' inquired the friend. ' Whj',' 
said the emigrant, 'I had a son with Gen- 
eral Taylor's army in Mexico, and the old 
general always told him to carry his whis- 
key-jug with a hole in the bottom ; and 
since that, I have carried my jug as you 
see it, and I find it is the best invention I 
ever met with.' 

Everybody admired Admiral Farragut's 
heroism in clinging to the topmast to 
direct a battle ; but there was another 
jsarticular of that contest, illustrating no 
less forcibly his heroic character. ' Ad- 
miral,' said one of his officers, the night 
before the battle, ' won't yon consent to 
give Jack a glass of grog in the morning, 
not enough to make him drunk, but enough 
to make him fight cheerfully ? ' ' Well,' 
replied the admiral, ' I have been to sea 
considerably, and have seen a battle or 
two, but I never found that I wanted rum 
to enable me to do my duty. I will order 
two cups of coffee to each man, at two 
o'clock ; and, at eight o'clock, I will jaipe 
all hands to breakfast, in Mobile bay.' 
And he did give Jack the coffee ; and 
then he went up to the mast-head, and the 
result is well known. 

These illustrations of devotedness to the 
principle of temperance in high places 
might be greatly multiplied. Their value 
to the cause can hardly be overestimated. 



15 



XXIII. 

[NVENTION OF THAT WONDKOUS PIECE OF MECHANISM, 
THE SEWING-MACHINE.— 1S46. 



Rumantic Genius and Perseverance Displayed in its Production — Toils of the Inventor in His Garret. 
— World-Wide Introduction of tlie Device — Upwards of One Thousand Patents Taken Out in the 
United States. — The Industrial Interests of tlie Country AflTected to tlie Amount of $500,000,000 
Annually. — The Humble Inventor Becomes a Millionaire. — The Main Principle Involved. — Compari- 
son with Hand Sewing — How it was Suggested. — Listening to Some Advantage. — History of Mr 
Howe's Efforts — Ingenuity, Struggles, Triumphs. — Value of a Friend in Need — A Machine at Last. 
— Its Parts, Capabilities, etc. — Reception by the Public. — Doubt Succeeded by Admiration. — Great 
Popularity and Demand. — ^ Wearisome Litigation with Rivals — Interesting Question of Priority. — 
Decided in Howe's Favor — He Rises to Affluence — Improvements by Others. — Unique and Useful 
Devices. — Number of .Machines Produced. — Time and Labor Saved. — Effect Upon Prices — New 
Avenues of Labor Opened. 



" The invention nil iidmired. 

And each hnw lie to be the inventor miesed. 

Bo plain it seemed oni-c found— which yet un. found. 

Most would have thought impossible." 




IFFEREISrCE of opinion there may 
be, with regard to the abstract 
question, wlio first conceived the 
peculiar principle involved in 
sewing by machinery-, and even 
pect to who was the original con- 
11 of a machine capable of fulfilling 
lea ; but, so far as actual demonstra- 
its feasibleness and utility is con- 
and for the great results which 
followed that demonstration, the world 
be considered as indebted to Elias 
Jr., a Massachusetts mechanic, born 
eared in obscure circumstances, and 
early age thrown upon his own 
lustrious endeavor, for simple sub- 
It may be remarked, as a general fact, that the 
peculiar or original principle characterizing the 
THE^vENTOR TOILING IN HIS GARRET, '"^'^lem scwing-machine, consists in the use of two 

threads, one being fed by a needle, and the other — 



INVENTION OF THE SEWING MACHINE — 1846. 



227 



the wrong side thread, or, as it has been 
termed, the auxiliary thread — being sup- 
plied bj' a shuttle and bobbin. The needle 
is secured to a stock, whose movement, 
caused by arms and levers, drives its point 
through the material to be sewed ; the 
eye of the needle, at a moderate distance 
from the point, carries the thread through 
and then retires leaving a loop, through 
which loop a shuttle is passed, on tlie 
under side of the material to be sewed; 
this shuttle carries a quantity of thread 
upon a spool, which it supplies as the seam 
progresses. The needle on retiring draws 
up the loop, and thus closes the seam, 
which on the upper or face side of the 
work presents the appearance of what is 
called a 'row of stitching,' and on the 
under, a close resemblance, but differing 
slightly. The return, or rotation of the 
shuttle in its orbit, is a matter of course, 
and the work thus goes on continuously 
and with great rapic'it^-. 

Tlie feed, or the progressive movement 
of the material to be sewed under the 
needle, is accomplished in various ways — 
primaril3', by means of the friction of a 
feeding wheel, whose roughened surface 
■.reates sufficient adhesion to movQ the 
material forward at the requisite intervals. 
This feed is effected by the ordinary 
means of a racket-wheel and click, or paul, 
the latter being capable of adjustment 
through shifting levers, so as to give a 
longer or shorter stitch, at the will of the 
operator, or the requirements of the work. 

These devices and arrangements, with 
such improved modifications as experience 
and ingenuity have suggested from time to 
time, constitute the American sewing- 
machine. 

Although the use of the sewing-machine 
has become general only within a compar- 
atively recent period, the instrument is, 
'n a certain sense, an old invention. The 
needle with the eye in the center, and 
double-pointed, is beautifully employed in 
the embroidery machine, which is an old 
French device. This machine worked 
upon cloth as many as sixty similar figures 
or flowers at the same time; the whole 



being directed by one hand, who, by the 
aid of a pentagraphic guide on a prepared 
pattern, pointed the needles to their appro- 
jjriate place of entrance, and returned them 
with unerring certainty and exactitude. 
The earliest form of stitch made use of 
was the -'chain stitch,' vi'hich is still 
emjiloj'ed for ornamental jiurposes, but is 
not approved of where strength and dura- 
bility are required. The next stitch in 
order was the ' running stitch,' and was 
accomplished bv means of a needle having 
an eye in the middle and points at each 
end ; this has been extensively used for 
the cheaper kinds of work, but does not 
insure durability. The next form of stitch 
is that already described, as formed by 
means of two threads, with a needle and 
shuttle ; — and this opens up the wonderful 
era of modern sewing-machines, beginning 
with the introduction to the public of that 
by Mr. Howe. 

It w-ould be impossible to follow Mr. 
Howe through all the details of his varied 
experience during his early years. Suffice 
it to say, that it was at Boston, when in 
his twentieth year, and after he had 
learned the rudiments of his trade in one 
of the machine shops of Lowell, and sub- 
sequently in Cambridge, working side by 
side with Nathaniel P. Banks, that the 
thought of sewing by machinery was first 
suggested to his mind. As related by 
Mr. Parton, in his admirable magazine 
sketch of Howe, this singularly fortuitous 
incident happened in this wise : — In the 
year 1839, two men in Boston, one a 
mechanic and the other a capitalist, were 
striving to ])roduce a knitting-machine, 
which proved to be a task beyond their 
strength. When the inventor was at his 
wit's end, his capitalist brought the 
machine to the shop of Ari Davis, to see 
if that eccentric genius could suggest the 
solution of the difficultj^, and make the ma- 
chine work. The shop, resolving itself into 
a committee of the whole, gathered about 
the knitting-machine and its proprietor, 
and were listening to an explanation of its 
principle, when Davis, in his wild, extrava- 
gant way, broke in with the question — 



n;oM coLOXY to would tower. 



"Wliat are you bothering yourselves 
with a knitting-nuichiue for V ^^ hy don"t 
you make a sewing-machine ? " 

" I wish I could," said the cajjitalist : 
"but it can't be done.'' 

"Oh, yes, it can," said Davis; "I can 
make a sewing-machine mj'self." 

"Well," said the other, "you do it, 
Davis, and I'll insure you an independent 
fortune." 

Among the workmen who stood by and 
listened to this conversation — and in this 
instance at least the old adage concern- 
ing listeners appears to have been reversed 
— says Parton, was Howe ; and from that 
time he was in the habit, in his leisure 




moments, of meditating devices for sewing 
by machinery. Having inherited a con- 
stitution hardly strong enough for the 
work of a machinist, and burdened even 
in his opening manhood with the care of a 
growing family, his attention was more 
and more concentrated upon the project 
of building a machine which would furnish 
him a livelihood more easily earned. In 
December, 1845, upon a small capital, pro- 
vided by the generosity of an old friend, 
he shut himself up in a garret at Cam- 
bridge, and set himself seriously to the 
task of inventing a sewing machine. 
After about six months of incessant labor 



and reflection he produced the first mor 
chine tJutt ever sewed a seam, and he ivas 
soon the wearer of a suit of rlotlics made 
hij its assisfanri: This first machine, 
which is one of great beauty and finish, is 
still in existence, an object of peculiar 
interest to the curious who inspect it; and 
it will sew ten times as fast as a woman 
can sew by hand. Having jaatented the 
machine, and finding the tailors of Amer- 
ica averse to its introduction, he went to 
England, where he succeeded in selling 
two machines ; but found so little encour- 
agement that he would have starved to 
death but for the aid of friends, and he 
resolved to return home, or at least to send 
his family. So pinched was he, 
while in London, that he fre- 
quently borrowed small sums of 
Lis friend, Mr. Inglis — on one 
occasion a shilling, with which he 
bought some beans, and cooked 
and ate them in his own room, — 
and through him also obtained 
some credit for provisions. Ar- 
riving home, after an absence of 
about two years, he found that the 
sewing-machine was a conspicuous 
object of public attention ; doulit 
had been succeeded by admiration 
of its qualities; and several ingen- 
ious men having experimented, 
had finallv improved upon the ma- 
chine as originally constructed. 
A war of litigation ensued, and, 
after several years, Jlr. Howe's 
claim to be the original inventor was 
legally and irreversibly established, the 
judge deciding that 'there was no evidence 
which left a shadow of doubt that, for all 
the benefit conferred ui)on the public by 
the introduction of a sewing-machine, the 
public are indebted to Mr. Howe.' To 
him, therefore, all other inventors or 
improvers had to pay tribute. From 
being a poor man, Howe became, in a 
few years, one of the most noted mil- 
lionaires in America ; and his bust, exe- 
cuted by Ellis, shows a man of marked 
personal appearance and striking natural 
endowments. 



INVEXTIOX OF THE SEWING lIACIiIXE — 1S40. 



229 



But here the verj' singular circumstances 
relating to the alleged priority' of Mr. 
Walter Hunt's invention, as described by 
a graphic and well-informed writer in the 
New York Galaxy, — showing how preca- 
rious, at best, is the basis upon which 
even the most impartial of legal conclu- 
sions are arrived at, — may well be pre- 
sented, as exhibiting the trials of inventors 
and public benefactors : It was between 
the years 1832 and 1834, that Mr. Hunt, 
in his own workshop in Amos street, New 
York city, invented, built, and put into 
full and effective operation a machine for 
sewing, stitching, and seaming cloth. 
This first machine was made principally 
by the inventor's own hands. It was the 
pioneer sewing-machine of America, and 
the first really successful one of the world. 
There had already been a French inven- 
tion, a tambour machine for ornamenting 
gloves; but it was of very little general 
utility. These machines of Walter Hunt 
all contained the invention of the tnirved 
needle with the eye near the point, the 
shuttle and their combination, and they 
originated the famous interlocked stitch 
with two threads. Many samples of cloth 
were perfectly sewn by these machines, 
and many of the friends and neighbors of 
the inventor came to see them work. At 
length, one G. A. Arrowsmith was so well 
satisfied with the working of the machines, 
that he bought them, in 1834, and there- 
with the right to obtain letters-patent. 
But no sooner had Arrowsmith got this 
right, than he became impressed both with 
the vastness of the undertaking and with 
the prejudice which any scheme appar- 
ently tending to impoverish poor seam- 
stresses would awaken. At the same time 
he became involved in pecuniary disaster, 
and for years did nothing with the 
machine. Fortunately for Mr. Hunt's 
fame, many persons had seen his machines 
work, and had seen them sew a good, 
strong and handsome stitch, and form 
seams better than hand-sewing. Of these, 
no less than six directly testified to this 
fact in a suit afterward brought, and 
established the fact beyond question that 



Walter Hunt invented the first sewing- 
machine, and that it contained the curved, 
eye-pointed needle at the end of a vibrat- 
ing arm with a shuttle. The case itself 
was decided upon another point. These 
afiidavits are still in existence. But this 
was not all. Fifteen years after he had 
sold his machines to Arrowsmith, who lost 
a fortune and a name in not devoting him- 
self to their reproduction, Walter Hunt 
from memory gave a sworn written de- 
scription of his first machine in every part, 
and, to clinch the matter, afterward con- 
structed a machine from that description, 
which was the counterpart of the machine 
of 1834, and worked perfectly. Finally, 
one of the original machines sold to Arrow- 
smith in 1834, was and is, still preserved, 
though in a dilapidated condition. Walter 
Hunt then undertook to make a new 
sewing-machine, which should be an oper- 
ative instrument, and should contain 
all the parts which were preserved of 
the old machine, with such others as were 
necessary to present the machine in the 
same shape that the original one pos- 
sessed. He did this succes.sfully, and 
the restored machine, still operative and 
ready to sew good, strong seams, is yet in 
existence. 

W^ithout drawing further, however, from 
this curiously interesting chapter in the 
history of the machine, involving a ques- 
tion of the deepest interest to inventors, 
it is time to describe the instrument — its 
parts and peculiar features, and modus 
operandi, — invented b}' Mr. Howe, and 
which transformed him from an obscure 
and struggling mechanic to one of the 
foremost manufacturers and millionaires 
in America Seating ourselves therefore 
before this wonderful elaboration of artis- 
tic genius and skill, as it has come fresh 
from the hands of the toilsome but at last 
successful inventor, and witnessing its 
weird and agile movement while its enthu- 
siastic proprietor essays to sew a seam, we 
find that two threads are employed, one of 
which is carried through the cloth by 
means of a curved needle, the pointed end 
of which passes through the cloth; the 



230 



FKO.M COLONY TO WOKLD I'OWER. 




THE OLD AND SEW: SEWING BY HAND AND MACHINE. 

needle used lias tlie eye that is to receive each side of tlie cloth the same appearance 

the thread within a small distance, say an as that tjiven by stitching, with this pecu- 

eighth of an inch, of its inner or pointed liarity, that the thread sewn on one side 

end, the other or outer end of the needle of the doth is exclusively that which was 

being held by an arm that vil)rates on a [ given out by the needle, and the thread 

pivot or joint jiin, the curvature of the ' seen on the other side is exclusively that 

needle being such as to correspond with which was given out by the shuttle, 
the length of the arm as its r.adius. ! Thus, according to this arrangement, a 

When the thread is carried through the stitch is made at every back and forth 

cloth, which may be done to the distance , movement of the shuttle. The two thick- 

of about three-fourths of an inch, the thread nesses of cloth that are to be sewed, are 

will be stretched above the curved needle, held uiion pointed wires, which project out 

something in the manner of a bowstring, frmu a metallic plate, like the teeth of a 



leaving a small open space between the 
two. A small shuttle, carrying a bobliin 
filled with silk m- thread, is then made to 
pa.ss entirely through, this open space, 
between the needle and the thread which 
it carries; aii<l when the shuttle is re- 



comb, but at a considerable distance from 
each otlier. — say three-fourths of an incli. 
more or less, — these ])oiuted wires sustain- 
ing the cloth, and answering the purpose of 
ordinary basting. The metallic plate from 
which these wires project has numerous 



turned, which is done Dy means of a picker ! holes through it, which answer the purpose 

staff or shuttle-driver, the thiead which of rack teeth in enabling the ])late to move 

was carried in by the needle is surrounded forward, by means of a pinion, as the 

by that received from the shuttle ; as the ] stitches are taken. The distance to which 

needle is drawn out, it forces that which the said plate is moved, and, consequently, 

was received from the shuttle into the the length of the stitches, may be regu- 

body of the chith ; and as this oiieration ! lateu at pleasure, 

is repeated, a seam is formed which has on i One of the most formidable of Mr. 



INVENTIOX OF THE SEWIXG :MACHIXE — 1846. 



231 



Howe's competitors, as a, successful in- 
ventor and manufacturer, was Mr. I. M. 
Singer. His biographer speaks of him as 
a mechanic of some ingenuity but of Gmall 
means, who, taking up with a casual sug- 
gestion made to him by a comrade, that a 
sewing-machine capable of doing a fjredti-r 
variety of work would be a profitable 
thing, ceased all other labor, and, borrow- 
ing forty or fifty dollars of his friend Mr. 
Zieber, applied himself unremittingly to 
the accomplishment of his task. He 
worked, as he states, day and night, sleep- 
ing but three or four hours out of the 
twenty-four, and eating generally but 
once a day, knowing that he must get a 
machine made for forty dollars, or not get 
it at all. The machine was completed the 
night of the eleventh day from the day it 
was commenced. About nine o'clock that 
evening the parts of the machine were 
finally put together, and a trial commenced 
with it. The first attempt to sew was 
unsuccessful, and the workmen, who wei'e 
tired out with almost unremitting work, 
left him one by one, intimating that the 
thing was a failure. Singer continued, 
however, trying the machine, with Zieber 
to hold the lamp for him ; but, in the ner- 
vous condition to which he had become 
reduced by incessant toil and anxiety, was 
unsuccessful in getting the machine to 
sew tight stitches. About midnight, 
Singer started for the hotel where he then 
boarded, accompanied by Zieber. Upon 
the way, they sat down on a pile of boards, 
and Zieber asked Singer if he had noticed 
that the loose loops of thread on the upper 
side of the cloth came from the needle. 
It then flashed ujjon Singer's mind that 
he had forgotten to iidjitst the tensioyi upon 
the needle thread ! They both started for 
the shop again. Singer adjusted the ten- 
sion, tried the machine, and sewed five 
stitches perfectly, when the thread broke. 
The perfection of those stitches, however, 
satisfied him that the machine was a 
success, and he therefore stopped work, 
went to the hotel, and had a sound sleep. 
By three o'clock the next day, he had the 
machine finished, and started with it to 



New York, taking immediate steps to 
secure a patent. It brought him, in a few 
years, princely rvealtli. The peculiarity 
of this machine is the chain stitch or 
single thread device, but with the employ- 
ment of an eye-pointed needle, and other 
appliances, so as to make it admirably 
adapted for the general purposes of sewing. 
On a similar principle are the Ladd and 
Webster, and Finkle and Lyon, machines. 

Other improvements or modifications of 
the machine have been patented by Messrs. 
Grover & Baker, Blodgett, Lerow, Wilson, 
Morey, Johnson, Cliapin, Gibbs, Leavitt, 
Watson, Clark, Weed, Arnold, McKay, 
Langdon, and others, but which can only 
be alluded to here. The principle of the 
double -thread self- regulating machine 
brought forward by Mr Martin, stopping 
whenever the thread breaks or a loop is 
missed, is claimed by several j^arties. A 
number of the machines patented after 
Howe's, use needles of a different kind from 
his, but produce the same stitch ; most of 
these instruments are equally correct in 
respect to mechanical principles, but differ 
widely in certain particulars, one being 
vertical and the other horizontal, one car- 
rying its own cloth and another requiring 
that it should be carried by hand; with 
other differences. 

But one of the most ingenious and orig- 
inal devices in this line remains to be 
mentioned, namely, a combination of the 
sewing-machine and the melodeon, bj' 
Wheeler and Wilson, and by them exhib- 
ited, on its comj)letion, to an admiring 
jiublic. The apparatus had the appear- 
ance, externally, of a small parlor side- 
board or other similar piece of furniture. 
On lifting the front, there was seen a 
handsome set of piano keys. On closing 
it, and turning back a hoop on the top, 
there opened to the view a complete 
sewing-machine, conveniently arranged. 
Concealed below, within side doors, were 
two pedals, one for the music, the other 
for th* sewing-machine. Thus, by the 
use of one of these ingenious contrivances, 
when the lady operating the machine 
became tired of playing at sewing, she 



i32 



FKOil fOl-OXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



could cbangf! Ikt foot to the other pedal, 
open the melodeon part, and discourse 
music! The 'rotating hook ' and feeding 
apjiaratus of the Wilson machine consti- 
tute an admirahle feature ; and the same 
may be said of the Grover & Baker or 
' double loop ' stitch. 

Though at first looked uj)on as of doubt- 
ful utility, the value of the sewing-machine 
was in a short time abundantly demon- 
strated. Curiosity and doubt were suc- 
ceeded by admiration, and soon the demand 
became extensive both at home and abroad, 
until, at the present time, the annual pro- 
duction of machines is thought to appro.x- 
iniate to half a million. Active minds 
were also not slow to devise what they 
deemed to be im[)rovements in the ma- 
chine and its appurtenances; and to this 
end, the number of patent-claims filed U]) 
to the present time does not vary much 
from one thousand, though only an 
extremely small proportion of these are of 
any really practical importance. 

Such a revolution in the processes and 
results of national industry as that effected 
by this machine could have entered into 
no man's mind — not even the mind of one 
given to the wildest romancing. Thus, in 
the brief period of some dozen years 
merely, from the time of the introduction 
of the machine to the ]niblic, the value 
and practical results of the invention may 
be understood from the following facts, 
which appeared in evidence in the contest 
before the commissioner of patents, for the 
extension of Howe's patent — namely : 

At that time, the amount of the boot and 
shoe business of Massachusetts was fifty- 
five million dollars annually, and of this 
amount, the ladies' and misses' gaiter- 
boots and shoes involved one-half. About 
one-eleventh of the sum total above named 
was paid for sewing labor. From this 
proportion it appeared that the annual 
expenditure for sewing upon ladies' and 
misses' gaiter-boots and shoes was two and 
a half million dollars, and that it would 
have cost four times as much if done by 
hand, — so that the saving in a single year, 
in one state, by this invention, in the man- 



ufacture of one special article only, was 
nearly eight million dollars. 

Similarly conclusive evidence was given 
in regard to the making of shirts, by an 
extensive manufacturer in Connecticut, 
who stated that his factory turned out 
about eight hundred dozen i)er week ; that 
he used four hundred sewing-machines, 
and that one machine, with an attendant, 
would do the work of five hand-sewers at 
least, and do it better. He paid, at least, 
four dollars per week ; but, reckoning it 
at three dollars, — the old price for sewing 
before machines were introduced, — it 
showed a saving, in this single manufac- 
tory, of two hundred and fortj' thousand 
dollars. Allowing, then, the males of the 
United States, at that time, to wear out 
two shirts a year apiece, a projjortional 
saving would amount to the large sum of 
between eleven and twelve million dollars 
annually, in making the single article of 
shirts. 

Another witness, representing the firm 
of Brooks Brothers, of New York city, 
manufacturers of clothing, stated that that 
house alone did a business, at the period 
named, of over a million dollars annually, 
using twenty machines in the store, 
besides patronizing those that others used, 
and doing about three-fourths of all their 
sewing bj' machines, and paying annually 
for sewing labor about two hundred thou- 
sand dollars ; seventy-five thousand dollars 
of this was saved I)}' machines, — that is, 
the machines saved seventy-five thousand 
dollars on every two hundred thousand 
paid for sewing labor. But the great 
manufactures of this house did not consti- 
tute, at most, but one-hundredth part of 
the machine-made clothirig produced in 
that city ; which fact, putting the propor- 
tion at one-hundredtli part, made the busi- 
ness of manufacturing machine clothing ir 
the city of New York one hundred millici 
dollars per annum ; and thus, at the rate 
paid by that house for sewing, it brought 
the cost of sewing in that branch of the 
business in that citj^, — even witli the 
assistance of the sewing-machines, — up to 
twenty million dollars. Applying the 



INVENTION 01>" THE SEWING MACHINE — 1*40. 



233 



same ratio to tLe estimated amount of this 
branch of business in tlie United States, 
the total would reach the sum of seventy- 
five million dollars. All this, be it remem- 



bered, was in the comparative infancy of 
the machine. Its pecuniary importance, 
as a labor agent, is now estimated to reach 
$500,000,000 annually. 



XXIV. 

DISCOVERY OF THE INHALATION OF ETHER AS A PRE- 
VENTIVE OF PAIN.— 1846. 



Performance of Surgical Operations Involving the Intensest Torture, During the Happy Unconscious- 
ness of the Patient — Account of the First Capital Oenionstration Before a Crowdeil and Breatliless 
Assembly. — Its Signal Success. — Thrill of Enthusiastic Joy — Most Beneficent Boon Ever Conferred 
by Science upon the Human Race. — Instinctive Dread of Pain — Fruitless Search Hitherto for a Pre- 
ventive. — Terror of the Probe and Knife. — Heroes Quail Before Tliem. — Case of the Bluff Old 
Admiral. — Discovery of the Long-sought Secret. — Sulphuric Ether the l^rize. — Bliss During Ampu- 
tation. — Honor Due to America. — A Whole World Elated. — Medical Men Exultant.— Curious Relig- 
ious Objections. — Test Case in Surgery. — Startling and Romantic Interest. — Value in Public Hos- 
pitals. — War-SufTerings Ameliorated — Various Effects while Inhaling. — Amusing and Extraordinary 
Cases. — " Thoclit the Dei! had a Grip o' her!" — Odd Talk of an Innocent Damsel. — Old Folks 
Wanting to Dance — Awards to the Discoverers. 



'■ The fierce extremity of autferinc has been steeped in tlie 
agony has been amootbed foiever." — Prof. o. W lioLUbs 



waters of for^ettulnesa, and the deepeat furrow in the knotted brow of 






UMANITY — even the Iiardiest 
.111(1 bravest portions of it — in- 
stinctively shrinks, with dread, 
from the pain attendant upon a 
deliberate cutting of tlie living 
flesh by surgical instruments. 
The case is related of a bluff 
old English admiral — one of the 
stoutest hearts that ever beat, lu 
a service whose men of every 
grade are, to a jiroverb, daunt- 
less, — who, in the opening of his 
distinguished career, had been engaged in cutting out an enemy's frigate. From the 
gun-boat, he climbed up the ship's steep side, and, foremost of his crew, had reached the 
bulwarks, when, receiving a stunning blow, he fell into his boat again, striking Ins 
back with great violence. Years afterwards, a tumor had grown on the injured 
part; and at length the admiral — gray, and bent in year.^^ — found it advisable tliat 
this growth should be removed. The man that never feared death in its most ghastly 
and appalling form, now shrank from the surgeon's knife ; the removal, contemplated by 
the man of inany b.ittles with feeling almost akin to childish fear, was long deferred; 
and at length, half stupefied by opium though he was, a most unsteady patient did he 
prove during the operation. 




KELIKVING PAIN RV THE USE OF ETHER. 



THE DISCOVERY OF ETHER — 184G. 



235 



Numberless instances have there been, 
too, of women — mothers — who, for their 
kindred, have been at any time read}' to sac- 
rifice their lives,by watching and privation, 
in loathsome and tainted chambers of infec- 
tious disease, but, wlien themselves be- 
came victims of that which the}' knew re- 
quired a surgical operation, and which, 
without this, they were well assured must 
miserably consume them away, — • even 
these noble minds, resolute in the prospect 
of death, have yet quailed under the fear 
of surgical suffering; they have studiously 
concealed their malady from their nearest 
friends, and deliberately preferred the 
misery of a fatal, and unchecked, and 
gnawing cancer, to the apprehended tor- 
ture of an operation, temporary though it 
be. This feeling has been universal, in 
all ages, among the victims of keen physi- 
cal suffering. 

From time immemorial, means have 
been sought, and with partial success, to 
relieve and even to destroy pain, during 
the manipulations of practical surgery. 
For this purjiose, opium, Indian hemp, 
mesmerism, and nitrous oxide gas and 
alcohol, have been employed, and all in 
their turn abandoned, except that opium 
in many cases, and mesmerism in a few, 
still continued to be used with imperfect 
success, and almost always with the subse- 
quent disadvantage of headache, feverish- 
ness, or other general disorder. 

It was reserved for the simjple inhala- 
tion of a certain gas — pure sulphuric 
ether — to achieve insurgerij that for which 
surgeons had for centuries labored, and 
labored in vain ! 

This was in 1846. A certain old gentle- 
man, however, — as the case is narrated, — 
was not altogether a stranger to the com- 
forting effects of this same anodyne pro- 
cess, some forty years previously. He had 
discovered that the fumes of ether could 
lull him into forgetfulness of the pains 
and disquietude of a bustling and check- 
ered life. He was a man of research in 
his way ; curious in beds, baths, and pro- 
fessing to understand disease and its cure 
better by far than his fellows. But he 



was loose in principle, as well as weak in 
science, and no doubt, most deservedly, 
had niauj' roughnesses in life which he 
could wish to rub away. His mode was 
this ; Obtaining an ounce or two of 
ether, he leisurely sniffed up its vapor, sit- 
ting softly the while, and manifestly en- 
joying a time of calmness and repose, 
greatly to his liking. Indeed, on being 
interrogated, he was in the habit of 
blandly answering, " soothing, sir, sooth- 
ing to an immeasurable degree." In this 
oblivion to the disgusting harassments 
of life, he was in the habit of indulging 
many times a day. He had curiously dis- 
covered tliat the fumes of ether could 
relieve, temporarily, from the pains of a 
mind ill at ease ; but he was not to know 
that it could still more wonderfully 
assuage the body's worst suffering. 

The divulgement of this most beneficent 
boon to the world since man's moral re- 
demption — by which the most dreaded of 
surgical operations can be performed dur- 
ing a happy uneon.sciousness of the jiatient 
— not merely with little suffering, but ab- 
solutely with none — is due to three Ameri 
cans, namely, Drs. Morton, Jackson, and 
Wells ; but to which of these is due the 
priority or chief merit of the discovery, is 
a question long and bitterly discussed, and 
still undecided. Certainly, however, the 
proceedings of each of these gentlemen, in 
connection with the discovery, show mi- 
doubted scientific acuteness, ingenuity, 
zeal and perseverance. 

The entlnisiasm with which the an- 
nouncement of this marvelous discovery 
was received may well be described as 
unbounded. Wafted across the Atlantic, 
it was at once hailed with rapturous ex- 
ultation in England, and speedily adopted 
in most of the large hospitals throughout 
the kingdom — also, in the vast hosjiitals 
of Paris, and in the numerous institutions 
of like character in Germany, including 
those so celebrated at Vienna and Berlin. 

Still, there were not wanting those who 
regarded the discovery with distrust, and 
some of the public medical institutions 
barred their doors against the new alle- 



l!36 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



viating agent. Objections based on relig- 
ious grounds were urged against the em- 
ployment of etlier. Pain, it was argued, 
was the natural and intended consequence 
of the primal sin, and therefore any attempt 
to do away with it must be wrong. These 
objectors failed to see that their argument, 
if it proved anything, proved too much, 
since it held with equal cogency against 
any and every remedial agency, in all 
cases whatsoever. Others opposed the 
anaesthetic on the ground that pain is sal- 
utary, and that its annihilation would be 



this, it was alleged that the new agent 
might be used for infamous purposes. " A 
fatal habit," it was said, " had sprung up 
of using ether, like opium, for purposes of 
exhilaration, to all intents intoxication. 
A burglar forced his way into a mansion 
when all its occupants were in profound 
slumber, and, applying ether to them, he 
had the house all to himself." Frequent 
accidents, moreover, resulted from the use 
of impure ether by unskillful hands, so fre- 
quent, indeed, that prosecution was threat- 
ened for administering it at all. 




He RACE Wells 

THE THKEE CLAIMANTS OF THE DISCOVERY OF PAINLESS SURGERY, BY' ETHER. 



hazardous to the patient. And an emi- 
nent physiologist expressed the doubt 
whether there were a true advantage in 
suppressing pain. " It is a trivial mat- 
ter," said this stoic, " to suffer, and a dis- 
covery whose object is the prevention of 
pain is of slight interest." 

Then, too, letters came pouring in upon 
the discoverer from all over the civilized 
world, upbraiding him with having an- 
nounced the claims of a humbug. He 
also received constant visits from profes- 
sional gentlemen, who questioned the ac- 
curacy of the experiments. Worse than 



But the domain of the grim demon, 
Pain, having once been successfullj' in- 
vaded, humanity and science were ill-dis- 
posed to yield the vantage ground. One 
of the most eminent professors of surgery 
in America, Dr. 0. W. Holmes, said : 
" The knife is searching for disease — the 
pulleys are dragging back dislocated 
limbs — nature herself is working out the 
primal curse, which doomed the tenderest 
of her creatures to the sharpest of her 
trials ; but the fierce extremity of her 
suffering has been steeped in the waters 
of forgetfulness, and the deepest furrow 



THE DISCOVERY OF ETHER — 1S4(J. 



237 



in the knotted brow of agony has been 
smoothed forever." So, too, that world- 
renowned surgeon and anatomist. Dr. 
John C. Warren, — grave, venerable, and 
dispassionate, — exclaimed : 

" Who could have imagined, that draiv- 
ing the knife over the delicate skin of the 
face might produce a sensation of un- 
mixed delight! — that the turning and 
twisting of instruments in the most sensi- 
tive bladder might lie accompanied di/ a 
beautiful dream/" 

It was natural enough, certainly, that 
benevolence should prompt the humane 
surgeon to such utterances of congratula- 
tion, for it supplied to him a desideratum, 
long sought, for the relief of the excrucia- 
ting pain they were necessarily obliged to 
inflict in the practice of their profession. 
For screaming, and struggles, and intense 
suffering under the surgeon's knife, ether- 
ization substituted complete exemption 
from pain, associated in some with the 
quietude, mental and corporeal, of deep 
sleep ; in others, with pleasing dreams, 
imaginary busy scenes, and sweet music ; 
and in others, with a perfect consciousness 
of surrounding objects and events. The 
obstetrician finds in it the means of alle- 
viating that distress with which woman 
has always been aiifiicted, wlien in the 
act of becoming a mother. To the phj'si- 
cian it affords one of the most useful, as 
it is one of his most prompt, remedies. 
He, before, had no reliable means of re- 
lieving the spasms of tetanus ; he not 
unfrequently failed to procure sleep, in 
delirium tremens, when the question was 
one of sleep or death; his before pallia- 
tive remedy, opium, for the pain of colic, 
too often purchased temporary relief at the 
expense of an aggravation of the cause of 
the disease, and of increased difficulties in 
its cure ; and he occasionally witnessed 
the breaking up of the system of a neu- 
ralgic patient, more as a consequence of 
repeated large doses of opium, than of the 
disease itself. 

Heretofore, also, the shock of all serious 
operations had been formidable. The 
patient, however resigned and courageous, 



was deeply impressed in sj'stem ; the 
pulse became feeble, the sui-faco cold and 
pale, the e^-e dim, respiration troubled, 
and the whole powers of life brought low. 
With the use of ether, this is otherwise. 
Parturition may take place, thighs maj- be 
amputated, stones extracted, tumors re- 
moved, dentistry in all its branches per- 
formed ; the chief deviations from the nor- 
mal characters of health being, in all these 
cases, such as are known to be the effects of 
ether — and, accordingly, both manageable 
and transient. In the army, it has been 
found of incalculable service, in cases re- 
quiring the use of the probe and and knife, 
— the sadly ample opportunity in this field 
during the war in the Crimea, in Mexico, 
and on the battle-grounds of the South, 
adding fresh triumphs to the discovery. 

It will be interesting to give, at this 
point, an account of the first surgical 
operation pcrfornied under the infl,uence 
of ether, the result of which so fully de- 
monstrated this glorious truth of science. 
It occurred at the Massachusetts General 
Hospital, the operator being Dr. Haj'ward. 

In his own narration of the circum- 
stances of this deeply interesting and most 
important occasion, Dr. Hay ward says : " It 
was my fortune to perform the first capital 
operation on a patient rendered insensible 
by the inhalation of sulphuric ether. It 
rarely falls to the lot of a professional 
man to be the witness of a scene of more 
intense interest. The operating-room was 
crowded ; many were obliged to stand. 
Besides the class of students in attend- 
ance on the lectures, numbering more than 
one hundred, and many of the principal 
physicians and surgeons of the city and 
neighborhood, there were present several 
clergymen, lawyers, and other individuals, 
from the various callings of life. When 
I entered the theater, before the patient 
was brought in, I found it, to my surprise, 
filled in every part, except the floor on 
which the table stood, with persons on 
whose countenances was depicted the al- 
most painful anxiety with which they 
awaited the result of the experiment they 
were about to witness. I simply told them 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



that I liad decided, with the advioe of my 
colleagues, to allow the patient on whom I 
was to operate, to inhale an article which 
was said to have the power of annulling 
pain. The patient was then brought in. 
She was a delicate looking girl of about 
twenty years of age, who had suffered for 
a long time from a scrofulous disease of 
tiie knee-joint. It had at length sup- 
purated ; there were extensive openings 
into the cavity of the joint; the cartilages 
were ulcerated, and partly absorbed ; the 
bones carious, and symptoms of hectic 
fever had already made their appearance. 
As soon as she was well arranged on tlie 
table I told her that I should let her 
breathe something which I hoped would 
prevent her from suffering much from the 
operation, and that she need not be afraid 
of breathing it freely." The critical 
nature of this case can easily be appre- 
ciated, even by the unprofessional mind, 
and the result is fraught with deep and 
romantic interest. 

It being desirable that the amputation 
should be performed as rapidly as possible, 
Dr. Haywai'd decided to accomplish it 
by means of the flap operation. One per- 
son was to compress the artery, another to 
withdraw the flaps, a third to hand the in- 
struments, and a fourth to watch the pulse. 
Dr. Hayward grasped the patient's limb 
with his left hand, and held the amputat- 
ing knife behind him in his right, care- 
fully concealed from her view. The 
mouth-piece of the inhaling instrument 
was then put into her mouth, and she was 
directed to take long inspirations. After 
breathing iji this way a short time, the 
nostrils were compressed, so that all the 
air that went into the lungs must first 
pass through the machine, and of course 
be mixed with the vapor of the ether. 
Slie breathed with perfect ease, and with- 
out struggling, and in about three minutes 
from the time the instrument was put 
into her mouth, Dr. Morton said, ' She is 
ready.' A death-like silence reigned in 
the room ; no one moved, or hardly 
breathed. The doctor passed the knife 
directly through the limb, and brought it 



out as rapidly as he could, and made the 
upper flap. The patient gave no sign of 
feeling or consciousness, but looked like 
one in a deep, quiet sleep. Every other 
person in the room took a full inspiration 
that was distinctly audible, and seemed to 
feel that they could now breathe again. 
The second flap was then made, the bone 
sawed, five arteries were tied, and as the 
doctor was tightening the ligature upon 
the sixth and last she groaned, being the 
first indication of sensibility that had 
been given. Nothing more was done than 
to bring the flaps together, cover the 
stump with cloths dipped in cold water, 
and apply two or three turns of a roller to 
keej) them in place. Her consciousness 
soon returned ; she was wholly ignorant 
that the operation had been done! For 
some time she would not believe it, and 
said that she had felt nothing till the 
doctor tied the last arter^'. The operation 
lasted a minute and three-quarters. 

The phenomena, or effects, produced by 
the administration of ether, are extremely 
various, depending much, of course, upon 
the temperament, habits, and condition of 
the patient. Sometimes the dreaui is ex- 
quisitely charming, and the patient seems 
passed into another and a better world. 
Sometimes the opiiosite state obtains, the 
patient betraying manifest uneasiness 
while in the trance, by restless, staring, 
anguished eye-balls, by groaning, and by 
wrestling movements of the body. And 
these are not loath to emerge from the 
effects of the drug, while the former jiart 
with them grudgingly. One poor girl, for 
instance, had struggled hard during an 
amputation, yet felt no pain ; and, on com- 
ing to herself, thankfulness was expressed 
in every feature, as well as by her blithe 
tongue, for she " thocht the deil had a 
grip o' her a' the time." 

In some cases, the dreamer is falling from 
a great height rapidly, down and down into 
some unfathomable abyss. In other cases, 
the dream is warlike ; personal to the 
dreamer ; or of by-gone days, implicating 
some great military demonstration ; and 
the crack of tooth-pulling has thus passed 



THE DISCOVEKT OF ETHEE — 1S4G. 



239 



off as the din of ordnance. Sometimes, in 
youth, the dream has been " all fun ;" and 
the dreamer has been anxious to be back 
i.ito the midst of his pleasant pastime 
again, even at the cost of another tooth- 
drawing. The patient, if a wanderer, and 
then in a strange land, may dream pleas- 
antly of home — " she had been home, it 
was beautiful, and she had been gone a 
month ; "' so said one poor woman in the 
midst of what, without the ether, would 
have been agony. 

Sometimes the dream passes steadily on 
to completion, sometimes it is abruptly 
closed by some critical procedure on the 
part of the operator— -the extraction of a 
tooth, with a sudden wrench, for example. 
A .soldier dreams of guns and bayonets, 
and strife, and clamor ; a sailor, of ships, 
and storms, and grog ; an Irishman of 
whiskey and shillalahs, and a " skrim- 
mage ; " a boy of marbles, tops, and " lots 
of fun ; " a mother, of home and children ; 
a girl, of gala-days and finery. 

A tippler fancies he is in the grog-shop, 
and there he may enjoy himself hugely — 
or he may dream " his wife came to fetch 
him.'' Quarrelsome men grow pugilistic, 
and coats may be doffed with appropriate 
accompaniment of word and action. 
Young men, having some one in their list 
of female acquaintance dearer than the 
rest, grow active lovers, and in lone walks, 
earnest conversations, or soft whisperings, 
seem to make rare progress in their suit. 
The swearing and dissolute may indulge 
in oaths and profane jests. The man of 
fervent piety, who is habitually looking 
heavenward, may not only suppose himself 
translated to the realms of bliss, but may 
take part in imagined exercises there. A 
patient of this class was known thus to 
employ himself immediately after a pain- 
ful operation ; four verses of a psalm were 
sung by him very londly, with his eyes 
fixed, his body in a tremor, and intense 
fervor shown in every movement; he 
would not be interrupted, and could 
scarcely be prevailed upon to leave the 
operation-room, seeing that he found him- 
self so wonderfully happy there — said he 



had been in heaven, and had seen his 
Savior ; on reaching his bed, he fell on his 
knees and was rapt in praj'er. 

Not always, however, is the dream con- 
sistent with the character. Among the 
instances showing this, is that of a young, 
simpering and innocent damsel, who, 
addressing a most amiable and excellent 
dentist, knitting her brow into something 
more than a frown, clenching her fist, and 
scowling deiiance, vowed in the most up- 
roarious tone and manner, that if he ven- 
tured near her with his profane touch, 
"big blackguard, as he was, slie'd knock 
him down." And so, too, staid, demure, 
elderly persons, have, in most abandoned 
gaj'ety, insisted on the operator forthwith 
joining them in a joyous polka ! 

In plain language, as in plain fact — says 
an English reviewer, whose interesting 
7'esume is here quoted — the patient is 
dnn/k. Sometimes the consciousness of 
this condition is made apparent by the 
sensations which are induced in the early 
period of inhalation. '' You'll have me 
drunk I " cried one ; "Oh, you rascals! I 
know what you are ; " evidently supposing 
that he had fallen into loose society, and 
that his companions had a design on him. 
But it is on coming out of the trance, that 
the intoxication shows most. The patient 
sways as he tries to stand ; is garrulous, 
sprightly, and humorous ; and often in- 
sists on shaking hands with all and 
sundry. The unsteadiness of gait, and 
lightness of head, sometimes have an 
inconvenient duration, as is illustrated in 
the case of a most worthy lady, who, leav- 
ing the dentist too soon, had to grope her 
way along the railing of the street, in 
noonday, and ran no slight risk of losing 
all reputation for sobriety. 

Among the many amusing examples of 
the effect produced by the administration 
of the ansesthetic — in addition to its pri- 
mary quality of annulling pain — the follow- 
ing may be cited : An Iri.sh woman, who 
had never heard of ether previous to call- 
ing upon the dentist for the jsurjjose of 
having a large molar tooth extracted, took 
it on being told that she would suffer no 



240 



FEOM COIONY TO WORLD POWEIJ. 



pum, and would, probably, have an inter- 
view witli her friends in the old country. 
Just as its influence commenced, the 
doctor remarked that lie would like to 
have her observe what occupation her 
friends were engaged in, if she succeeded 
in finding them. The tooth was di'awn ; 
she moved not a muscle of the face, but 
remained as in a quiet sleep, for about one 



machinery, declared herself unhurt by the 
operation, and wished the doctor to see if 
there was not " another tooth what wanted 
to he drfir." 

Another example of this class, was that 
of a middle-aged Irisliman, who had sus- 
tained compound fracture of the leg. The 
fracture had not united, in consequence of 
the presence of a dead piece of bone, and 




MONDBBNT ERECTED IN HOKOR OF THE DISCOVEKY OF ETHEU. 



minute. Upon opening her eyes, she 
exclaimed, " I have seen all my friends ; 
they were engaged in spinning — and don't 
I hear their wheels now, sure ? " She 
said it appeared to her as though she had 
been absent many months. She recol- 
lected that she went home in a steam 
vessel, heard the noise of steam and 



it became necessary to remove this by a 
painful operation, in the following manner : 
The patient was seated on a table, and 
the inhalation was applied. At first, little 
effect was produced, but after some min- 
utes, the patient fell liackwards, as in a 
swoon. Tlie operator was then about to 
proceed ; but the man immediately ob- 



THE DISCOVERY OF ETHER — ISiG. 



1'41 



jected, saying that "he was not asleep, and 
that he trusted nothing would be done 
till he was asleep." For full twenty min- 
utes more the inhalation went on, the man 
confused and talkative, but wide-awake, 
and occasionally expressing very emphati- 
cally his conviction that " it would not do." 
At length, however, while in this wakeful 
state, the operation was begun. Incisions 
vere made on the shin, and tlajjs were dis- 
sected off so as to expose the bone beneath. 
A portion of this was sawn and clipped 
through, and then the dead Ijone was 
removed. Only during the clipping of the 
bone with strong straining pliers did any 
sign of feeling escape from the patient, 
who was busy inhaling all the while, and 
now and then protesting that " it wouldn't 
do." The operation occupied aljuut ten 
minutes, and, from the highly sensitive 
nature of the parts involved, must have 
been attended with excruciating suffering 
under ordinary circumstances. After it 
was over, the operator said to the patient — 

" I suppose you won't let me operate 
to-day ? " 

" Certainly not," replied the patient, 
"it won't do; I must be asleep. The 
thing hasn't succeeded with me, and I am 
sure it can't succeed with any one else, for 
I did everything I could to get asleep, for 
my own sake, and I'd do anything to plase 
you." 

" Then you won't even let me make a 
cut into the leg ? " 

" No ; I must be asleep ; we can try it 
another time." 

This plain proof of his utter unconscious- 
ness of the operation having been per- 
formed was acknowledged by the specta- 
tors in a hearty round of applause. The 
patient then sat up, and, seeing the wound, 
burst into an immoderate fit of laughter, 
saying — • 

'■No doubt there's blood, or something 
very like it ; but I haven't felt a single 
thing done to my leg. That bates the 
globe ! " 

On being asked decidedly as to his 
having felt anything, he repeatedly an- 
swered "Not a ha' porth." He got into 
16 



amazing spirits, and refused to leave the 
room until he had told "all about the tol- 
drums of the business." And then, with 
the manner of a tipsy man, and very 
happy, he kept surgeons and students in a 
roar of laughter for some minutes with a 
narrative of his condition during the in- 
halation, which, Irish-like, seemed to have 
an interminable medley of imaginary 
fights and " killings " going on around 
him. 

It has already been stated, that Drs. 
Jackson, Morton, and Wells, respectively, 
claim the honor of having discovered this 
great fact in chemical and medical science, 
and the claim of each is supported by a 
formidable army of names and evidence. 
One of the most candid investigators of 
the character and weight of these several 
and conflicting claims, has presented the 
case in this light, namely : That to Dr. 
Wells unquestionably belongs the merit 
of having first demonstrated the happy 
idea of deadening sensibility in painful 
operations, by using both nitrous oxide 
and sulphuric ether ; that to Dr. Jackson, 
the thanks of the world are due for lend- 
ing that influence which his well-earned 
reputation qualified him to do, in estal)- 
lishing confidence in the public mind in 
the use of sulphuric ether, as a substitute 
for the nitrous oxide ; and that, to Dr. 
MortOii's indefatigable exertions in secur- 
ing the attention of leading medical men 
to the subject, was due the rapid adoption 
of sulphuric ether in connection with the 
practice of surgery. But, singularly 
enough, though the French Academy has 
acknowledged, by jiecuniary and honorary 
awards, the indebtedness of mankind to 
the American discoverers of this vast 
blessing to humanity, the American gov- 
ernment has thus far failed to confer any 
reward upon any one of the distinguished 
claimants. A costly and superb monu- 
ment, designed and executed with con- 
summate skill by AYard, the eminent 
sculptor, and erected at the cost of a 
wealthy citizen of Boston, in honor of this 
great discovery, now adorns the public 
garden of that city. 



XXV. 



DISCOVERT OF 



GOLD AT SUTTER'S MILL, OALIFOR- 

NIA.— 184S. 



Widely Exteudeil ami Iiiexliaustilile Deposits of tlie Precious Metal. — The News Spreads like Wikl-fire 
to tlie Four Quarters of the Glohe — Uverwljeluiiug Tide of Euiigratiou froiu All Couutries. — Nucleus 
of a (ireat Empire on tlie Pacific— California J5econies the El Dorado of the World aud the Goldeu 
ConiuionweaUli of the American Union. — First Practical Discoverv of the Gold.— On John A. Sutter's 
Land -Found liy J. W. Marshall.— Simple Accident that Led to It.— Marshall's Wild Excitement.- 
Shows Sutter the Golden Grains. — A Dramatic Interview. — The Discoverv Kept Secret. — How it 
was Disclosed —A Keal Womler of the Age.— Trials of the Early Emigrants.— Their Bones Whiten 

tlie Soil. — All Professions at the Mines. — Impetus Given to Commerce. — Life Among the Dif;gers. 

Disordered State of Society. — Crimes, Outrages, Conflagrations.— Scarcity, Fahulous Prices. — Minin" 
hy Macliinery. — Order and Stability Reached. — Population in 18.57, fiOO.OOO. — Gold in Ten Years, 

$i;oo,ooo,ooo. 



" Gold to fetch, and pold to neiid. 
Gold to Itorrow, ami pold to lend. 
Gold to keep, and gold to (tpend. 
.'\nd abundance of gold in fuluro.'* 




Ml.VlNt; OCKKA riOXS IN < A l.lFolt-N'lA. 



ITHOUT any exaggeration, it 

may be asserted that no modern 

event lia.s been the cause of .so 

much romance in real life, — no 

laMiich or sphere of trade, even though perfected b^' long 

experience, has called into eni[iIoyment so many of the 

means and instrumentalities of diversified human industry 

and commercial intercourse, — indeed, nothing within the 

memory of man, except the achievements of steam and the 

electric telegraph, approaches so nearly to magic, as the 

discovery of gold, in luxurious deposits, on the shores of the 

Pacific, and that, too, in the soil of a territory which, by 

ronqiiest and purchase, had but just fallen, like fruit golden 

ripe, into the lap of the Great Republic. Tliis 

iscovery occurred at Sutter's mill, in Coloma 

county, California, in February', 

1848." 

Here, however, it deserves to 
be stated as a matter of histori- 
- cal interest, that gold placers 
were worked in certain jiortions 
of California, long before the 
discovery just mentioned. The 



DISCOVERY OF GOLD AT SUTTEE'S MILL — 1848. 



243 



eTi'dence of this appears in a letter ad- 
dressed by Abel Stearns, of Los Angeles, 
to Louis R. Lull, secretar}- of the Califor- 
nia Society of Pioneers. Mr. Stearns, who 
went to California from Mexico in 1829, 
states that on the 22d of November, 1842, 
he sent by Alfred Robinson — who returned 
from California to the states by way of 
Mexico — twenty ounces California weight, 
or eighteen and three-fourths ounces mint 
weight, of placer gold, to be forwarded by 
him to the United States mint at Phila- 
delphia; the mint assay was returned 
August 6, 1843. This gold was taken 
from placers first discovered in March, 
1S42, by Francisco Lopez, a Californian, 
at San Francisquito, about thirty-five miles 
north-west from Los Angeles. It appears 
that Lopez, while resting in the shade with 
some companions, during a hunt for stray 
horses, dug up some wild onions with his 
sheath knife, and in the dirt discovered a 
piece of gold. Searching further, he found 
more pieces, and on returning to town an- 
nounced his discovery. A few persons, 
mostly Sonorians, who were accustomed to 
placer mining in Mexico, worked in the 
San Francisquito placer from this time 
until the latter part of 1846 (when the 
war with the United States disturbed the 
country), taking out some six thousand :o 
eight thousand dollars in value, per annum. 
The United States mint certificate for the 
assay made for Mr. Stearns in 1843, is now 
in the archives of the " Society of Califor- 
nia Pioneers." 

Before the great event which made the 
year 1848 so memorable, the influence of 
the United States had already become con- 
spicuous in the affairs of California, and 
had in a degree prepared the way for what 
was to follow. In the words of a British 
writer, the United States spread her actual 
influence long before she planted a flag as 
the sign of her dominion. For two years 
previous to the capture of Monterey, in 
1846, her authority had been paramount in 
California. At length, towai-d the close of 
the summer of 184.5, Fremont appeared in 
the neighborhood of Monterey, whose park- 
like scenery — trees scattered in groups 



over grassy hills, wide sloping fields, plan- 
tations of oak and fir, red-tiled houses, 
yellow-washed church, and white cottages 
— showed in pleasant contrast to the deso- 
late region of the Rocky mountains he had 
left. He was accompanied by some of his 
trappers — men of muscle and daring, 
dressed in deer-skin coats, with formidable 
rifles, and mounted on tall, spare horses. 
They rode in Indian file through the out- 
skirts ; their leader viewed the town, and 
they vanished. Soon again he appeared, 
with an ominous array of thirty-five fol- 
lowers, encamped on a woody height ; was 
commanded to depart, was driven to the 
hills, pursued, and again lost sight of. 
An American ship then sailed into the 
harbor. Fremont was again at Monterey. 
The Californians foresaw the probable 
progress of events, and perhaj)s secretly 
desired the fostering protection of the 
gre.at republic. While balancing between 
that and independence, two United States 
vessels simultaneously entered the harbors 
of Monterey and San Francisco, and in 
July, 1846, the whole of California came 
under the rule of America. A new era 
was again opened. An immediate change 
appeared. Industry was revived; deserted 
villages were repeopled ; neglected lands 
were again cultivated ; decaying towns 
were renovated ; and the busy hum of 
toil broke that silence and lethargy which 
brooded over an ill-governed country. 

But another and greater change was at 
hand, to turn the tide of her fortunes into 
a new, a wider, and more diffusive channel, 
and to raise California from the condition 
of a wild and isolated territory, to be the 
very focus of -the world's attention, — the 
spot where innumerable streams of emigra- 
tion from the four quarters of the world, 
from barbarous and civilized countries, 
pouring across the Rocky Mountains, or 
brought over the sea, from distant shores, 
were to meet in tumultuous confluence, 
and, flowing upon each other, form an 
eddying whirlpool of excitement, such as 
few countries on the globe, in any period 
of their history, could present to the ob- 
servation of mankind. 



244 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



Wliat is tlio character of this region, 
independently of its newly- discovered 
treasures, at the period mentioned ? It 
is wealthy in many natural resources. Its 
extent is great. From Cape Mendocino, 
at the borders of the United States, to the 
root of the peninsula, is seven hundred 
miles, and Lower California thrusts out 
its vast tongue to an almost equal dis- 
tance. The old region is for the most 
part a broken, hilly, and barren tract of 
land ; but occasional plains of rich fertility 
alternate with the less favored tracts, and 
these formed the sites of the old Jesuit 
missions. Alta California extends from 
the coast to the provinces of New Mexico. 
Of the interior desert basin, little is known, 
except that it is a wild, rocky, and woody 
territory, watered by a few rivers, and 
lakes, rising periodically from the earth, 
and peopled by wandering Indian hordes. 
The Sierra Nevada, or snowy range, di- 
vides the gold region from the great des- 
ert basin ; and between this and the sea 
lies another line of mountains, forming a 
valley five hundred miles in length, wa- 
tered by the Sacramento and the San 
Joachim. These streams, forming a junc- 
tion in the center of the valley, iliverge 
toward the sea, and pour in an united 
current into the harbor of San Francisco 
— one of the no!)lest on the globe. The 
aspect of the country is diversified, and 
full of beaut3^ Green valleys, glittering 
lakes, and verdant hills, extend along the 
interior borders, backed by the rounded 
si)ires of the snowy range, whose deep ra- 
vines and caverns are just now peopled liy 



toiling gold-hunters ; and these are drawing 
more wealth from the bleakest, most bar- 
ren, and most neglected spots, than a hus- 
bandman in the course of many years could 
derive from the most luxuriantly cultivated 
land. Along the river banks, light grassy 
slopes alternate with stony, broken, sandy 
expanses, honey-combed as it were by 
time, but now swarming with amateur 
delvers. However, the country', as a 
whole, is fertile ; producing readily grains, 
vegetables, and fruits, with fine timber, 
whilst immense pasture grounds afford 
nourishment to the tlocks and herds that 
once formed the priucijsal wealth of Cali- 
fornia. 

LTp to the year 1847, so comparatively 
small were the gatherings of gold, in 
various sections of the globe, that in 




:K b MII.L. \\ Ill-I^L *.OLD "^N Ad riKhl L i .<: _ La I I , >1S48 



DISCOVERY OF GOLD AT SUTTEES MILL — 1848. 



245 



reckoning the avercage produce of the pre- 
cious metal, of all parts of the New and 
Old World for a series of years previous to 
1847, it did not amount to the annual 
value of twenty-five million dollars. 

It was in September, 1847, that Captain 
John A. Sutter, the great pioneer settler 
in California, commenced an undertaking 




I! - * 

.lOHN A. SUTTER. 

which led, by a very simple and ordinary 
circumstance, to t/ie first practical dif:- 
coveri/ of the prodigiounbj i^Aliiahle (fold 
mines of California — the long-sought JEl 
Dorado of ancient and modern times. 
This undertaking consisted in the erection 
of a saw-mill at Coloma, on a mountainous 
spot about one thousand feet above the 
level of the valley, where the Kio des los 
Americanos pours down from the Sierra 
Nevada to swell the united streams of the 
Sacramento and San Joachim. 

Such an enterprise, in such a region, at 
a time when the political and social con- 
dition of the country was so unsettled and 
uncertain, indicated a mind of energy and 
executive capacity, on the part of the 
projector. And it was even so, in full 
measure, In the case of Captain Sutter. 
He is described, by his biographers, in the 
annals of San Francisco, as an intelligent 
Swiss emigrant, who sailed for and reached 
New York, in July, 1834; but finally 
settled and for several years resided in 
Missouri. The wild w^est had always 
possessed a charm for him, and he had re- 
moved thither ; but now his adventurous 
spirit looked still further tcrtvards the setting 



sun, and roved along the waters that sped 
their unknown way to the Pacific. Leav- 
ing family and home, in company with Sir 
William Drummond Stewart, he joined a 
party, under the charge of Cajstain Tripps, 
of the American Fur Companj', and start- 
ed for the broad valleys of California, 
where he knew that rich and fertile lands 
only awaited an industrious cultivator, and 
where Providence had even a still richer 
yielding field that lie knew not of. He 
left the trappers at their rendezvous on 
the Wind river among the Kansas Rocky 
mciuntains, and with a new party of six 
decided on proceeding to their destination 
by way of Oregon. Crossing the valley of 
the Willamette, he finally arrived at Fort 
Vancouver, and there ascertained that 
innumerable delaj^s must elapse before he 
could reach California. Nothing daunted, 
and apparently urged, like Columbus, to 
accomplish his object despite of fate, 
Cajjtain Sutter sailed for the Sandwich 
Islands, hoping to embark thence direct 
for the Spanish coast. But when he 
arrived there, no vessels were about to sail 
in that direction. Again he threw down 
the gauntlet to fate, and re-embarked for 
Sitka Island, in Russian America, and 
from that immense distance at last reached 
Yerba Buena, July second, 1839. Not 
permitted to land here, he again embarked, 
and was fijaally allowed to set foot on 
California soil at Monterey. Having suc- 
ceeded in overcoming the Spanish opposi- 
tion to foreign settlers, he obtained the 
permission of Governor Alvarado to locate 
himself in the valley of the Rio del Sacra- 
mento ; more readily granted, perhaps, 
because it was then the abode of savage 
Indians. He explored the Sacramento, 
Feather and American rivers, and in 
August, 1839, about eighteen months after 
he commenced his journey, permanently 
established himself on the latter river, 
with a colony of only three whites and 
eight Kanakas. In a short time, he re- 
moved to the location afterwards known as 
Sutter's Fort, and took possession of the 
surrounding country under a Mexican 
grant, giving to it the name of New 



246 



FROM COLOXY TO WOULD TOWER. 



Helvetia. From this point lie cut a road 
to the juuetion of the Sacramento and 
American river.s, where he established a 
quay or hinding-plaire, on the site of whiidi 
has since been built the city of Sacramento. 
Here he remained for several years, becom- 
ing possessor of a large amount of land, 
and rapidly carrying on various and ex- 
tensive improvements. At one time he 
had a thousand acres sown in wheat, and 
owned eight thousand neat cattle, two 
thousand horses and mules, as many sheep, 
and a thousand swine. He was appointed 
alcalde of the district by Commodore 
Stockton, and Indian agent by General 
Kearney ; and with all his sympathies 
with this country, his earnest wish was to 
see California brought into the American 
Union. 

Among the followers of Sutter was 
James W. IMarshall, who emigrated from 
New Jersey to Oregon in 1843, and a j-ear 
later went to California. By trade he 
was a carpenter, and to him Captain 
Sutter intrusted the erection of the saw- 
mill at Coloma, where good water-power 
and plenty of lumber had determined its 
location. It was this enterprise which led 
to the most famous discovery of gold ever 
known in the history of the globe. How 
this happened, has been differently related 
by different authorities, but jierhaps by 
none more authentically than by Mr. 
Dunbar, president of the Traveller's Cluh 
of New York. The saw-mill was com- 
pleted in January, 1848, and they had 
just commenced sawing lunilier, when, on 
the night of February 2d, Marshall 
appeared at Sutter's Fort, his horse in a 
foam and himself presenting a singular 
appearance — all bespattered with mud, 
and laboring under intense excitement. 

And now ensued a scene which can 
scarcely be exceeded in its elements of 
dramatic representation. Marshall imme- 
diately requested Captain Sutter to go 
with him into a room where they could be 
alone. This request was granted, and, 
after the door was closed, Marshall asked 
Captain Sutter if he was sure they would 
not be disturbed, and desired that the 



door miglit be locked. Captain Sutter did 
not know what to make of his actions, and 
he began to think it hazardous to lock 
himself in the i-oom with Marshall, who 
appeared so uncommonly strange. Mar- 
shall being satisfied at last that they 
would not lie interrupted, took from his 
pocket a jjoucli from which he poured 
upon the table about an ounce of yellow 
grains of metal, which he thought would 
prove to be gold. Captain Sutter inquired 
where he got it. Marshall stated that in 
the morning, the water being shut off from 
the saw-mill race, as was customary, he 
discovered, in passing through the race, 
shining particles here and there on the 
bottom On exaniination, he found them 
to be of metallic substance, and the 
thought flashed over him that they might 
be gold. Jioif linj ir'ith events teas this 
point of ti)?)i' .' Marshall stated that the 
laborers — white and Indian — had picked 
up some of the particles, and he thought 
a large quantity could be collected. 

Captain Sutter was at first quite 
incredulous as to these particles being 
gold, but happening to have a bottle of 
nitric acid among his stores, he applied 
the test, and, true enough, the yellow 
grains proved to be jiure gold. The great 
discoueri/ iras made! 

The account given above agrees sub- 
stantially with Captain Sutter's own 
narrative of the event, namely: That 
Marshall had contracted with him for the 
building of a saw-mill for producing 
lumber, on the south fork of the American 
River, a feeder of the Sacramento. In 
the course of his operations, Marshall had 
occasion to admit the river water into the 
tail-race, for the purpose of widening and 
deepening it by the strength of the 
current. In doing this, a considerable 
quantity of mud, sand, and gravel, was 
carried along with the stream, and 
deposited in a heap at the foot of the tail- 
race. Marshall, when one day examining 
the state of his works, noticed a few 
glittering particles Ij'ing near the edge of 
the heap. His curiosity being aroused, 
he gathered some of the sparkling objects; 



DISCOVEKY OF GOLD AT SUTTEE'S MILL — 1848. 



247 



and he at once became satisfied of their 
nature and the value of his discovery. All 
trembling with excitement, he hurried to 
his employer and told his story. Captain 
Sutter at first thought it was a fiction, and 
the teller only a mad fool. Indeed, he 
confesses that he kept a sharp eye upon 
his loaded rifle, when he, whom he was 
tempted to consider a maniac, was eagerly 
disclosing the miraculous tale. However, 
his doubts were all at once dispelled when 
Marshall tossed on the table before him 
some of the shining dust. 

Xot less interesting is the account given 
of the manner in which the discovery 
became public — owing, as appears by Mr. 
Dunbar's statement, to that which extracts 
both wit and wisdom, as well as folly, from 
the brain of man. After some examin- 
ation, Captain Sutter became satisfied that 
gold in considerable quantities would be 
found in that neighborhood; and while the 
reflections of Marshall were probably con- 
fined to the idea of rapidly acquired 
wealth for himself, Captain Sutter realized 
at once how impossible it would be to hold 
his laborers to their work in carrying on 
his improvements, gathering his crops, and 
avoid being overrun by new-comers, 
should the gold prove abundant and the 
discovery be promulgated. He therefore 
begged the laborers to say nothing about 
the gold for six weeks. His grist-mill and 
some other improvements would then be 
completed, and his crops all gathered. 
The laborers promised to comj)ly with his 
request, and Captain Sutter returned home 
on the fifth of February. But the great 
secret could not long be retained. A 
bottle of whiskey made it known. A 
teamster, whom Captain Sutter had dis- 
patched to the saw-mill with supplies, 
heard of the discovery of gold, and 
managed to obtain some of the precious 
grains. On returning to the fort, he 
immediately went to the neighboring 
store, kept by a Mormon, and demanded a 
bottle of whiskey. This was a cash article 
in that country, and, as the teamster was 
poor pay, the trader refused to sell him 
the whiskey. The man declared he had 



plenty of monej-, and exhibited some 
grains of gold. The astonished trader, on 
being satisfied that these were gold, gave 
his customer the bottle of whiskey, and 
earnestly inquired where he got the gold. 
The teamster refused to make known the 
secret till he had imbibed considerable of 
the liquor, when his tongue was loosened, 
and he told all about the discovery of gold 
at Sutter's mill. The wonderful tale 
spread like wild-fire throughout the 
sparsely inhabited territory of California. 
It ran up and down the Pacific coast, 
traversed the continent, reached the 
Atlantic shores, and in a short time the 
story of California's golden treasures had 
startled the whole civilized world. 

Naturally enough, the first rumors, as 
they spread abroad, were lightly tossed 




JAMES W. MARSIULL. 

aside ; but confirmation gave them 
strength, and as each transmission of 
intelligence to the United States carried 
fresh accounts of new discoveries, an 
enthusiastic ardor was awakened, and 
within four months of that eventful day, 
five thousand persons were delving on the 
river's banks, on the slopes, amid the 
ravines, hollows, and caverns in the valley 
of the Sacramento. 

And now, from the vast population of 
the great republic, new streams of emigra- 
tion broke at once to swell that current 
which for j'ears had set noiselessly toward 
the valle3's of California. Gradually, the 
knowledge of the auriferous soil was borne 
to the four quarters of the worlil. and from 



248 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



all the ports of all nations sails wero 
spread toward the i-oasts of that wealthy 
region. As by a magnetic impulse, the 
sands of the Sacramento attracted popula- 
tion. Lawyers, clergymen, physicians, 
hotel-lceeper.s, merchants, mechanics, 
clerks, traders, farmers, left their occupa- 
tions, and hurrii'd with basket and .spade 
to the land that glittered. Homes and 
houses were closed ; the grass threatened 
to grow over whole streets ; deserted ships 
swung on their anchors in silent harbors. 
The garri.^on of Monterey abandoned arms 
and took up the pickaxe and the shovel. 
Trains of wagcms constantl}' streamed 
from the coast to the interior. Stores and 
sheds were built along the river bank, 
and crammed with provisions to be sold at 
more than famine prices; whole towns of 
tents and bushy bowers .sprang ujj as if 
by magic ; every dawn rose upon a motley 
toiling multitude, swarming in every nook 
and corner of the modern El Dorado, and 
every night was illuminated by the flames 
of a thousand liivouacs. 

Half-naked Indians, sharp-visaged Yan- 
kees in straw hats and loose frocks, groups 
of swarthy Spanish-Americans, old Dons 
in the gaudy costume of a dead fashion, 
gigantic trappers with their rude prairie 
garb, and gentlemen traders from all the 
States of the Union, with crowds of 
Californian wouien, jostled in tumultuous 
confusion through the gold district. 
Every method, from the roughest to the 
most ingenious, was devised for the rapid 
accumulation of gohl ; and the strange 
spectacle was presented of a \'ast popula- 
tion, without law, without authoritj^ with- 
out restraint, toiling together in amicable 
companionship. But the duration of this 
condition of things was brief. Outrages 
were perpetrated, robbery commenced, 
blood was shed, and unarcliy in its most 
hideous form apjieared. But the United 
States government soon laid tlie founda- 
tions of order, and prepared a system of 
regular legislation for California. A 
severe code was established ; thieving in- 
curred the heavy penalty of a brand on 
the cheek, with mutilation of the ears : 



other crimes were punished with similar 
rigor. 

Within a period of five months, the 
population of the territory had run up to 
one hundred thousand, having just quad- 
rupled during that time. Of these, some 
forty-five thousand arrived in the nine 
thousand wagons that traversed the over- 
land route, and four thousand on mule- 
back, while the remainder came i-ia 
I'anama, and round Cape Horn. One- 
third of this multitude was composed of 
farmers, another of tradesmen and me- 
chanics, and the rest of merchants, pro- 
fessional men, adventurers, and gamblers. 
The vast emigrant armies acted as pioneers 
on their various routes, )iewing down 
trees, filling up chasms, leveling the 
grounds, and bridging torrents. But the 
sufferings endured in these colossal cara- 
vans were severe and terrible. Many 
perished on the route ; many became in- 
sane, or wasted away, through lack of food 
and water. The scourge of -holera also 
overtook the early emigrants, before they 
were fairly embarked on the wilderness; 
the freijuent i-ains of the early spring, 
added to the hardships and exposure of 
their travel, prepared the way for its 
ravages, and the first four hundred miles 
of the trail were marked by graves, to 
the number of about four thousand. 
Many also suffered immensely for want 
of food. Bayard Taylor, in his narrative 
of what befell these pioneer emigrants, says 
that not only were they compelled to kill 
their horses and mules to keep themselves 
from starvation, but it was not unusual for 
a mess by way of variety to the tough mule 
steaks, to kill a (piantity of rattlesnakes, 
with which the mountains abounded, and 
have a dish of them fried for supper. 

And still the tide of emigration rolled 
onward, as the richness of the gold 
product, over .so vast a region of territory, 
l)ecame a confirmed fact. Notwithstand- 
ing the oft-told story of deprivation, 
famine and death, parties and companies 
daily went forth to El Dorado, the golden 
land. Some took the perilous inland route 
across the Rocky mountains; some went 



DISCOVERY OF GOLD AT SUTTER'S MILL — 1848. 



249 



round Capo Horn ; and multitudes took 
the Panama route. The tens of thousands 
who thus went, having no other object 
than to get gold, had neither means nor 
inclination to grow their own food nor to 
manufacture their own necessaries ; and 
hence arose a field of enterprise which the 
commercial world did not neglect. Valu- 
able cargoes were dispatched to San Fran- 
cisco to be there sold in exchange for 
gold dust, and that place in time became a 
populous, busy, thriving city, distinguished 
also for reckless speculation, fabulous 
prices for real estate, excesses of all kinds, 
and disastrous conflagrations. During 
one week in 1850, gold dust to the value 
of three million dollars was shipped and 
exported from San Francisco. In August 
of che same year the monthly shipment 
had reached about eight million dollars. 
On September 15, 1850, there were in that 
port six hundred and eighty-four vessels, 
belonging to twenty-one different nations ; 
some of these vessels, small in size, had 
crossed the whole breadth of the Pacific 
from Australia and New Zealand, to ex- 
change their produce for gold dust. In 
the first two weeks of October, in the 
same year, ninety-four vessels arrived at 
San Francisco, not including the regular 
steamers. 

But the most strange and wonderful 
spectacle of all, was that exhibited by 
the money-diggers at their avocation. 
Men with long-handled shovels delved 
among clumps of bushes, or by the side of 
large rocks, never raising tlieir eyes for an 
instant; others, with pick and shovel, 



worked among stone and gravel, or with 
trowels searched under banks and roots 
of trees, where, if rewarded with small 
lumps of gold, their eyes suddenh- kindled 
with pleasure, and the search was more 
intently pursued. In the water, knee, or 
even waist deep, regardless of the shiver- 
ing cold, others were washing the soil 
iu the tin pans or the common cradle rocker, 
whilst the sun poured a hot flood upon their 
heads. The common rocking machine 
for separating the gold was at first in great 
demand, but this was soon superseded by a 
cradle of ingenious construction ; then 
came crushing mills, of various kinds, for 
pounding the auriferous quartz ; and in 
time, machinery of the most effective 
adaptability was universally introduced. 
This operated powerfully to regulate min- 
ing operations, and to give order and 
stability to affairs generally throughout 
the territory. Society assumed the most 
advanced organization, churches every- 
where dotted the land, education was 
fostered, and the political institutions of 
the country patterned after those of the 
older states. Agricultural, industrial, 
and commercial pursuits were entered upon 
largely and with great success ; California 
was admitted as a state into the Union in 
1850 ; and in only ten years from Mar- 
shall's curious and accidental discovery of 
gold at Sutter's mill, in 1848, the gold 
product of California had reached a total 
of six hundred million dollars, and the 
population had increased from between 
twenty and thirty thousand souls to six 
hundred thousand ! 



XXVI. 

VICTORIOUS RACE OF THE YACHT "AMERICA," IN THE 
GREAT INTERNATIONAL REGATTA.— 1851. 



She Distances, by Nearly Eight Miles, the Whole Fleet of Swift and Splendid Competitors, and Wins 
" the Cup of all Nations." — Grandest and Most Exciting Spectacle of the Kind P'ver Known. — Queen 
Victoria Witnesses the Match — Universal Astonishment at the Result — Admiration Elicited by the 
" America's " Beautiful Model anil Ingenious Rig — Scenes at the " World's Exhibition " at London — 
Grand Finale Yet to Come Off — Championship of the Sea. — England Sensitive on this Point. — Her 
Motto, " Rule Britannia!" — George Steers Builds the America — Commodore .Stevens Takes Her to 
England — His Challenge to All Countries — An International Prize Race. — Eighteen Yachts Entered. 
— The .Scene on Wave and Slmre. — All Sails Set : The Signal. — Every Eye on " the Yankee." — Her 
Leisurely Movements — Allows Herself to be Distanced — Her Quality Soon Shown. — No "Bellying" 
of Canvas — Amazing Increase of Speed. — .VII Rivals P;isseil, One by One. — They Return in 
Despair. — Great Odds for the America. — Is Visited by Queen Victoria. 



On every side wna beard the hail. 
DON Tluus. 



3 the America firat?"— The aoawer, " Ye 3 ! "— •■ Whaft second ?"— The reply, " NoTHlN*!"— LoN- 



RATIFYING, iu the highest degree, to the pride of every American, was the 
announcement that, in tlie great and exciting international yacht 
race, — whicli formed, in an important sense, the grand 
finale of the " Exhibition of the Industry of All 
Nations," held in London, in 1851, — the victory had 
been won by the clipper yacht America, of one 
hundred and seventj' tons, built by JNIr. George 
Steers, of Brooklyn, N. Y., and commanded by 
Commodore John C. Stevens, also of New York. 
The jirize was no less than "T/(e Cv2j of all Na- 

Making but an indifferent show of contributions 
to the various departments of art, science, and 
manufactures, at that renowned exposition, the 
conclusion had become universal, that the United 
States would gain but little eclat in that magnifi- 
cent congress of the industries of civilization. One 
trial of championship, however, was yet to be made 
and determined, — the supremacy, in respect to 
architectural moilel, equipment, nautical skill, and power of speed, upon that element, 
the dominion of which has ever been the coveted achievement of every maritime coun- 




VICTOKIOUS RACE OF THE YACHT AMERICA — 1851. 



251 



try, and of England in particular, — the 
Iiigli claims put fortli by the latter being 
well understood. 

How happily it was reserved for the 
United States to take this honor to her- 
self, in a manner, too, undreamed of by 
any compeer or rival, will appear from the 
following history of the great fact, as given 
at the time by the press of both England 
and America. Indeed, in resjject to the 
English journals and the English public, 
it can truly be said, that fair jilay and 
vianhj acknoivleJgment of a, fair beat 
were never more Jionorahh/ exit ihitcd. And 
this last-named fact is all the more credit- 
able, when all the circumstances of the 
case are considered. A large portion of 
the British jseerage and gentry left their 
residences and forsook their usual diver- 
sions, to witness the struggle between the 
yachtsmen of England, hitherto unmatched 
and unchallenged, and the Americans who 
had crossed the Atlantic to meet them. 
All the feelings of that vast population 
swarming in British ports and firmly 
believing in " Rule Britannia," as an arti- 
cle of national faith ; all the prejudices of 
the nobility and wealthy aristocrac3', who 
regarded the beautiful vessels in which 
they cruised about the channel and visited 
the shores of the Mediterranean every 
summer as the perfection of naval archi- 
tecture, were roused to the highest degree ; 
and even the Queen of England did not 
deem the occasion unworthy of her pres- 
ence. 

Until the very day, August twenty- 
second, 1851, of this celebrated contest, no 
Englishman ever dreamed that any nation 
could produce a yacht witli the least pre- 
tensions to match the efforts of White, 
Camper, Ratsey, and other eminent build- 
ers ; and in the pages of the Yacht List 
for that very year (1861), there was an 
assertion which every man within sight of 
sea water from the Clyde to the Solent 
would swear to, namely, that " yacht build- 
ing was an art in which England was 
unrivaled, and that she was distinguished 
pre-eminently and alone for the perfection 
of science in handling them." Of the sev- 



enteen j-acht clubs in various parts of the 
united kingdom, not one of them had ever 
seen a foreigner enter the lists in the 
annual matches. It was just known that 
there was an imperial yacht club in St. 
Petersburg, maintained, it was affirmed, 
by the imperial trcasur3', to encourage a 
nautical spirit among the nobility, and 
that a few owners of jachts at Rotterdam 
had enrolled themselves as a club ; but, 
till the America came over, the few who 
were aware of the fact that there was a 
flourishing club in New York did not 
regard it as of the slightest consequence, 
or as at all likely to interfere with tlieir 
monopoly of the glory of the manliest of all 
sports. The few trial runs made by the 
America, on her arrival in English waters, 
proved her to be of great speed, and satis- 
fied the English critics that her owners 
were not so little justified as at first they 
Lad been thought, in offering to back an 
untried vessel against any other yacht 
for the large sum of fifty thousand dollars, 
or for a cup or piece of plate. An inter- 
esting reminiscence or two, in this connec- 
tion, related by Colonel Hamilton, a mem- 
ber of the club, may here be given, 
namely : 

There had previously been some talk 
among the meml)ers of the New York 
yacht club, of a race with the yachts of 
England, and Mr. W. 11. Brown, the well- 
known and skillful ship-builder, had under- 
taken to build a schooner that should out- 
sail any other vessel at home or abroad, 
and he agreed to make the purchase of her 
contingent upon her success. His offer 
was accepted by the yacht club. And 
now, to the master hand and brain of that 
accomplished architect, George Steers, 
was confided the task of furnishing the 
model of this — to be — nautical wonder. 
The America teas built. Failing, however, 
in repeated trials, to beat Commodore 
Stevens's yacht Maria, the club were not 
bound to purchase. But the liberality of 
the original offer was so great, in assuming 
all risk, and the vessel in fact proved her- 
self so fast, that several gentlemen, the 
commodore at the head, determined to buy 



252 



YllOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEE. 



hm' and send licr out. She was accord- 
ingly purchased, and sent to Havre, there 
to await the arrival of the members of the 
club, who were to sail her, they following 
ill a steamer. 

Everything being made ready and com- 
pleted at Havre, they sailed thence to 
Cowes, a seaport of the Isle of Wight — the 
scene of the contemplated regatta. Their 
arrival was greeted with every hospitality 
and courtesy, not only by the noblemen 
and gentlemen of the royal yacht club, but 
by the offi<-ers of government. Lord 
Palmerston issued an order that the Amer- 
ica should be admitted iiKall the English 
ports on the footing of English yachts; 
the custom-houses were all made free to 
her: and the admiral of the station at 




GEORGE STEERS. 



Portsmouth offered every assistance and 
civility. The Earl of Wilton, and the 
veteran Manpiis of Anglesea, the latter 
eighty years of age, were among the first 
visitors on board. 

When the time for the regatta came, 
which was to take place on the most dan- 
gerous course possible for a stranger — in 
the waters of the Isle of Wight, with their 
currents and eddies, familiar only to those 
ai-customed to the water — great solicitude 
was naturally felt by the Americans, as to 
the pilot to be employed. Warnings of 
all sorts, from various quarters, reached 
them, not to rely too much on any pilot 
that might offer; and the commodore was 
naturallj' perplexed. But here again the 
English admiral, witli an intuitive pei'cep- 
tion of the difficulty — of which no men- 



tion, nevertheless, had ever been made to 
him — told Commodore Stevens that he 
would furnish him with a pilot for whom 
he himself would be answerable. The 
offer was as frankly accejated as it was 
honorably made. The pilot came on 
board, and never, for a moment, was there 
a suspicion on any mind that he was not 
thoroughly honest and reliable. Yet, so 
strong was the distrust among Americans 
oiifside, that even after the pilot was in 
charge, the commodore was warned, by 
letter, not to trust too much to him, and 
urged to take another pilot to overlook 
him. But the commodore's own loyaltj' 
of character would not entertain such a 
proposition — he gave his confidence to 
the pilot the admiral sent him, and it was 
completely justified. 

The London Times said that never, in 
the history of man, did Cowes present such 
an appearance as on the eventful day 
apjiointed for this race. Upwards of one 
hundred j-achts lay at anchor in the roads ; 
the beach was crowded ; and the esplanade 
in front of the club swarmed with ladies 
and gentlemen, and with the people inland, 
who came over in shoals, with wives, sons, 
and daughters, for the day. Booths were 
erected all along the quay, and the road- 
stead was alive with boats, while from 
sea and shore arose an incessant buzz of 
voices mingled with the splashing of oars, 
the flapping of sails, and the hissing of 
steam, from the excursion vessels prepar- 
ing to accompany the race. Flags floated 
from the beautiful villas wliich stud the 
wooded coast, and ensign and bargee, rich 
with the colors of the various clubs or the 
devices of the yachts, flickered gayly out in 
the soft morning air. The windows of the 
houses which commanded the harbor were 
filled from the parlor to the attic, and the 
"old salts " on the beach gazed moodily on 
the low black hull of " the Yankee," and 
spoke doubtfully of the chances of her 
<'ompetitors. Some thought " the Vo- 
lante " might prove a teaser if the wind 
was light ; others speculated on " the 
Alarm " doing mischief, if there was wind 
enough to bring out the qualities of that 



VICTOKIOUS EACE OF THE YACHT AMEEICA — 1S51. 



ioo 



large cutter in beating up to windward 
and in tacking ; while more were of the 
opinion that the America would carry off 
the cup, " blow high — blow low." It was 
with the greatest difficulty the little town 
gave space enough to the multitudes that 
came from all quarters to witness an event 
so novel and interesting. Among the vis- 
itors were countless strangers — Frenchmen 
en route for Havre, Germans in quiet won- 
derment at the excitement around them, 
and Americans already triumphing in the 
anticipated success of their countrj'men. 

Eighteen yachts were entered, and were 
moored in a double line from Cowes castle, 
the Beatrice being nearest that point, the 
America about midwaj', and the Aurora 
farthermost. The mist which hung over 
the fields and woods from sunrise was cai'- 
ried off about nine o'clock by a very gentle 
breeze from the westward, which veered 
round a little to the south soon afterwards, 
and the morning became intensely warm. 

At five minutes before ten o'clock, the 
preparatory gun was fired from the club- 
house battery, and the yachts were soon 
sheeted from deck to topmast with clouds 
of canvas, huge gaff topsails and balloon 
jibs being greatly in vogue, and the Amer- 
ica evincing her disposition to take advan- 
tage of her new jib by hoisting it with all 
alacrity. The whole flotilla, not in the 
race, were already in motion, many of 
them stretching down towards Osborne 
and Eyde, to get a good start of the clip- 
pers. Of the yachts that entered, fifteen 
started, seven of these being schooners 
and eight cutters. 

Precisely at ten o'clock, the signal gun 
for sailing was fired, and before the smoke 
had well cleared away the whole of the 
beautiful fleet was under way, moving 
steadily to the east, with the tide and a 
gentle breeze. The start was effected 
splendidly, the yachts breaking away like 
a field of race-horses ; the only laggard 
was the America, which did not move for 
a second or so after the others. Steamers, 
shore-boats, and yachts, of all sizes, buzzed 
along on each side of the course, and 
spread away for miles over the rippling 



sea — a sight such as the Adriatic never 
beheld in all the pride of Venice — such, 
indeed, as was never before known in the 
annals of yachting. Soon after they 
started, a steamer went off from the roads 
with the members of the sailing committee 
— Sir B. Graham, Bart., commodore, of 
the royal yacht squadron, and other distin- 
guished gentlemen. The American minis- 
ter, Hon. Abbott Lawrence, and his son. 
Colonel Lawrence, uttdclie to the American 
legation, arrived too late for the sailing of 
the America, but were accommodated on 
board the steamer, and went round the 
island in her. 

The Gipsey Queen, with all her canvas 
set and in the strength of the tide, took 
the lead after starting, with the Beatrice 
next, and then, with little difference in 
order, the Volante, Constance, Arrow, and 
a flock of others. The America went 
easily for some time under mainsail, (with 
a small gaff-tojisail of a triangular shape, 
braced up to the truck of the short and 
slender stick which served as her main-top- 
mast,) foresail, fore-staysail and jib ; 
while her competitors had every cloth set 
that the club regulations allowed. Slie 
soon, began to creep upon them, passing 
some of the cutters to windward. In a 
quarter of an hour she had left them all 
behind, except the Constance, Beatrice, 
and Gijjse}' Queen, which were well to- 
gether, and went along smartly with the 
light breeze. Once or twice the wind 
freshened a little, and at once the Amer- 
ica gathered vvay, and passed ahead of the 
Constance and Beatrice. Another puff 
came, and she made a dart to pass the 
Gipsey Queen, but the wind left her sails, 
and the little Volante came skimming past 
her with a stupendous jib, swallowing up 
all the wind that was blowing. The glo 
rious pageant, passing under Osborne- 
house, formed a pageant surpassingly fine, 
the whole expanse of sea, from shore to 
shore, being filled as it were with a count- 
less fleet, while the dark hull of the Ven- 
geance, eighty-four, in the distance at 
Spithead, towered in fine relief above the 
tiny little craft that danced around her ; 



254 



FROM COLOIS'Y TO WOELD TOWEE. 



the green hills of Hampshire, the white 
batteries of Portsmouth, and the pictur- 
esque coast of Wight, forming a fine 
frame-work for the picture. 

As the Volante passed the America, 
great was the delight of the patriotic, but 
the nautical knowing ones shook their 
heads, and said the triun)ph would be 
short-lived ; the breeze was freshening, 
and then the sprightly cutter must give 
way, though she was leading the whole 
squadron at the time. At half-past ten, 
the Gipsey Queen caught a draught of 



densely crowded. But the America wag 
forging ahead, and lessening the number 
of her rivals every moment. The Sand- 
heads were rounded by the Volante, 
Gipsey Queen, and America, without any 
perceptible change in point of time, at 
eleven o'clock, the last being apparently 
to leeward. Again the wind freshened, 
and the fast yachts came rushing up before 
it, the run from the Sandheads being most 
exciting, and well contested. Here one of 
the West India mail steamers was ob- 
served paddling her best, to come in for 




YACHT AMKUICA 



wind and ran past the Volante, — the Con- 
stance, America, Arrow, and Alarm, being 
nearly in a line; but in fifteen minutes, 
the breeze freshened again for a short 
time and the America passed the Arrow, 
Constance, and .Marm, but could not sliake 
off the Vcil.uite nor come up to the Gipsey 
Queen, and exclamaiions were heard of 
•■• Well, Brother Jonathan is not going to 
have it nil his own w;i_y," etc. 

Passing Rj'de. the excitement on shore 
was very great, and the vast pier was 



some of the fun, and a slight roll of the 
sea inwards began to impart a livelier 
motion to the yachts, and to render excur- 
sionists, whether male or female, ghastly- 
looking and uncomfortable. 

The yachts Volante, Freak, Aurora, 
Gipsey Queen, America. Beatrice, Alarm, 
Arrow, and Bacchante, were timed oft' 
Norman's Land buoy ; the oth.er six were 
staggering about in the rear, and the 
Wyvern soon afterwards hauled her wind, 
and went back towards Cowes. 



VICTORIOT^S RACI-: OF THE YACHT AMERICA — 1851. 



200 



At this point, the wind blew somewhat 
more steadily, and the America began to 
show a touch of her quality. Whenever 
the breeze took the line of lier hull, all the 
sails set as flat as a drumhead, and, with- 
out any careening or staggering, she 
"walked along" past cutter and schooner, 
and, when off Brading, had left every 
vessel in the squadron beliind her, with 
the exception of the Volante, which she 
overtook at half-past eleven, when she 
very quietly hauled down her jib, — as 
much as to say she would give her rival 
every odds, — and laid herself out for the 
race round the back of the island. The 
weather showed signs of improvement, as 
far as 3'achting was concerned ; a few sea- 
horses waved their crests over the water, 
the high lands on shore put on their fleecy 
"niglitcaps" of cloud, and the horizon 
looked delightfully threatening ; and now 
" the Yankee" flew like the wind, leaping 
over, not against, the water, and increasing 
her distance from the Gipsey Queen, 
Volante, and Alarm, every instant. The 
way her sails were set evinced superiority 
in the cutting which the English makers 
would barely allow, but, certain it was, 
that while the jibs and mainsails of her 
antagonists were "bellied out," her canvas 
was as flat as a sheet of paper. No foam, 
but rather a water-jet rose from her liows ; 
and the greatest point of resistance — for 
resistance tliere must be somewhere — 
seemed about the beam, or just forward of 
her mainmast, for the seas flashed off from 
her sides at that point every time she met 
them. WJiile the cutters were thrashing 
througli the water, sending tlie spray ovei 
their bows, and the schooners were wet up 
to the foot of the foremast, the America 
was as dry as a bone. She had twenty-one 
persons on her deck, consisting of the 
owners, the crew, cook, and steward, a 
Cowes pilot, and some seamen. They 
nearly all sat aft, and, when the vessel did 
not require any handling, crouched down 
on the deck by the weather bulwarks. 
The Gipsey Queen, when a little ]iast 
Rrading, seemed to have carried awav her 
foresail sheets, but even had it not been 



so, she had lost all chance of success. The 
America, as the wind increased, and it was 
now a six-knot breeze, at least, hauled 
down her wee gaff-toj)sail, and went n\Tay 
under mainsail, foresail, and fore-stavsail, 
so that it required the utmost the steamer 
could do to keep alongside of her. T/ii.i 
was her quickest bit of suHitirj, for on 
rounding the east point of the island it 
was necessary to beat to the westward, in 
order to get along the back of the "Wight. 

At 11 : 37, the Arrow, Bacchante, Con- 
stance, and Gipsey Queen, stood away to 
the north, to round the Nab, imagining 
that it was requisite to do so, as the visual 
course was to go outside the lightship, 
though the cards did not specify it on this 
occasion. The America and most of the 
other yachts kept their course round the 
Foreland and by Bembridge. She ran 
past tlie white and black buoys at a tre- 
mendous rate, and, at 11 :47, tacked to the 
west, and stood in towards the Culver cliffs, 
the nearest yacht being at least two miles 
to leeward or astern of her. She was not 
very quick in stays on this occasion, and 
it would seem she was not very regular in 
that maneuver, sometimes taking a minute, 
sometimes thirty seconds, to perform it. 
At 11 : 58, she stood out again to the south- 
east, and, having taken a stretch of a mile 
or so, went about and ran in towards San- 
down. The breeze died off at this point, 
and to keep the cutters and light craft off, 
the America hoisted her gaff-topsail and 
jib once more. Under Shanklin t'hine the 
set of the tide ran heavily against her, but 
still there was nothing to fear, for her 
rivals were miles away, some almost hull 
down. 

While running under Dunnose, at 12 : 58, 
her jib-boom broke short off; it was 
broken by mismanagement on the part of 
the men when straining on it with the 
windlass, and did not snap from the action 
of the sail. This accident threw her up in 
the wind, and gave the advantage of about 
a quarter of an hour to her opponents, 
while she was gathering in the wreck. 
But it was of little use to them. Looking 
away to the east, they were visible at 



256 



FROM COLUXY TO WOIILD POWEli. 



great distances, standing in shore, or 
running in and out, most helplessly astern 
— the Aurora, Freak, and Volante, in spite 
of light winds and small tonnage, being 
two or three miles behind. The wind fell 
off very much for more than an hour, and 
it was but weary work stretching along 
the coast against a baffling tide, every 
moment making the loss of her jib of 
greater consequence to the America. 




"cur OF ALL NATIONS," WON UY THE A5IERICA. 

At about o : 20, the breeze freshened, 
and the America, still some miles ahead, 
.slipped along on her way, making tacks 
with great velocity, and standing well up 
to windward. Her superiority was so 
decided that severn.l of the yachts ■irorK, 
and iveiit hack again, to Cowes in despair; 
and, for some time, the America increased 
her distance every second, the Aurora. 
Freak, and Volante, keeping in a little 
.squadron together — ^ tack for tack — and 



running along close under the cliffs. This 
was rather unfortunate in one respect, for, 
in going about, the Freak fouled the 
Volante and carried away her jib-boom; 
and the boatman's pet became therebv 
utterly disabled, and lost the small glimpse 
of fortune which the light winds might 
have given her. 

Meanwhile, minute after minute, "the 
Yankee " was gaining ground, and at 3 : 30 
was fl.ying past St. Lawrence towards Old 
Castle, while the Bacchante and Eclipse, 
which had been working along honestly 
and steadily, were about two and a half 
miles to leeward behind her. Further 
away still, were visible five or six yachts, 
some hull down, some dipped further still, 
digging into the tideway as hard as they 
could, and lying into the wind as well as 
their sails might stand it. 

By this time, the America had got the 
wind on her quarter, having gone around 
Rocken-end, an<l thus having a tolerably 
fair course from the south to north-west, 
up to the Needles, the wind being light 
and the water somewhat broken. The 
persons on board the steamers were greatly 
astonished at seeing ahead of the America, 
after she had rounded Rocken-end, a fine 
cutter with a jib and foresail together — 
" two single gentleman rolled into one," 
bowling away with all speed, as if racing 
away for her life, and it was sometime 
liefore they could be persuaded she wa> 
not the Aurora; but she was in reality the 
Wildfire, forty-two tons, which was taking 
a little share in the match to herself, an<l 
had passed the End at 3 : 40. The Amer- 
ica, however, bore straight down for th*' 
cutter, which was thoroughly well-sailed, 
and passed her after a stern cha.se of niori' 
than an hour, though the Wildfire, when 
first sighted, was reckoned to be some tw.' 
and a half miles ahead. 

At 5 : 40. the Aurora, the nearest yacht, 
was fully seven and one-half miles astern, 
the Freak being about a mile more distant, 
and the rest being " nowhere. " The 
.America was at this time close to thi' 
jSTeedles, upon which she was running with 
a liffht breeze all in her favor. 



VICTORIOUS RACE OF THE YACHT AMERICA — 1851. 



.'o. 



Two of the excursion steamers ran into 
Alum L).iy, and anchored there to see tlie 
race round the Needles. While waiting 
there in intense anxiety for the first vessel 
that should shoot round the immense pil- 
lars of chalk and limestone which Lear the 
name, the passengers were delighted to 
behold the Victoria and Albert, with the 
royal standard at the main, and the Lord 
Admiral's flag at the fore, steaming round 
from the north-west, followed by the 
Fairy, and the little dock-yard tender. 
Her majesty. Prince Albert, and the royal 
famil}', were visible by the aid of a glass 
from the deck of the steamers. The royal 
yacht went past the Needles, accompanied 
by the Fairy, at 5 : 35, but quickly re- 
turned, and at 5 : 45 lay to, off Alum Bay. 
The Fairy was signaled to proceed round 
the Needles, to bring tidings of the race, 
and at once started on her errand. 

But all doubt and speculation, if any 
there could have been, was soon removed 
by the appearance of the America hauling 
her wind round the cliff, at 5 : 50. The 
breeze fell dead under the sliore, and the 
America lowered out her foresail and fore- 
staysail so as to run before it. All the 
steamers weighed and accompanied her^ 
giving three cheers as she passed, a com- 
pliment which owners and crews acknowl- 
edged with uncovered heads and waving 
hats. At 6 : 04 the Wildfire rounded the 
Needles, and bore away after the schooner, 
which by this time had got almost in a 
line with the Victoria and Albert ; and, 
though it is not usual to recognize the 
presence of her majesty on such occasions 
as a racing match — no more, indeed, than 
a jockey would pull up his horse to salute 
the queen, when in the middle of his 
stride, — the America instantly lowered her 
ensign, blue with white stars, the commo- 
dore took off his hat, and all his crew, fol- 
lowing his order and example, remained 
with uncovered heads for some minutes, 
till they had passed the royal yacht. The 
steamers, as she passed on, renewed their 
cheering. 

On turning towards the Needles, at 
6:. 30, not a sail was in sight, but the 
17 



breeze was so very light that all sailing 
might be said to have finished ; and it was 
evident that the America had won the 
cuj), uidess some light cutter ran xii3 with 
a breeze in the dusk and slipped past her. 
The steamers returned towards Cowes, and 
the royal yacht, having run close by the 
America under half-steam for a .short dis- 
tance, went on towards Osborne. Off 
Cowes were innumerable yachts, and on 
every side was heard the hail, " Zs tlie 
Americu first?" — The answer, " Yes." 
"What's second?"— The reply, "Nofh- 
iuf/." 

As there was no wind, the time con- 
sumed in getting up from Hurst Castle to 
the winning flag was very considerable, 
the America's arrival first not having 
been announced by gunfire till 8 : 37. The 
Aurora, which slipped up very rapidly 
after rounding the Needles, in consequence 
of her light tonnage and a breath of wind, 
was signaled at 8 : 45 ; the Bacchante at 
9:30; the Eclipse at 9:45; the Brilliant 
at 1 : 20 a. m., August 23d. The rest were 
not timed. Thus the America made good 
all her professions, and to Commodore 
Stevens was presented, by the royal yacht 
squadron, the well-won cup. 

On the evening after the race there was 
a splendid display of fire-works by land 
and water along the club-house esjdanade, 
at which thousands of persons were pres- 
ent. A re-union also took place at the 
club-house, and the occasion was taken of 
the Hon. Abbott Lawrence's presence to 
compliment him on the success of his 
countrymen ; to which his excellency made 
a suitable reply, humorously remarking 
that, though he could not but be proud of 
his fellow-citizens, he still felt it was but 
the children giving a lesson to the father 
— and if the America should be purchased 
by English friends, the Yankees would 
nevertheless try to build something better 
in New Y^ork, so as to beat even her ! 

The queen having intimated her desire 
to in.spect the America, the latter sailed 
from Cowes to Osborne, where the Victoria 
and Albert also dropped down. As the 
queen, with Prince Albert, and suite, neared 



258 



i'KOAi CULU^Ii' 10 WUKLD TUWEii. 



the Ainorica, the national colors of that 
vessel were dipjjed, out of respect to her 
majesty, and raised again when she h.ad 
proceeded on board. The queen made a 
close inspection of the vessel, attended by 
Commodore Stevens, Colonel Hamilton, 
and the officers of the yacht, remaining 
half an hour on board, and expressing 
great admiration of the famous schooner. 
Indeed, the America's beautiful and ingen- 
ious model, and her remarkable sailing 
qualities, were the astonishment of every- 
body. 

The triumph of the America was due 
alike to her superior model and to the 
unique cut and fit of her sails. Tlie first 
thing that met the eye, whether the vessel 
was afloat or in dock, was the position of 
the greatest transverse section — in ap- 
pearance situated at about ten-seventeenths 
of her whole length from forward ; at this 
section, the bottom was nearly straight for 
several feet out from the keel, while the 
two sides included au angle of about one 
hundred degrees. At the forepart, her 
appearance contrasted sti'augely with the 
observances of modern ship-building, 



namely, the avoidance of hollow water- 
lines, hers being very concave, and her 
forefoot exceedingly short, or, in other 
words, the lower part of the stem and 
gripe forming a long curve, and therefore 
only a small rudder being needed; in con- 
sequence of this, there was, in steering, 
but little impediment opposed to her pas- 
sage through the water; the great draught 
of her water aft, eleven feet four inche^, 
with only six feet forward, added also to 
her facility in steering. Any defect that 
might be expected to result from this in 
sailing on a wind, was quite avoided by 
her great depth of keel, — two feet two 
inches amidships. The copper was placed 
upon her bottom with great care, and 
everv possible projection avoided, in order 
to diminish the friction in jiassing through 
the water. But by far the most distin- 
guishing feature of the America was the 
set of her sails. The bellying of the sails 
of yachts universally — not only when 
running free, but also when sailing on a 
wind — was, in the case of the America, 
avoided to a very great extent, and from 
this arose much of her superiority. 



Stmmaky of R.\cf';s kok thk A.merica's Ci'r. 



DATE. 



Aug. 22, 1S51. 



Course. 



Aug, 
Oft. 
Oct. 
Oct. 
Oct, 
Oct, 



8, 1870. 
16, 1871. 
18,1871. 
19,1871. 
21, 1871. 
23,1871. 



Aug. 11, 1S76. 

Aus. 12, 1876. 

Nov. 9,1881., 
Nov. 10,1881., 
Sept. 14, 1885., 
Sept. 16, 1885., 
Sept. 9, 1886., 
Sept. 11, 1886., 
Sept. 27, 1887., 
Sept. 30, 1887., 
Oct. 7,1893., 
Oct. 9, 1893. , 
Oct. 13,1893,, 
Sept. 7,1895.. 
Sept. 10, 1895., 
Sept. 12, 1895,. 
Oct. l"!, 1S99.. 
Oct. 17, 1899., 
Oct. 20,1899.. 
Sept. 28, 1901.. 
Oct. 3,1901., 
Oct. 4,1901.. 
Aug. 22,1903.. 
Aug. 27, 1903., 
Sept. 3,1903., 



.\round Isle of Wight .\nierica 



.\merican 
yacht. 



Time. 



.\ew York Y. C. course. 
New Y^orlc Y. C. course. 
20 m. windward and back , 
New York Y'. C. course, . , . 
20 m. windward and back. 
New Y'ork Y. C. course. 



■Vlagic . 

Columbia. 

Columbia. 

Columbia* 

.■^appho., 

Sappho., 



-\ew Y'ork Y. C. course I .Madeleine . 

20 m. windward and back. . .Madeleine. 



New York Y. C. course 

16 m. leeward and back 

-New Y'ork Y'. C. coiu-se 

20 m. leeward and bark 

New Y'ork Y'. C. course 

20 m. leeward and back 

New Y'ork Y. C. course 

20 ni. windward and back . . . 
15 m. windward and back. . . 

30 m. triangular course 

is ra. windward and back. . , 
i5 m. windward and back. . . 

30 m. triangukir course 

15 m. leeward and back 

15 m. windward and back, , , 

30 m. triangular cour.se 

15 m. leeward and back 

15 m. windward and back. . . 

30 m. triangular course 

15 m. leeward and back 

15 m. windward and back. . . 

30 ra. triangular course 

15 m. leeward and back 



Mischief, . . 
-Mischief. . . 
Puritan . . , 
Puritan . . . 
Mayflower . 
Majflower . 
Volun teer. . 
Volunteer.. 
Vigilant.. . 
Vigilant. . . 
Vigilant. , . 
Defender. . 
Defender . . 
Defender. . 
Columbia.. 
Columbia. . 
Columbia.. 
Columbia.. 
Columbia.. 
Columbia.. 
Reliance... 
Reliance... 
Reliance... 



H. M. s. 
10,37,00 
3,58.26, 
6.19 41. 
3.07,42 
4.17.35, 
5,39.02. 
4.46.17. 
5.23.54 

7.18.46. 

4.17.09. 
4. .14. 53. 
6.06.05 
5.03.14 
5.26,41 
6,49,00 
4 53,18 
5. 42. .56 
4.05,47 
3,25,01 
3,24,39 
4. 59. .54 
3.55.56 
4.43.43 
4 . 53 . 53 
3.27.00 
3.38.09 
4.30.24 
3.12.35. 
4. 32. .57. 
3.32.17. 
3,14.54, 
4. 28. 06. 



English 
yacht. 



.Aurora 

Cambria 

Livonia 

Uvonia 

Livonia 

Livonia 

Livonia 

Countess of 

Dufferin. . . . 
Countess of 

Dufferin. . . . 
.\tlatita. . . . 

.\tlanta 

(lencsta 

(Jencsta 

Galatea 

(lalatea 

Thiitle 

Thistle 

Valkyrie II.. 
\'alkyrie II . 
V.ilkyrio II . . 
N'alkvTie III 
Valkyrie Hit 
\alkyrie III . . 
Shamrock I. , . 
Shamrock I . . . 

hamrock I . . . 
Shamrock II . . 

hamrock II 
Shamrock IIJ 
Shamrock III 
Shamrock III . 
Shamrock III . 



Time. 



H. M. s. 
10.55 00. 
4.37.38. 
6 46.45. 
3.18.15. 
4.02.25. 
6.09.23. 
5.11.44. 

5.34.53. 

7.46.00. 

4.45.39. 

5 33.47 

6.22.24. 

5.04.52. 

5.38.43. 

7.18.09. 

5.12,41. 

5,54,45, 

4.11,35 

3.35.36. 

3.25.19 

5.08 44 
Disqu'fied 
Withdrew. 

5.04 01. 
Disabled. . 

3.44.43. 

4.31.44. 

3.16.10. 

4.33.38. 

3.39,20 

3,16.13. 



Result. 



.American boat first home by 18,00. 
-Vnierican boat won by 3f . 1 2, 
.\merican boat w'on by 27.04. 
.\merican boat won by 10.33. 
English boat won by *15.10. 
American boat won by 30.21. 
.American boat won by 25.27. 

American boat won by 10.59. 



.\merican 
.\merican 
.\merican 
,\merican 
,\merican 
.American 
.\merican 
American 
.American 
.\merican 
.\nierican 
.\mcrican 
.\merican 
j.\merican 
.\merican 
.\merican 
.\merican 
.\merican 
,\merican 
American 
.American 
.\merican 
.\merican 
English 



boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 
boat 



won by 27.14. 
won by 28.30. 

by 38.54. 

bv 16.19. 

by 1.38. 

by 12.02. 

by 29.09. 

by 19.23. 

by 11.48. 

by 5.48. 

by 10.35. 

by .40. 

by 8.4(1. 
fovl 



won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 

won on 
bad walk 
won by lO.OS. 
had walk over, 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
won 
lost 



by 
by 
by 
by 
by 
by 



6.34. 
1.20. 
3.35. 
t.41. 
7.03. 
1.19. 



♦Oohirabia disab'ed. f Valkyrie finished first, but race awarded .American boat on account of foul. 

JShamrock II finished first, but lost race on time allowance of 4S s. 



XXVIL 

NAVAL EXPEDITION TO JAPAN, UNDER COMMODORE 

M. C. PERRY.— 1852. 



Xegotiations u< be Oiieneil for Unsealing the Ports of tliat Empire to America. — Letter of Friendship 
from the President of the United States to the Emperor. — Distinguislied Favor Shown the Represen- 
tatives of tiie Great Kepublic. — Ceremonies, Entertainments, and Diplomatic Conferences. — Treaty 
of Peace, Amity, and Commercial Intercourse Concluded — Former Japanese Isolation Policy. — Exclu- 
sive Privileges to the Dutch. — Effects of this restriction. — European Ettbris to Cliange it. — Mission 
of Commodore Uiddle. — Seeks the Release of United States Sailors. — Ordered to Depart Forth- 
with. — Firm Conduct of Captain Glynn. — Contempt for Japanese Etiquette. — Cham|iagne as a 
Mediator. — Commodore Perry's Fine Fleet. — The Letter in a Golden Box — Its Presentation to the 
Emperor — Commissioners Meet Commodore Perry. — Their Attire, Manners, Etc — The Conference 
in Session. — Frendliness of the Japanese. — Civilities and Festivals. — Reception on the Flag-Ship. — 
Substance nf the Tre.ity. — A Talk with tlie Emperor. — More Privileges Extended. 



"I have tlirecteil Commodore Perry loasBUre yonr imperial majesty that I entertain ttie kindest feelings towards your majeaty's person 
aid government, and that I have no othf r object in sending him to Japan but to propose to your imperial niajesly tliat the I. nlted Statei 
and Japan should live in friendaliip and have commercial intercourse with each other. —The Pbesident's L'etthk to the Eupebor. 



7 APANESE seclusion from tlie'rest of the nations of the earth, and especially 

from the governments representing the same, seemed, for centu- 

rie.s, to be an irritating problem, defying the utmost ingenuity 

and sidll of diplomacy to solve ; and the various attempts, made 

by different governments, to break through this impenetrable 

barrier of isolation, were, until a period comparatively recent, 

completely abortive, — the only approach to anything deserving 

the name of commercial intercourse with that country being a 

restricted privilege to trade at one or two points, granted for a 

,..;.^ time to the Portuguese, and subsequently to the 

Dutch, but, in each case, upon conditions most 

humiliating to the parties thus favored by the 

Japanese. 

But it is a fact which would seem not to 
admit of any doubt, that this practice of jeal- 
ous seclusion is fostered rather by the ruling 
classes, than by the masses of the people, and, 
therefore, foreign nations have felt all the 
more justified in endeavoring to break down a 
policy so manifestly at war with the rights 
and interests of the human race. Providence 
having bestowed the whole earth on the chil- 
TREATY OF PEACE, AMITY, ETC. dieii of mcu, sucli isolatiou is defeating alto- 




260 



FROM COLOKY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



getluu- tliat beneficeiit purpose ; for, should 
other niitious follow the example of Japan, 
and refuse to couiniunieate with t'.ieir 
neighbors, there would be an end of all 
eomiiierce, of all progress, of all civiliza- 
tion, — industry v.'ould be smitten with 
paralysis, and men would regard the inhab- 
itants of adjoining countries as enemies. 

Of the efforts put forth by European 
nations to establish commercial and politi- 
cal fraternity with Japan, no rehearsal 
need be here made. On the jaart of the 
United States, negotiations were under- 
taken during the administration of Presi- 
dent Polk, through Commodore Biddle, 
but with no success of a permanent chai'- 
acter. The commodore had been espe- 
cially charged with the duty of bringing 
home several American sailors, who, having 
escaped from the wreck of their whale-shij), 
succeeded in reaching the Japanese coast, 
but were forthwith imprisoned. As illus- 
trating the rules and conduct of the singu- 
lar people into whose good graces the com- 
modore thus essaj'ed to propitiate himself, 
the following circumstances, as related by 
Mr. Secretary Kennedy and others, will 
both amuse and instruct, and form a fit pre- 
liminary to llie account of Commodore Per- 
r3''s subsequent visit : — 

As soon as Commodore Biddle had an- 
chored in the bay of Yeddo, a junk, with 
the officials of the empire, came out to his 
shi]>, having witli them a Dutch inter- 
preter. Biddle told the dignitaries that 
the vessels came with goo<l will, to learn 
whether Japan had, like China, oi)ened 
her ports to foreign trade ; and, if she 
liad, to negotiate a treaty of commerce. 
The dignitaries requested that this state- 
ment should be reduced to writing, foi 
transmission to the higher authorities. 
He also stated that all needed supplies 
would be furnished, but refused any per- 
mission to land. In about a week, an offi- 
cer with a suite of eight persons came on 
board with tlio emperor's letter, which 
read thus: "According to the Ja2:)anese 
laws, the Japanese may not trade excejJt 
with the Dutch and Chinese. It will not 
be allowed that America make a treaty 



with Japan or trade with her, as the same 
is not allowed with any other nation. 
Concerning strange lands, all things are 
fixed at Nagasaki, but not here in the 
bay ; therefore j-ou must depart as quick 
as possible, and not come any more to 
Japan." Biddle's instructions being not 
to do anything " to excite a hostile feeling, 
or distrust to the United States," he was 
compelled to refrain from any compulsory 
proceedi/igs. 

It so hapjiened, that when the junk, 
with the officials, made the visit to the 
commodore's vessel, as above described, 
one of the American officers stepjied on 
board ; hut, in consequence of his having 
violated Japanese etiquette by boarding a 
government junk before the official bell 
had been rung, a Japanese knocked him 
overboard, and the junk returned to the 
shore. The officer, very natiu-all}' thinking 
himself badly used, demanded an apology. 
The next day, therefore, the commodore 
received a message stating that the Jap- 
anese who had knocked the American over 
the gangway, would be sent on board with 
his father and mother, brothers and sis- 
ters, grandmother, wife, and wife's sister, 
and that thi^ij ivould all rip themselves 
open lirfiire tJie captiii.n, for his satisfac- 
tion. But the caiitain did not want to 
witness that sort of satisfaction, and, as 
he could not ascertain anything aliout the 
prisoners, he set sail for home. The Jap- 
anese entertained a very poor opinion of 
the American peojde, in consequence of 
the conduct of the captain on that occasion 
— a nation, they thought, that would not 
allow mcTi to rip tliemselves open, must be 
a nation of cowards. The next squadron 
to Japan was directed by Captain Glynn, 
who determined to make an example of th« 
Japanese. 

As soon, therefore, as the American ship 
approached the shore, a junk came off to 
her, and, when near enough, a parchment 
was extended towards the ship's officers 
on a reed. The captain took the parch- 
ment and threw it into the water. In an 
instant, four or five Japanese jumped over- 
board and recovered the parchment, b«- 



PERRY'S NAVAL EXPEDITION TO JAPAN — 1S52. 



261 



cause, as the captain was told afterwards, 
they would have been ripjied open if tlie 
parchment had been lost. As the anchor- 
age usually allotted to foreigners did not 
please Captain Glynn, he moved towards 
a more convenient haven. Suddenly, a 
voice in tiie junk shouted, " You must go 
no furder — you must go no furder ! " The 
captain, on hearing his own language, said 
to the speaker, " You are the very man I 
want." He hove to and got the man on 
deck. "Who are you, sir?" asked the 
captain. " I am the interpreter," said he. 
" Are you one of the big men of this 
country?" asked Glynn. He answered 
in the negative, but told the captain that 
he musj go no nearer the shore, as it was 
contrary to the Japanese laws to do so. 




U^d^ 



"■ Stranger," said the captain, " I'll go just 
where I please, and I don't mean to speak 
to any one on the island under the prince 
or governor." So, onward he sailed, till 
he came to a place that suited him, where 
he dropped his anchor. Next day the 
prince of the district, with a great 
cortege, consisting of about fifty men in 
yellow robes, was seen walking along the 
shore. 

They soon entered a junk, and ap- 
proached the ship. The yellow men 
entered first, and as soon as they did so 
they put their heads to the deck and kept 
them there. When the great functionary 
entered, instead of going aft, as is the 
practice with Americans, he walked for- 
ward. Glynn went up to him, clapped 



him on the shoulder, and said, "Look you 
here, friend, you must come the other 
way." The Japanese officers and men 
were astonished at this audacious famil- 
iarity of the Americans, and thought that 
their prince was going to be martyred. It 
is customary in Japanese state junks, to 
have an elevated jilatform forward, and 
that is the place of honor. The Japanese 
officer was surprised, therefore, on going 
on the quarter-deck of the strange ship, to 
see that no platform had been provided ; 
and so, after looking round for the seat of 
honor, he went to the helm and perched 
himself on the rudder post. Glj'nn sent 
for a chair, and pointed to it, and in 
language which, though not to be found in 
manuals of politeness, was at least very 
perspicuous, bade him put himself into it. 
"Now," said he, turning to the interpreter, 
"tell him that!" The interpreter replied 
that he could not do so, as such a remark 
from him would insure his being ripped 
open on the spot. The captain told him 
that if he didn't obey him he would blow 
his brains out. So the interpreter, as a 
choice of evils, complied with the com- 
mand. As soon as the prince had seated 
himself, the captain ordered a bottle of 
sherry wine, of which he offered him a 
glass. The interpreter said, "the prince 
never drinks." "He is with me now, and 
he vH».<i drink," replied Glynn. The 
jjrince put the glass to his lips, but did 
not drink the liquor. The captain then 
turned round to the interpreter and asked, 
"Will you have it ?" He replied in the 
negative. The captain then offered cham- 
pagne. When the prince saw how it 
sparkled, his scruples vanished, and he 
drank it off. The captain filled another 
and yet another glass, which the jsrince 
enjoyed infinitely. When the captain saw 
that he had pleased the prince, he t«Id 
him, through the interpreter, that he ha<l 
come for the American prisoners, and they 
must be given up immediately. The 
prince said forty days would be required 
to send to Yeddo for them. Glynn replied, 
" I must sail in three days, and I must 
have them then." After some demur, 



:J62 



YLiVM CULUAY TU WUlvLD i'OWEi;. 



four days were 'allowed, at wliicli time the 
prisoners were returned. 

In dispatching the expedition under 
Commodore Perry, the object of the 
United States government was to obtuin 
some definite stipulations, in the form of a 
treaty, for mutual commercial transactions, 
between the two countries; and, in order 
to suitably impress the Japanese with the 
serious character of the movement, the 
fleet sent out was composed of some of the 
finest and most formidable ships in the 
American navy, carrying a large number 
of sailors and marines, and more than the 
usual complement of guns, mostly heavy 
ordnance. Each of the steamers mounted 
a couple of Paixhan shell-guns, of the 
largest caliber, and i)laced on revolving 
trucks, so as to sweep the horizon, — these 
guns lieing intended to be nsed for the 
discharge of shells of sixty-eight and one 
hundred and twentv poun<ls each, and 
long forty -twos, making twenty-two guns 
to each steamer. Every ship was provided 
with two brass twenty-four-pound field 
pieces. 

With this splendid disjilay of naval 
power. Commodore Perry sailed from the 
United States, in the steamship Missis- 
sippi, November 24, 1852, touched at 
Madeira ami the Cape of Good Hope, 
reached Hong Kong in April, 1853, and 
thence sailed for Japan. After uniting 
all the vessels of the squadron. Perry, 
leading the fleet in the flag-ship Sus(pie- 
hanna, made Cape Idzu on the eighth of 
July. Their first anchorage and inter- 
course with the natives was near the town 
of Uraga. On the fourteenth. Prince 
Iwami gave Commodore Perry a formal 
reception on shore, and took charge of the 
president's letter to the emperor. 

This letter, which was written by Hon. 
Edward Everett, secretary of state, and 
signed by President Fillmore, was beauti- 
fully engrossed on parchment and depos- 
ited in a gold-mounted bo.x of superb 
workmanship and costing a thousand dol- 
lars. The excellent spirit in which it was 
couched will appear from the opening sen- 
tences, namely: " Great and Good Friend: 



I sen<l you this pul)lic letter by Commo- 
dore Matthew C. Perry, an officer of the 
highest rank in the navy of the United 
States, and commander of the squadron 
now visiting your imperial majesty's 
dominions. I have directed Commodore 
Perrj' to assure your imperial majest}' that 
I entertain the kindest feelings towards 
your majesty's j)erson and government, 
and that I have no other object in sending 
him to Japan but to propose to your 
imperial majesty that the United States 
and iFapan should live in friendship and 
have commercial intercourse with each 
other. The Constitution and laws of the 
United States forbid all interference with 
the religious or political concerns of other 
nations. I have particularly charged 
Commodore Perry to abstain from every 
act whicli could possibly disturb the tran- 
quillity of your imperial majesty's domin- 
ions ; " etc. In this friendly and resjiect- 
ful strain was the whole of the presidential 
letter written. 

Al)undant time having been given the 
Jaj)anese authorities to decide upon what 
course they woui<i pursue, the American 
squadron, which had temporarily with- 
drawn, now re-ajipeared in the bay of 
Yeddo. As soon as they had anchored, a 
nund-ier of Japanese officers went on Ijoard 
the flag-shi[) to welccmie the commodore 
and his ofScers >jack. and to inform him 
that preparations liad been made for his 
reception at Uraga. where an answer from 
the emperor to the president's letter would 
be delivered to him, and begged that he 
would move his squadron down to that 
place. To this, the commodore, through 
the captain of the fleet, peremptorily re- 
fused to accede, on the ground that the 
anchorage there was too much exposed at 
such a season of the year, and even inti- 
mated that he might have to go up to 
Yeddo, the imperial capital! 

Several days passed in fruitless argu- 
ments on the part of the Jai)anese to 
induce the commodore to yield this point. 
In the meantime, the surveying jjarty had 
been actively employed, and, as the Jap- 
anese began to assume an independent 



PERRY'S NAVAL EXPEDITION TO JAPAN — 1852. 



263 



and intractable tone, a signal was thrown 
out and the squadron moved up the baj', 
to a position ten or twelve niile^ above the 
' American Anchorage,' and iu front of the 
city of Kanagawa. Boats were immedi- 
ately dispatclied to make further examina- 
tions of the channel in the direction of the 
capital ; but before they returned, the dig- 
nitaries from Uraga arrived, and, forget- 
ting their pertinacious obstinacy of a few 
hours previously, good-humoredly begged 
that an officer might be sent with them to 
select a suitable anchorage and place of 
reception somewhere in the vicinity of 
where the squadron lay. The commodore 
assenting to thi.s, the village of Yoko- 
liama was chosen on account of the excel- 
lent shelter afforded by its harbor. 

The squadron then present, consisting 
of the steam-frigates Powhatan, Susque- 
hanna, and Mississippi, sloops-of-war Mac- 
edonian, Vandalia, and Saratoga, and 
store-ships Southampton and Lexington, 
anchored in a line off the town, and the 
Japanese set to work with a will to erect 
suitable buildings for the conferences. 

On the eighth of March, the accommo- 
dations being completed, the commodore, 
by appointment, landed witli a suite of 
officers and an escort of five hundred sea- 
men and marines. He was received by 
five commissioners appointed by the em- 
peror to confer with him, consisting of the 
supreme counselor, the prince of Tsa- 
Sima, the prince of Mimi-Saki, a member 
of the board of revenue, and one other 
officer of high rank. The seamen and 
marines were all armed, and, with drums 
beating, colors fl.ving, bands playing at 
intervals, and salutes fired on the arrival 
of the officials, the scene was indeed a 
striking one. Thousands of Japanese sol- 
diers crowded the shore and neighboring 
heights, looking on with curious interest. 
The house was a plain frame-building, 
containing one large room — the audience 
iiall — and several smaller ones for the con- 
venience of attendants, etc. The floor 
was covered with mats, and very prettily 
painted screens adorned the sides. Long 
tables and benches, covered with red 



woolen stuff, placed parallel to each other, 
three handsome braziers, filled with burn- 
ing charcoal, on the floor between them, 
and a few violet-colored crape hangings 
suspended from the ceiling, completed the 
furniture of the room. The Americans 
touk their seats at one of the tables, and 
the Jaj)anese commissioners placed them- 
selves at the other table opposite; while 
behind them both, seated on the floor on 
tliuir knees — their usual position, as they 
do not use chairs — was a crowd of Jap- 
anese officers, forming the train of the 
commissioners. The business was carried 
on in the Dutch language, through inter- 
preters. 

First of all, after an exchange of com- 
pliments, the communication from the 
emperor to the j)i'esident of the United 
States was delivered in due form by the 
commissioners, and then thej' expressed 
themselves prepared to commence discus- 
sions ujjon the various points contained in 
the president's letter, and also to receive 
any further propositions that might be 
made, — the commissioners stating that, in 
the determination of the emperor to make 
some modification in their laws of seclu- 
sion, he relied upon the friendly disposi- 
tion of the Americans towards Japan, and, 
as such negotiations were entirely novel 
to them, they would trust witli confidence 
to the commodore's superior experience, 
to his generosity, and his sense of justice. 
A real desire was manifested b_y the Jap- 
a;iese to cultivate friendl_y feelings with 
their guests; in fact, the general bearing 
of the people had already convinced the 
Americans that Jajjanese distrust of them 
had measurably worn away. 

Refreshments were served in elegantly 
lacquered dishes — first of all, tea, which, as 
in China, is the constant beverage ; then 
different kinds of candy and sponge cake ; 
and, lastly, oranges, and a palatable liquor, 
distilled from rice, and called saki. What 
was left on their plates, by the Americans, 
at the close, was wrapped in paper, and 
given them to carry away, according to 
the usual custom in Japan. The commis- 
sioners were intelligent looking men, 



164: 



FROM COLOXY TO WOULD POWER 



riclil}' dressed in gaj', silk petticoat panta- 
loons, and upper garments resembling in 
shape ladies' short gowns. Dark-colored 
stockings, and two elegant swords, pushed 
through a twisted silk girdle, tinished the 
costume. Straw sandals are worn, liut are 
always slipped off on entering the house. 
The^' do not cover the head, the top and 
front part of which is shaved, and the 
back and side hair, being brought up, is 
tied so as to form a tail, three or four 
inches long, that extends forward upon the 
bald pate, terminating about half way 
between the apex and the forehead ; this is 



beautiful locomotive, tender, and passenger 
car, one-fourth the ordinary size, also a 
mile of magnetic telegraph, the operations 
of which were exhibited on shore. These 
excited a great deal of interest among the 
Japanese, particularly the telegraph, when 
they came to comprehend its utility in the 
transmission of intelligence, communica- 
tions being made in their presence in the 
English, Japanese, and Dutch languages. 
They were also delighted with the railroad, 
when they saw the engine and car flying 
along the track at the rate of twenty miles 
an hour, but thought it would be impossi- 




NAVAL EXPErHTION TO -TAPAIf 

a very comfortable fashion, and, were it 
not for the quantity of grease used in it, 
would be a cleanly one. 

The negotiations proceeded harmoni- 
ously, but, on account of the exacting cer- 
emony peculiar to the Japanese, very 
slowly. Thus, a question proposed had to 
pass first through the interpreters, and 
then through several officers ascending in 
rank, before it could reach the commis- 
sioners, every one bowing his head to the 
floor before he addressed his superiors. 
Among the presents intended for the 
emperor was a small railroad track, with a 



CTRDER COJrMODORE M. C. PERRY. 

ble to construct them to advantage in 
Japan, owing to the ver^' uneven surface 
of the country ! 

The ])olicy of the commodore had been, 
on lioth this and his former visit, to ob- 
serve a strict exclusiveness, and the Jap- 
anese were, on all occasions, given to 
understand that, with a desire on the part 
of the Americans to establish friendly 
relations, no unworthy restrictio- s or 
exactions would be submitted to ; that 
they came among them not to beg, but to 
dispense favors ; that, conscious of the 
power of their government, they were, 



PERRY'S NAVAL EXPEDITION TO JAPAN — 1S52. 



^65 



nevertheless, desirous of meeting them on 
equal and honorable terms, and upon no 
other conditions whatever fould they con- 
sent to hold amicable intercourse with 
them. The favorable effect of this course 
was verj' apparent; they were glad to be 
admitted on board the ships, and the com- 
missioners offered no objections to the 
officers strolling about the country in the 
neighborhood of the anchorage. 

Whilst the negotiations were pending, 
the commodore gave an entertainment to 
the commissioners, on board the flag-ship. 
They also visited other vessels of the squad- 
ron. The engines of the steamers were 
put in motion, that their operation might 
be witnessed. The ships' companies were 
drilled at general quarters, and attention 
was called to the caliber of the heavy 
guns in use among western nations. 
Their usual stoicism and self-possession 
were not proof against such novelties, 
and they v/ere unable to withhold their 
admiration and surprise. During the 
entertainment, toasts to the emperor and 
the president were drank with all the 
honors, the guests did ample justice 
to the sumptuous dinner, and the com- 
pany did not disperse until a very late 
hour. 

At length, after uiueh di[)lomacy on the 
part of the Japanese, — the Americans 
strenuously refusing to accept any propo- 
sition to go to Nagasaki, — a treaty of 
amity, peace, and commerce, was agreed 
to and ratified, three copies in Japanese 
being delivered to Commodore Perry, and 
three copies in English, signed by himself, 
with Dutch and Chinese translations, be- 
ing delivered to the imperial commission- 
ers. Article first of the treaty established 
peace and amity between the United 
States and Japan ; article second assigned 
the ports of Simoda, in the principality of 
Idzu, and of Hakodadi, in the principality 
of Matsmai, for the reception of American 
ships, and where thej' might obtain wood, 
water, provisions, and coal, payment to be 
made in gold and silver ; articles third, 
fourth, fifth, and sixth, provide for good 
treatment, security to jjroperty, etc., in the 



case of American vessels and crews ship- 
wrecked on the coast ; article seventh pro- 
vided that ships of the United States 
resorting to the ports opened to them, 
should be jaermitted to exchange gold and 
silver coin, and articles of goods, for other 
articles of goods, under such regulations as 
the Japanese government might tempora- 
rily establish for that purpose, it being 
also stipulated that the ships of the United 
States should be permitted to carry away 
whatever articles they received in ex- 
change. These articles were the most 
important embraced in the treaty, which 
was signed March 31, 185-1. The treaty 
privileges thus obtained by Commodore 
Perry for the United States, were the 
most liberal and advantageous of any 
which, up to that time, had been accorded 
by Japan to a foreign people ; but the 
same or equal privileges were afterwards 
permitted to other nations, and, subse- 
quently, new treaties were made with the 
United States, greatly enlarging the lib- 
erty of trade. 

As already stated above, one of the arti- 
cles of the treaty gave to citizens of the 
United States the right of free access to 
the two Japanese ports of Simoda and 
Hakodadi, and, with this, unrestricted 
liberty in the surrounding country em- 
braced by a radius of about sixteen English 
miles. These, with some other stipula- 
tions of a certain character, it was thought 
desirable to make a practical te.st of , before 
the departure of the squadron from the 
waters of Japan. 

Accordingly, a few days after the con- 
clusion of the treaty, which were occupied 
in completing the surveys on hand of por- 
tions of Yeddo Bay, the ships sailed for 
Simoda, it being a short distance to the 
south and westward, — a capital harbor, 
and surrounded by a charming and highly 
cultivated country. Accustomed to a sys- 
tem of unrelenting espionage, it required 
much patience and address to bring the 
inhabitants to a proper appreciation of the 
new condition of things ; but in a short 
time, however, the movements of the 
officers and men about the city and coun- 



266 



FROM fuLuXY TO WOKLL TOWEi:. 



try became as unhampered and safe as in 
anv part of the United States. 

After making an accurate survey of tlie 
harbor and its approaches, the sqiuidron 
sailed for Ilakodadi ; and, although six 
weeks had elapsed since the signing of the 
treaty, the authorities protested that they 
had heard nothing of it, and consequently 
nothing of the intended visit of the squad- 
ron, and gave as an evidence that the 
women and ch'Mren had all fled to the 
interior, frightened at the apiJroach of the 
ships off the harbor. On delivering a 
letter from the commissioners, however, 
and showing them the treaty, their anxi- 
ety was at once allayed, an.l all were very 
kindly received. The deputies di.spatched 
from Yeddo, by the commissioners, to 
meet the commodore at Hokodadi, did not 
arrive till he was on the eve of sailing, 
and stated that they had been upwards of 
fifty days on the road, although the dis- 
tance by the air line was less than four 
hundred miles. Still, the intercourse with 
the authorities and inhabitants had been 
very satisfactory, and the parting was one 
of sincere mutual regret. 

The subsequent treaty, made by INIr. 
Townsend Harris, United States consul- 
general at Japan, secured several addi- 
tional ports to American commerce. Mr. 
Harris was in direct contact with the 
emperor, at Yeddo, during a portion of the 
time employed in negotiating this treaty, 
— a contact as interesting as it was unirpie. 
Mr. Harris states that after passing 
through the various fortified gatevva^-s, up 
to the gate of the palace itself, he was 
received at the entrance by two chamber- 
lains, who conducted him to an apartment 
where a chair had been jilaced for his use. 
Tea, bon-bons, and other refre.shments, 
were offered, and a large number of princes 
came to be presented to him. Passing 
through a large hall, in which some three 
or four hundred nobles of the empire, all 
dressed in their court costume, were kneel- 
ing, all silent and motionless as statues, 
Mr. Harris entered the supreme audience 



chamber. At this moment, a chamberlain 
called out, ' Merrican Embassador,' and 
then the prince of Sinano threw himself 
down and crawled along, as the consul 
walked in. Advancing up the room, and 
making three bows as he proceeded, Mr. 
Harris halted at the head of two lines of 
men, who were prostrate on their faces ; 
those on the right were members of the 
council of state, with the prince of Bittsu 
at their head, and those on the left were 
brothers of the emperor. 

His majest}' was seated on a chair 
placed on a dais, elevated some three feet 
above the floor of the chamber. He was 
dressed in yellow silk, and wore a black 
lacquered cap of indescribable peculiaritj'. 
After a short pause, the consul made an 
address to the emperor ; and, after a simi- 
lar pause, his majesty replied in a clear 
and pleasant voice. At the close of the 
emperor's speech, the consul's secretary 
passed the president's letter intended for 
the emjjeror to Mr. Harris ; the latter 
removed the silk ewer — striped, red and 
white, — ojsened the box, and displayed the 
writing to the prince of Bittsu, who now 
stood up, and then, closing the box, Mr. 
Harris handed it to the prince, who i)laced 
it on a lacquered stand, prepared for the 
jnirpose. The prince again became pros- 
trate, and then the emperor bowed to the 
consul, smiling pleasantly as he did so. 
This ended the audience, and Mr. Harris re- 
tired from the room, still facing the empe- 
ror, and making the customary three bows. 

From the audience chamber, the consul 
was taken to another room, where the 
gi-eat councilors of state congratulated 
him on the interview just held, and ex- 
pressed much wonder and astonishment at 
what they called his 'greatness of heart.' 
On asking their meaning, they told the 
consul that they were filled with admira- 
tion to see him stand erect, look the awful 
'tycoon' in the face, speak j)lain]y to him, 
hear his reply — and all this without any 
trepidation, or any ' (juiveriug of the mus- 
cles of the side ! ' 



XXVIIl. 

TERRIBLE CRISIS IN THE BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL 

WORLD.— 1857. 



Known as " the Great Panic." — A Suililen, Universal Crash in the Heiglit of Prosperity. — Caused by 
Wild Speculations and Enormous Debt. — Suspension of Banks all Over the Country — Failure of the 
Oldest and Wealthiest Houses — Fortunes Swept Away in a Day. — Prostration of Every Branch of 
Industry. — Prolonged Embarrassment, Distrust, and Suffering — The Panic of 1837 a Comparison — 
Extravagance and High Prices. — Chimerical Railroad Schemes. — Mania for Land Investments — 
Reckless Stock Gambling. — Western Paper Cities — Fabulous Prices for " Lots." — Money Absorbed 
in this Way. — Bursting of the Bubble, — The First Great Blow. — A Bomb in Money Circles — Wide- 
spread Shock and Terror. — Fierce Crowds at the Banks. — A Run Upon Them for Specie. — They 
" Goto the Wall." — Savings Bank E.xcitement — Rare Doings at the Counters. — Wit, Mirth, Despair, 
and Ruin. — Forty Thousand Persons in Wall Street. — Factories, Foundries, etc.. Stopped. — Business 
Credit Destroyed. — Root of the Whole Difficulty. 



" The moBt extraordinary, violent, and deetructive panic ever experienced in thia country."— Gibbon's Histoky of Banes and 
Banki.mi. 




AJSTY persons will recall, even at this 
remote lapse of time, the terrible com- 

KUX ox A BANK. ■ , II,- 1 • 1 ■ 1 

mercial and business revulsion which 
preceded, by just a score of years, that more general and calamitous one of 1857, — the 
latter being universally known to this day as " the Great Panic." During the first- 
named, every bank in the Union failed and suspended specie payment, with a compar- 
atively few exceptions. Extravagance pervaded all classes of society, and so general 
and feverish was the excitement in western hinds' speculation, that men grasped at 
' lots " in that boundless and then almost untracked region, as if the supply was about 
to be exhausted. Indeed, the picture is but slightly if at all overdrawn, which repre- 
sents the land mania of that period as swallowing up, in its mad whirl, all classes. 
The "man of one idea" was visible everywhere; no man had two. He who had no 
money begged, borrowed, or stole it ; he who had, thought he made a generous sacri- 
fice, if he lent it cent per cent. The tradesman forsook his shop ; the farmer his 



268 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



plougli ; the merchant his counter ; the 
Lawyer his office ; the clergyman his study 
— to join tlie general chase. The man 
with one leg, or he that had none, could 
at least get on board a steamer, and make 
for Chicago or Milwaukee ; the strong, tlie 
able, but above all, the " enterprising," 
set out with his pocket map and his pocket 
compass, to thread the dim woods, and see 
■with his own eyes, — for who could be so 
demented as to waste time in planting, in 
building, in hammering iron, in making 
shoes, when the path of wealth laj' wide 
and flowery before him ! A ditcher, hired 
by the job to do a certain piece of work in 
liis line, was asked — 

" Well, John, did j'ou make anything ? " 

"Pretty well; I cleared about ten dol- 
lars a day, but I could have made more by 
standin' round" — that is, watching the 
land market, for bargains. 

The host of travelers on their western 
speculating tours met with many difficul- 
ties, as might be supposed. Such search- 
ing among trees for town lines ! — such 
ransacking of the woods for section cor- 
ners, ranges, and base lines! — such anxious 
care in identifying spots possessing " par- 
ticular advantages!" And then, alas! 
after all, such precious blunders, — blun- 
ders which called into action another class 
of operators, who became popularly known 
as " land lookers." These were plentiful 
at every turn, ready to furnish "water- 
power," "pine lots," or anything else, at 
a moment's notice. It was impossible to 
mention any part of the country which 
they had not "personally surveyed." 
They would state, with the gravity of 
astrologers, what sort of timber predomi- 
nated on any given tract, drawing sage 
deductions as to the capabilities of the 
soil ! Did the purchaser incline to city 
property ? Lo ! a splendid chart, setting 
forth the advantages of some unequaled 
site. 

But at last this bubble burst — thousands 
(if fortunes vanished into thin air — the 
crisis and the panic came like a whirl- 
wind. 

Similar was the state of things preced- 



ing the awful crash in 1857. The times 
were characterized by excessive debts and 
almost incredible extravagance and specu- 
lations. The cities, and many parts of the 
countrj', were drained of means for legiti- 
mate purposes, being devoted, instead, to 
the construction of unproductive railroads, 
or absorbed in western land speculations. 
The new territories, and some parts of the 
western states, were almost covered with 
paper cities, selling to the credulous at 
almost fabulous prices. In Kansas alone, 
where scarcely one legal title had as j'et 
been granted, there were more acres laid 
out for cities, than were covered by all the 
cities in the northern and middle states. 
Nearly the whole west swarmed with spec- 
ulators, who neither intended to cultivate 
the soil nor settle there, but who expected 
to realize fortunes, without labor, out of 
the bona fide settler. Lots in "cities," 
where was scarcely a house, were sold to 
the inexperienced and the unwary, at 
prices equaling those in the large cities. 
These operations, with others of a similarly 
chimerical character, made money scarce 
everywhere, and diverted thousands of 
men, and much of the capital of the coun- 
try, from the liusiness of producing, — 
tending, of course, to extravagant prices 
of food. 

But the omens of disaster began to cast 
their spectral shadows athwart the finan- 
cial sky, the first manifestation being a 
regular decline in the value of leading 
railroad stocks, especially the western 
roads. But the first great blow to public 
confidence was given by the unexpected 
failure, in August, of the Ohio Life Insur- 
ance and Trust Compan^y. The magni- 
tude and importance of the operations of 
this institution tliroughout the country, 
amounting to millions of dollars, and in- 
volving so many individuals and corpora- 
tions, rendered its suspension a fearfid 
disaster. The announcement fell like a 
bomb in the money circles, and, bj'' the 
first or second week of September, banks 
and business honses began to stop pay- 
ment, and a panic ensued, which became 
almost universal during the month. The 



TEERIBLE CRISIS IX FINANCIAL WORLD — 1S57. 



269 



best mercantile paper was at a discount of 
from tliree to five per cent, a month. 
Toward the close of the month tl.ree of 
the leading banks of Philadelphia failed, 
and the remainder resolved upon a tempo- 
rary suspension of specie payments. This 
was followed by a similar step on tlie part 
of most of the banks of Pennsylvania, 
Maryland, the District of Columbia, and 
New Jersey. 

No such intense excitement had ever 
before prevailed in Philadelphia, as that 
which reigned when the bank of Pennsyl- 



being nearly two million dollars. Very 
early on the same day, the Girard and 
Commercial banks ceased paying their de- 
jjosits, but continued to pay their bills. 
Checks were marked good and returned to 
the holders. After three o'clock, the city 
was full of all sorts of rumors, and, at a 
meeting of the bank jiresidents, a universal 
suspension was agreed upon. These tid- 
ings became rapidly known throughout the 
towns and villages of the state, and the 
next morning a vast number of anxious 
people flocked into the city by steam-boat 




E.NCITKMKST IN BUSINESS CIECLBS DURING THE GKEAT PANIC. 



vania closed its doors. Crowds of people 
poured into Third street from the distant 
extremities of the city, and the street 
became a perfect jam, everybody wlio had 
any money in those banks which had not 
yet stopped specie payment, being in haste 
to obtain their dues. Prom this vast mass 
of people there radiated lines reaching to 
the counters of all the banks, demanding 
coin for bills and deposits ; and all the 
various applicants, as the}' presented them- 
selves, received their money, and retired 
in good order. This scene continued until 
the hour of closing, the amount of coin 
thus paid out, from eleven to three o'clock, 



and railroad. As if unwilling to believe 
the unwelcome news, they gathered in 
crowds opposite the various banks, pa- 
tiently awaiting the hour for opening. 
All appeared bent on getting coin for their 
checks and bills. At ten o'clock the doors 
opened, police officers being everywhere 
about, to preserve order. Each customer 
went up in turn, presented his check, and 
luid it marked good ; while such as held 
bills were told that the redemption of them 
in sj^ecie was temporarily suspended. 

And now, all over the land, east, west, 
north, and south, the dark days of fear, 
alarm, and ruin, settled down upon the 



270 



FKOM COLOXY TO WOKLD TOWER. 



people, and panic raged like a pestilence. 
Indeed, the extent of the crash far ex- 
ceeded what it would have been, but for 
the shock and terror which so needlessly 
possessed men's minds at the instant, and 
unbalanced their judgment. Universal 
distrust prevailed — a loss of that mutual 
confidence between man and man, without 
which, the foundations of mercantile credit 
are washed away as so much sand, but 
with which, temporary difficulties, even 
though stringent, maybe surmounted, and 
total ruin to individuals and the public 
prevented. No more fitting illustration of 
the working of this principle of confidence 
could be cited, in sustaining or overturn- 
ing the steadiness of business affairs, than 
the anecdote of the little Frenchman who 
loaned a merchant five thousand dollars, 
when times were good, but who called at 
the counting-house on the times becoming 
" hard," in a state of agitation only faintl\' 
portrayed in the following hasty colloquy 
which ensued : 

•' How do you do ? " inquired the mer- 
chant, as the French creditor presented 
himself at the counter. 

" Sick — ver sick,'' — rrqilied monsieur. 

"What is the matter?" 

" De times is de matter." 

" Ih times ? — what disease is that ? " 

" De malaide vat break all de marchants, 
ver much." 

" Ah — the times, eh ? Well, they are 
bad, very bad, sure enough ; but how do 
they affect you ? " 

"Vy, monsieur, I lose de confidence." 

" In whom ? " 

"In everybody." 

"^ot in me, I hope?" 

" Pardonnez moi, monsieur ; but I do 
not know who to trust a present, when all 
de marchants break several times, all to 
pieces." 

" Then I presume you want your 
money." 

"Oui, monsieur, I starve for want of 
c'argeiit. " (the silver). 

" Can't you do without it ? " 

-'No, monsieur, I must have him." 

■' You must ? " 



" Oui, monsieur," said little dimity 
breeches, turning pale with apprehension 
for the safety of his monej'. 

" And you can't do without it ? '' 

" No, monsieur, not von other leetle 
moment longare." 

The merchant reached his bank book, 
drew a check on the good old ' Continen- 
tal ' for the amount, and handed it to his 
visitor. 

"Vat is dis, monsieur? " 

" A check for five thousand dollars, with 
the interest." 

"l&\thon?" (good,) said the French- 
man, with amazement. 

" Certainly." 

" Have you I' argent in de bank ? '' 

" Yes." 

" And is it parfaitement convenient to 
pay de same ? " 

" Undoubtedly ! What astonishes you ?' 

"■ Vy, dat you have got him in deet; 
times." 

" Oh, yes, and I have plenty more. I 
owe nothing that I cannot pay at a mo- 
ment's notice." 

The Frenchman was perplexed. 

" i\Ionsieur, you shall do me von leetle 
favor, eh?" 

" AVith all my heart." 

"AVell, monsieur, you shall keep I'ar- 
gent for me some leetle year longare." 

" Why, I thought you wanted it ! " 

" Tout au contraive. I no vant de 
ar</eiit. I vant de grand confidence. 
Suppose you no got de money, den I vant 
him ver much — suppose you got him, den 
I no vant him at all. Vous conqn-enez, 
eh ? " 

After some further conference, the little 
chatterer prevailed upon the merchant to 
retain the money, and left the counting- 
house with a light heart, and a counte- 
nance very different from the one he wore 
when he entered. His confidence was 
restored — he did not stand in need of the 
vionci/. 

The banks of New Y^ork and New 
England remained firm, far into the month 
of October, but so rapid and numberless 
were the failures, each succeeding day, of 



TEERIBIE CRISIS IX FINANCIAL AVORLD — 1857. 



271 



railroad and other forporations, and busi- 
ness houses which liad — some of tliem — 
breasted all the financial storms of the last 
half centurjf, that these were finally obliged 
to succumb to the avalanche of pressure, 
and fell into the vortex of universal sus- 
pension. Tuesday', the thirteenth of Octo- 
ber, the day preceding the suspension, was 
the climax of the struggle, and Wall 
street, 'New York, as the great center of 
money operations in the United States, 
presented a scene of wild excitement never 
before witnessed. 

The account of that scene, as given by 
the reporter for the Tribune, is here in 
part reproduced. At ten o'clock in the 



was hurriedly dashed off at its foot, and in 
another moment it was on its way to the 
bank. 

The crowd increased in numbers. Each, 
person took his place in the line and 
aivaited his turn, wliile policemen kept 
those out who were present only from 
motives of curiosity. One after another 
was paid, and with the shining treasure 
departed. Scores of hands, skilled by long 
experience in counting coin, were taxed to 
their utmost in their efforts to keep pace 
with the demand for gold. AJtogether, 
the scene presented was one of the wildest 
excitement. Tliirtij to forty thousand 
persons were at the same moment in the 




EFFECTS OP THE HARD TIMES. 

morning, says that journal, the fronts of 
the different institutions indicated, by the 
crowds gathered around them, that the 
ability of the vaults to yield up their treas- 
ure at the call of depositors and bill-hold- 
ers was to undergo no ordinary test. 
Check after check was presented and paid, 
and still they came. Word soon went 
forth that a run had commenced on the 
banks, and it passed from one house to 
another until the whole lower part of tlie 
city was alive with excitement. Bank 
books were examined ; but a moment was 
required to prepare a check — a signature 



sfrref — some rushing onward in the hope 
to secure their deposits before the hour of 
closing should arrive, and others clustered 
together, discussing the condition of af- 
fairs. One after another of the announce- 
ments made, of banks failing under the 
continued drain upon them, fell with dis- 
may among the crowd, and confident pre- 
dictions were uttered that ten o'clock of 
Wednesday would tell the storjf of the 
suspension of all. But not a few there 
were, whose belief in the ability of the 
moneyed institutions was still unshaken, 
and they asserted, with earnestness, tnat 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEK. 



every demand in checks and bills would 
be met to the last, and Panic be laughed 
to scorn. 

But, with all the anxiety and resolute- 
ness depicted upon so nian^- countenances, 
there were those who laughed and cracked 
jokes about their deposits in banks which 
had suspended, and about their stock in 
smashed-up railroads, as though the whole 
thing were a huge joke. From the top of 
Wall street to the bottom — from Broad- 
way to Water street — the sidewalks were 
crowded with people, desirous to know the 
truth of the rumors which lilled the air. 

In other parts of the city, stirring 
scenes were transpiring, and not a iew 
that were quite illustrative of human 
nature in its different veins. During the 
run upon the Bowery Savings Bank, an 
old Irishwoman, short, thick, resolute, and 
' a little in for it,' made herself conspicu- 
ous by elbowing her way through the dis- 
trustful depositors, very unceremoniously, 
and denouncing, in no measured terms, 
"the big blackguards that would be afther 
chafing a poor body out iv her hard earned 
wagis." Some order of precedence is cus- 
tomary at such times, Ijut the heavy shoes 
of the Irishwoman did such execution 
upon the corns of all who stood in her wav, 
that she soon obtained a good place near 
the door, in spite of the remonstrances of 
a dozen or two of younger Biddys, Mag- 
gies, Marys, and Kathleens, who had been 
waiting an liour or two. At the door, she 
had a wordy quarrel with a broad-should- 
ered black man in advance of her, calling 
him a "runaway nagur ; " and anon she 
varied her performances by shaking her 
fist in the face of a policeman — who, as an 
official conservator of the peace, had under- 
taken to check her, — and, at length, very 
red and sweaty, she stood before the pay- 
ing teller and presented her book, with a 
vocal invocation to him to do the clean 
thing. " What's this mean ? " .said he, look- 
ing at her somewhat impatiently. " What's 
your name?" "Can't yoos rade writin' 
hand?" she rejoined sharply; " shure, 
me nam's on the book ! " " But this," said 
he, " is only a grocer's old pass book ! 



What's your name, I say ? " " Mary 
McEagan I was christened, but I married 
Pat Millikens." The teller turned rapidly 
to his index of depositors. " You have 
got no money in this bank ! " said he, when 
he had ascertained the fact. She left the 
premises in company with an officer, to 
whom she confessed that she iiad found 
the pass book near the crowd, and think- 
ing it had been dropped accidentally by a 
depositor, she had thought to obtain the 
money before the depositor applied for it. 
At the same bank, one man who drew out 
his deposits was so intoxicated that he 
could hardly stand ; quite likely, he lost 
the savings of years before the night was 
over. At another savings bank, one poor 
girl had her pocket picked of her little all 
— about seventy-seven dollars, before she 
had got out of the crowd. A vast deal 
of chafifing occurred among those who 
thronged the doorways of the banks. " I 
don't know," said one to a bystander, 
" where to put my money when I get it ! " 
" Give it to me," rejoined the other. 
" Sew it up in your shirt," said another ; 
and several other methods were promptly 
and merrily suggested by the sympathiz- 
ing spectators, such as " Stick it in your 
wig" — "Let the old woman have it" — 
" Put it in your boots, and let me wear 
them ; " etc. 

At the Sixpenny Savings Bank, a little 
newsboy, without a jacket, and only one 
susjjender (and that a string), confronted 
the teller on Mondaj', and demanded to 
know whether " She was all right " — 
meaning the Institution — because if she 
was, he didn't mean to be scared, if every- 
body else was. He'd got forty-two cents 
salted down there, and all he wanted was 
his (the teller's) word of honor that it 
wouldn't si)ile. The teller assured him 
that his money was ready for him at any 
moment. " 'Nuff said, 'tween gen'l'men, 
but I don't want it," rejoined the youth, 
and with a self-complacent, well-satisfied 
air, walked out of the bank. "Is she 
good ? ' cried two or three other news- 
boys who were awaiting the result, at the 
doorsteps. " Yes, s-i-r-r-e-e ! " he replied. 



TEERIBLE CEISIS IX FI^'AXCIAL WORLD — 1.S5 



■'as good as wlieat. Ketch our bank to 
stop ! Yoos ought to seeil the gold I seed 
ill der safe ! " " How much was they ? " 
inquired a companion. '' More'n a house- 
full ! " was the prompt response, '• an' yoos 
don't ketch dis "ere chile a-makin' an oold 
woman of his-self, an' drawin' out his 
money ; I ain't so green — I ain't ! " 

It will require but little strain of the 
imagination to realize, to one's mind, the 
case of Mrs. Jones, who, on receipt of the 
news of the banks suspending specie pay- 
ments, hastened to her savings bank, 
elbowed her way smartly to the desk, pre- 
sented her hook, and demanded her money. 

" Madam," said the clerk, persuasively, 
" are you sure you want to draw this 
monej' out in specie '? " 

" Mrs. Jones," said a director, with an 
oracular frown, "do you know that you 
are injuring your fellow depositors ? " 

" And setting an example of great folly 
to less educated persons in this commu- 
nity ? " struck in another director. 

" Let us advise you simply to reflect," 
interposed the clerk, blandly. 

'■To wait for a day, at least," said the 
director. 

At last there was a pause. 

Mrs. Jones had been collecting herself. 
She burst now. In a tone which was 
heard throughout the building, and above 
all the din of ordinarj' business, and at 
which her questioners turned ashy pale, 
she said : 

" Will you pay me my money? — yes or 
no!" 

They paid her instantly. 

Not only in the great centers of business 
and finance, like New York, Philadelphia, 
Boston, Baltimore, Cincinnati, St. Louis, 
and New Orleans, but in every town and 
village, the scarcity of money and the 
failure of banks and commercial houses, 
operated to paralyze industry and bring 
want to thousands of families. In conse- 
quence of the universal stoppage of facto- 
ries, the poorer classes in some of the man- 
ufacturing communities saw winter ap- 
proaching, with no prospect of earning a 
livelihood. Wliole families began to suffer 
IS 



for bread — the fathers willing and eager to 
work, but absolutely nothing to do. Tales 
of distress were to be heard at almost 
every step, for the factories, forges, and 
foundries, had all ceased their cheerful 
hum of activity, and every day's intelli- 
gence from different parts of the land was 
that of fresh accumulations of disaster, 
increasing the severity of the situation, 
and adding to the general gloom. The 
oldest, heaviest, richest, and firmest mon- 
eyed institutions, corporations, companies 
and firms, which were considered equal to 
any pressure that might be brought to 
bear against them, were daily chronicled 
as having " gone to the wall." Fortunes 
were swept away, like ashes in a whirl- 
wind. Not even in 1837, when the bank- 
ing system of the country was in so preca- 
rious a condition, was there such a terrible 
downfall of old and wealthy houses. At 
the west, there was one short, tremendous 
collapse, that seemed to bring ruin, at one 
quick blow, upon everything and every- 
body ; and at the south, the devastation 
was no less wide-spread and fatal. 

Various means were resorted to, to real- 
ize cash for stocks of goods on hand, even 
at a ruinous discount. At numberless shop 
windows were to be seen in staring letters, 
such announcements as : ' These goods 
sold at wholesale prices.' 'Selling off at 
half cost.' 'Bargains to be had for two 
days — now or never!' ' We must realize 
ten thousand dollars to-daj', at any sacri- 
fice ; ' etc. Indeed, in all the large cities, 
the dry goods dealers, being severely 
jjressed for monej', offered their goods in 
this way, and effected large sales. A large 
number of the most prominent wholesale 
dealers threw open their vast warehouses 
to retail customers, and by this means, 
probably, not a few houses, of that class, 
managed to escape the hard fate that befell 
others. 

Thus, in a word, there was exhibited 
the melancholy spectacle of a great nation's 
commercial, financial, manufacturing, and 
industrial interests in utter ruin, from one 
end of the broad land to the other ; pros- 
perity succeeded by abject adversity ; con- 



!74 



iKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



lidence supplanteil by total distrust; a 
paralysis of all trade ; the stoppage of 
almost every bank in every part of the 
United States, the cessation of factories, 
the discharge of thousands of laborers, the 
inability to bring our large crops of prod- 
uce to market, the ruinous rate of two or 
three per cent, a month on the strongest 
paper, and a ruinous depreciation in the 
price of all stocks. The steamers on the 
great rivers and lakes stood still ; the 
canal boats ceased to ply ; the railroad 
trains conveyed less than half the usual 
amount of travelers and mei'chandise ; the 
navigating interest shared the common 
distress, so that the cargoes, brought from 
abroad, either passed into the public stores, 
or were re-exported at great loss ; the 
freighting business was nearly annihilated. 
Alarmed, too, at the prospect before them, 
ship-loads of emigrants were taken home 
to their native land, in the packets run- 
ning from Boston and New York to Eu- 
rope. Nor did the fortune-tellers fail to 
drive a brisk liusiness in informing igno- 
rant and credulous inquirers what was to 
"turn up." 

Tluit this great national calamity had 
its root in the fever for land and railroad 
siieculation, involving enormous debt, with 
no corresponding sound basis or adequate 
means, cannot be doubted. Mr. Gibbons, 
one of the very ablest of American finan- 
cial writers, argues, in respect to this 
point, that, notwithstanding the appear- 
ances of prosperity previous to the panic, 
there existed all the conditions of extraor- 
dinary financial disturbance. A prodig- 
ious weight of insolvency had been carried 
along for years in the volume of trade. 
Extravagance of living had already sapped 
the foundations of commercial success, in 
hundreds of instances where credit sup- 
plied the place of lost capital. Misman- 
agement and fraud had gained footing in 
public companies to an incredible degree ; 
hundreds of millions of bonds were issued 
with little regard to the validity of their 
basis, and pressed upon the market by dis- 
honest agents, at any price, from sixty 
down to thirty cents on the dollar. False 



quotations were obtained by sham auction 
sales. The newsjiaper press, :n 2Jarticular 
instances, was bribed into silence, or 
became a partner in the profits to be 
derived from the various schemes which it 
commended to' general confidence. The 
land grants by congress to railway compa- 
nies gave added impetus to speculation, 
and state legislatures were bribed to locate 
roads to serve individual interests. Public, 
as well as jirivate credit, was compromised. 
It could not be otherwise than that 
bankruptcy and an overwhelming crash 
should succeed such an inflated and preca- 
rious state of things. Even when trade 
and business are conducted in accordance 
with fair and legitimate rules, the records 
of insolveu'-y among American merchants 
tell a wofid tale. Thus, General Dearborn, 
who for twenty years was collector of the 
port of Boston, and who had ample opjjor- 
tiinities for observing the vicissitudes of 
trade, ascertained, on investigation, that 
among every hundred of the merchants 
and traders of that city — whuse character 
for carefulness and stabilitj' will compare 
favorably with that of merchants in any 
other portion of the land — not more than 
three ever acquired an independence. 
This conclusion was not arrived at without 
great distrust ; but an experienced mer- 
chant, who was consulted, fullj' confirmed 
its truth. A Boston antiquarian in the 
year 1800 took a memorandum of every 
person doing business on Long Wharf, 
and in 1840 only Ave in one hundred 
remained ; all but these had either failed 
or died insolvent. The L^nion Bank com- 
menced business in 1798, there being then 
only one other bank. The L^nion was 
overrun with business, the clerks being 
obliged to work till midnight, and even on 
Sundays. An examination, some fifty or 
sixty years from the starting of the bank, 
showed that of one thousand accounts 
opened at the commencement, only six 
remained ; all the others had either failed, 
or died insolvent, — houses wljose paper 
had passed without question, the very par- 
ties who had constituted the solid men of 
the city, all had gone down in that period. 



TP:K1UBLE crisis in financial WOKLD — l,s57. 



:io 



Of the direful havoc, therefore, created by 
a sudden and violent panic, sweeping over 
the whole country like a hurricane, some 
idea may be formed from the statistics 
here given. 

Notwithstanding the resumption of 
business on a specie basis, in about two 
months from the time of their suspension, 



by most of those banks which were in a 
solvent condition, it was a long while 
before trade and industry recovered from 
their crippled state ; and the embarrass- 
ment and suffering which consequently 
weighed, during so protracted a period, 
upon all classes of the community, were 
painful to the last degree. 



XXIX. 

THE " GREAT AWAKENING " IN THE RELIGIOUS WORLD ; 

AND THE POPULAR REA^IVAL MOVEMENT (IN 1875-0) 

UNDER MESSRS. MOODY AND SANKEY.— 1857. 



Like a Mighty Rushing Wind, it Sweeps from tlie Atlantic to tlie Pacific. — Crowded Prayer-Meetings 
Held Daily in Every City and Town, from the Granite Hills of the North to the Rolling Prairies of 
the West and the Golden Slopes of Calilornia. — Large Accessions, from all Classes, to the Ci.urches 
of Every Name and Denomination. — The "American Pentecost." — Early American Revivals — Dr. 
Franklin and Mr. WhiteHeld. — The Revival of 1857 Spontaneous. — No Leaders or Organizers. — Its 
Immediate Cause. — Universal Ruin of Commerce. — An.xiety for Higher Interests. — All Days of the 
Week Alike. — Business Men in the Work. — Telegraphing Religious Tidings. — New York a Center 
of Influence — Fulton Street Prayer-Meeting. — Scenes in Burton's Theater. — New Themes and Actors. 
— Countless Requests for Prayers. — A Wonderlul Book. — Striking Moral Results. — Men of Violence 
Reformed. — Crime and Suicide Prevented. — Infidels, Gamblers, Pugilists. — Jessie Fremont's Gold 
King. — " Awful " Gardner's Case. 



" What nothing earthly yivfs, or can destroy. 
The suul's calm eunshme and the heartfelt joy." 




^^^ EVIVALS of religious feeling 
J^\ and interest, attended with 
^* great numerical accessions to 
the church, have been not 
unfreqiient among the various 
denominations of Christians in Amer- 
ica, from the very earliest period of tlie 
country's settlement; and, during the 
eighteenth century, under the labors of 
such men as A^']litefiekl, Edwards, the 
Tennents. and others, such results fol- 
lowed as had never before characterized 
any age or jieople. The labors of 
Whitefield, in especial, stirred the public mind to its depths, and reached all hearts. 
Even Dr. Franklin, rationalist though he was, was won upon, head, heart, and pocket, 
by the power of this mightiest of pulpit orators. Happening to attend one of his meet- 
ings in Philadelphia, and perceiving, in the course of the sermon, that "Whitcticld 
intended to finish with a collection. Eranklin silently resolved that the preacher should 
get nothing from him, though he had in his pocket a handful of copper money, three or 
four silver dollars, and five pistoles in gold. As Whitefield proceeded, Franklin began 
to soften, and determined to give the copper. Another stroke of the preacher's oratory, 
made Franklin ashamed of that, and determined him to give the silver instead ; but 



K OK REQUESTS FOR rU.WKns. 



GREAT AWAKKXIXG IN THE EELIGIOL'S WORLD — 185 



tlip preacher finished so admirably, that 

the pliilosopner emptied his pocket wholly 
into the collector's dish, gold and all. On 
the same occasion, another gentleman, sus- 
pecting a collection might be intended, 
had, by precaution, emptied his pockets 
before leaving home. Towards the conclu- 
sion of the discourse, however, he felt a 
strong inclination to give, and applied to 
a neighbor, who stood near him, to lend 
him some money for the pur[Kise. The 
request was made to, perhaps, the only 
man in the assembly who had the firmness 
not to be affected by the preacher. His 
answer was, " At any other time, friend 
Hodgkinson, I would lend to thee freely; 
but not now, for thee seems to be out of 
thy right senses." The multitudes, of all 
denominations, that went to hear this won- 
derful man, were enormous — indeed, one 
great secret of his success was, his freedom 
from sectarian prejudice and animosity. 
As an illustration of this quality, it is 
related that in the midst of one of his 
most overjiowering discourses, he stopped 
short for an instant, and then uttered the 
following impressive apostrophe : " Father 
Abraham, who have _you in heaven ? any 
Episcopalians ? " " No." " Anj^ Pre.sbj'- 
terians?" "No." "Any Baptists?" 
" No." "Have you any Methodists, Sece- 
ders, or Independents there?" "No, 
no I " " Why who have j'ou there ? " 
" We don't know those names here. All 
who are here are Christians, believers in 
Christ — men who have overcome by the 
blood of the Lamb, and the word of his 
testimony." "Oh, is that the case? then 
God help me, God help us all, to forget 
party names, and to become Christians, in 
deed and in truth." The labors of such a 
champion could not be otherwise than 
fruitful of good. 

Without dwelling upon the scenes and 
results relating to the early religious 
efforts alluded to above, it may be said of 
the revival in 1857-8 — known as "the 
Great Awakeninfi" and which is the 
subject of this chapter, — that it depended 
not upon any leader or preacher, however 
eloquent, but was the spontaneous out- 



growth of the heart's necessities, felt in 
common by the great mass of the j^ublic, 
in view of the financial tornado which, 
sweeping with such universal destructive- 
ness over the land, had given impressive 
weight to the truth, that " the things 
which are seen are temporal, but the 
things which are not seen are eternal." 
No words could convey a better idea of the 
general feeling whicli thus possessed men's 
minds at this period of mercantile ruin on 
the one hand, and of religious anxiety on 
the other, than those uttered by a promi- 
nent merchant of New York, at one of the 
business men's daily prayer-meetings in 
that city. "Prayer," said he, "was never 
so great a blessing to me as it is now. I 
should certainly either break down or turn 
rascal, except for it ! When one sees his 
property taken from him every day, by 
those who might i)ay him if they were 
willing to make sacrifices in order to do it, 
but who will not make the least effort even 
for this end, and by some who seem de- 
signedly to take advantage of the times, in 
order to defraud him — and when he him- 
self is liable to the keenest reproaches from 
others if he does not pay money, which he 
cannot collect and cannot create — the 
temptation is tremendous to forget Chris- 
tian charity, and be as hard and unmerci- 
ful as anybody. If I could not get some 
half hours every day to jtray myself into a 
right state of mind, I .should either be 
overburdened and disheartened, or do such 
things as no Christian man ought." Tes- 
timonies like this were innumerable from 
business men, — they, as well as the laity 
in general, being most prominent in carry- 
ing on the work. 

But, though this movement was, in a 
very great degree, spontaneous, it was 
early accompanied by a systematic plan of 
family visitation, in the principal cities, 
and by noonday prayer-meetings, in almost 
every city, town, and village, from one end 
of the country to the other. In ?uch 
places as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 
Cincinnati, Chicago, Richmond, as well as 
farther south and west, not only were the 
usual houses of worship crowded daily, but 



•278 



FKO:\r COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



tlie largest public halls were hired for the 
same purpose, and resounded every day 
with fervent prayers, songs of praise, and 
earnest exhortations. 

Thus, in Philadelphia, the vast audience 
room of Jayne's Hall, and, in New York, 
Burton's well-known theater, were appro- 
priated for religious assemblings. The 
room hitherto occupied in the first-named 
hall, contained accommodations for about 
three hundred persons, and when it was 
decided upon to remove into the large hall, 
It was with no expectation that the room 
would be filled, at such an hour as noon- 
day. To the amazement of all, however, 
it was densely crowded, every seat being 
occupied, including the settees in the aisles, 
and a large portion of the immense galler- 
ies, and those who left for want of room 
upon the main floor, are said to have 
exceeded the number who could not gain 
admission on the day previous, when the 
meeting was held in the small room ad- 
joining. It was estimated that there were 
certainly not less than three thousand per- 
sons who entered the hall during the hour, 
and it was conceded, by those whose 
means of knowledge enabled them to judge, 
that this was the largest meeting convened 
for the simple purpose of prayer to God, 
that had ever been assembled in this 
country. 

From New York city, a vast religious 
influence went forth to all parts of the 
land, and details of the daily proceedings 
in the prayer-meetings held at Burton's 
theater, and in the Fulton street and John 
street church vestries, were published far 
and wide bj' the secular press. Indeed, 
the fullness and candor characterizing the 
reports contained in the city journals, 
were, with scarcely an exception, most 
honorable to those influential mediums of 
public enlightenment. Of the now almost 
world-renowned Fulton street prayer-meet- 
ing, held at first in one room, but to which, 
as the revival progressed, it was found 
necessary to add two more, the Daily Tri- 
bune of March 6, 1858, said : " All three 
are now not only filled to their utmost 
capacity, but would be still more largely 



attended if there were sitting or even 
standing-room to be offered to the multi- 
tude. A placard is posted on the gate, 
inviting persons to enter, though such au 
invitation seems no longer necessarj-: 
' Step in tor five minutes, or longer, as 
your time permits.' Inside notices are 
hung on the walls, to the effect that 
praj'ers and remarks should be brief, ' in 
order to give all an opportunity,' and for- 
bidding the introduction of 'controverted 
points,' for the jmrpose of preventing the- 
ological discussion. These j>recautions are 
taken, in order to give as much variety as 
possible to the exercises, for it is always 
unpardonable to render a crowded meeting 
dull. The frequenters of this meeting 
come from all classes of society, and are 
invited as such, without regard to their 
differences. Many clergj'men of the city 
churches, and many pi-ominent laymen, 
including merchants and gentlemen in the 
legal and medical jirofessions, are seen 
there every day — as they ought to be seen 
— side by side with the mechanic and the 
day laborer, and even the street beggar. 
Draymen drive up their carts to the 
church, and, hitching their horses outside, 
go in with the crowd ; and ' fine ladies,' 
who sometimes have Christian hearts in 
spite of unchristian fashions, driven down 
from ' uj) town ' in their fine carriages, also 
step in and mingle T.ith the same multi- 
tude. The exercises consist about equally 
of prayers, remarks, and singing. Of 
course it is impracticable for so many to 
take part in the speaking or the audible 
praying, but they all join in the singing 
with great zeal and emphasis. On one 
occasion, the volume of sound was so heavy 
as to dislodge from its place on the wall 
the clock wliich had been securely fastened, 
as was supposed, and bring it crashing to 
the floor. It is not unfrequent, during the 
continuance of the meeting, to see a crowd 
of persons collected in the street in front 
of the church, to listen to the siiirit-stirring 
hymns that are sung inside. The praj-er- 
meeting held in the old Methodist church 
in John street is similar to this. The 
attendance here is already found sufficient 



GREAT AWAKENING IN THE RELIGIOUS WORLD — 1857 



279 



to crowd the entire ground floor of the 
building. Many Methodist brethren at- 
tend this meeting in preference to the 
other, hut the proceedings are character- 
ized with entire catholicity and freedom 
from sectarianism." Perhaps no better 
illustration could be afforded of this unsec- 
tarian feeling, as well as of the prevailing 
spirit of the times, than the following dis- 
patch, which was sent by telegraph, at 
noon, March 12th, to the great union 
prayer-meeting in Jayne's Hall, Philadel- 
phia : 

''Christian Bn'fhri'ii — The New York 
John street Union Meeting sends you 
greeting in brotherly love : ' And the in- 
habitants of one city shall go to another, 
saying, Let us go speedil}' to pray before 
the Lord, and to seek the Lord of Hosts — 
I will go also. Praise the Lord — call 
upon his name— declare his doings among 
the people — make mention that his name 
is exalted.' " 

To the above message, the following 
dispatch from Mr. George H. Stuart, a 
prominent Old School Presbj'terian and 
chairman of the Philadelphia meeting, was 
immediately telegraphed and read to the 
John street meeting: 

" Jayne's Hall daily Prayer Meeting is 
crowded ; upwards of three thousand pres- 
ent; with one mind and heart they glorify 
our Father in heaven for the mighty work 
he is doing in our city and country, in the 
building up of saints and the convei'sion of 
sinners. The Lord hath done great things 
for us, whence joy to us is brought. May 
He who holds the seven stars in his right 
hand, and who walks in the midst of the 
churches, be with you by His Spirit this 
day. Grace, mercy, and peace, be with 
you." 

Even among those denominations unac- 
customed to what are known as 'revival 
measures ' for the furtherance of religion, 
such as the Unitarian, Universalist, and 
Episcopalian, a disposition was manifested 
to co-operate, in prayers and labors, for the 
success of the good work. In Boston, and 
other places, prayer-meetings were con- 
ducted by the Unitarian clergy and laity, 



which were thronged to the utmost capac- 
ity of the halls used for the purpose. In 
New York, the Orchard Street Universalist 
church. Rev. Dr. Sawyer, exhibited a warm 
sj'mpathy with the revival, and took an 
active part in its progress ; prayer-meetings 
were held twice a week, which were fully at- 
tended, a deep religious feeling pervaded 
the congregation, and large numbers 
united with the church. The card of invi- 
tation to their prayer-meeting, which, like 
that of other denominations, was exten- 
sively circulated, read as follows : A gen- 
eral prayer-meeting will be held every 
Wednesday and Friday evening, at half- 
past seven o'clock, in the lecture-room of 
the Rev. Dr. Sawyer's church, Orchard 
street, near Broome. ' Ho, everj' one that 
thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he 
that hath no money ; come ye, buy and 
eat ; yea, come, buy wine and milk with- 
out money and without price.' 

Among the Episcopalians, meetings of 
deep interest were held, including regular 
evening services for prayer and short ad- 
dresses, at the Church of the Ascension 
New York, Eev. Dr. Bedell's. One oi 
these meetings was of a very impressive 
character. The meeting commenced with 
singing the hymn, "Stay, thou insulted 
Spirit, stay," a series of prayers followed, 
after which Rev. Mr. Dickson delivered 
a short address, founded on the words, 
" Lord, are there few that be saved ? " 
Other hymns were sung, and then remarks 
made by Rev. Drs. Dyer and Cutler, Epis- 
copal rectors. Doctor Cutler said that, 
twenty years ago, such a meeting as the 
present one would have been denounced as 
Methodistical ; but he felt that he could 
almost say, with Simeon of old, "Now, 
Lord, let thy servant depart in peace," for 
he had witnessed that glorious "levia- 
than," the Episcopal Church, which for 
forty years he had lamented tv see, with 
all its noble qufilities and precious gifts, 
being fast in tlie stocks, at last launched 
and making full headway in the river that 
flows from the City of God. 

Next to the Fulton street prayer-meet- 
ing, in point of wide-reaching influence, 



180 



TKO.M C'OLOXY TO WORLD TO WEE. 




r.ROlI- OF EMINE.VT REVIVAL PREAIIIEES DUKING THE NATIONAL (ENTIRT. 



GEEAT AWAKENING IN THE EELIGIOUS WOKLD — 1S57. 281 



the meetings for prayer held daily, at 
noon, in Burton's theater, may be spoken 
of as most conspicuous. It was hired for 
this purpose by the New York Young 
Men's Christian Association, and was 
crowded daily with earnest-minded men 
and women, fervent in their songs, prayers, 
and exhortations. The j)lace made so 
famous, in j-ears pa.st, by the histrionic 
performances of Burton, Blake, Placide, 
Holland, Davenport, Johnston, Lester, 
Jordan, Eisher. Brougham, and other 
celebrities, now resounded with the soul- 
stirring appeals of such men as Cuyler, 
Beecher, Hatfield, Armitage, and a host of 
warm-hearted merchants and professional 
men, all enlisted in the good work of ex- 
tolling the glad tidings of salvation. In- 
stead of polkas, schottisches, and waltzes 
— instead of fiddle and bow, orchestra and 
overture, — there were the grave and seri- 
ous hymns, " Children of the Heavenly 
King," and "Salvation, the joyful 
sound," " Return, my wandering soul, 
return," etc. With the exception of now 
and then a fervid " Amen," or a hearty 
" Yes, Lord," the order and quiet of the 
audience during the speaking were entirely 
uninterrupted. 

At all the multitudinous prayer-meet- 
ings held in different places throughout 
the country, one marked feature of the 
proceedings was that of receiving and 
reading requests for prayers. The re- 
quests of this character sent to the Fulton 
street meeting have all been carefully pre- 
served in a book, constituting a volume 
upon which no one can look without the 
deepest interest. The scope and variety 
of these requests afford so apt a reflection 
of the state of feeling during the revival 
period, that a few specimens of those pre- 
sented at different times and places, will 
be a fair illustration of all : 

' A Christian merchant earnestly desires 
the prayers of God's people for his co-part- 
ners in business, and for all the young 
men in their employment unconverted to 
God.' 

' An anxious wife is praying earnestly 
at this hour for her husband, who once 



made a profession of religion, but is now 
fearful that he never was born of the 
Spirit, and is in darkness. She asks for 
an interest in your prayers in his behalf.' 

' The prayers of those who are accus- 
tomed to intercede with God, are requested 
by a San Franciscan, that the Almighty 
would visit the city of San Francisco with 
a gracious outpouring of his Spirit. Re- 
member jour brothers and fathers on the 
Pacific coast.' 

' The prayers of this meeting are re- 
quested for a j'oung lady who scoffs at 
religion. Don't forget her, brethren. She 
has no one to pray for her but the writer 
of this. Oh, pray for her.' 

'A widow asks for the prayers of the 
brethren and sisters for a son brought up 
under careful religious instruction, who 
last night cursed his mother — that he may 
this day be brought to the feet of Jesus.' 

'Prayers are requested for a sister who 
is given to intemperance.' 

' The prayers of Christians are most 
earnestly requested by a son in behalf of 
an aged father, nearly seventy years old. 
A familj' of ten children are praying 
morning, noon, and night for him.' 

' The prayers of Christians are requested 
for a young man — the son of a clergyman 
— who is an idle jester on the subject of 
religion, and who has, within the last 
hour, been heard to ridicule these meet- 
ings, and to jest upon these subjects.' 

'My husband is not a Christian, though 
often thoughtful. I have praj-ed for his 
conversion every day since our marriage 
— nine years. May I ask an interest in 
j'our jjrayers that my husband may seek 
noil) an interest in Christ, and that we 
may both become devoted, earnest, Bible- 
Christians ? ' 

'The prayers of the Fulton street meet- 
ing are earnestly requested for a bible 
class of twenty-two young ladies, con- 
nected with one of the Dutch Reformed 
churclies in this vicinity, some of whom 
appear to be anxious for their souls.' 

It was in this spirit that the Great 
Awakening showed its character and its 
power in all sections of the land, north, 



282 



feo:m colony to wokj.d powek. 



south, east, and west, tlie "Wind of God 
sweeping benignly from the Atbiutic to 
the Pacific, — reaching across the length 
and breadth of the continent, — from the 
granite mountains of the north to the roll- 
ing prairies of the west and the golden 
slopes of California. It was, in a word, 
the American Pentecost, — the great relig- 
ious epoch of the national century, un- 
equaled in earnestness, union, and univer- 
salitj-, by any similar movement that had 
preceded it, in the history of the western 
world. The spiritual activities of the 
denominations were everywhere constant 
and fruitful, the accessions to the churches 
being numbered by scores of thousands. 
In places the most obscure, remote and 
isolated, the most fervid religious engaged- 
ness was to be found, while, in the larger 
towns and cities, no business man, what- 
ever his location, needed to go forty rods 
to find a prayer-meeting in operation, with 
a printed invitation outside for him to 
enter and listen to the prayers and expe- 
riences of others, and, if he so desired, take 
a part in the exercises himself. There 
were special meetings for pra3'er, also, in 
behalf of firemen, policemen, waiters at 
hotels, seamen, and boys, maintained 
wholly or in part by the classes specially 
named, and resulting in a large amount of 
good. Men of established Christian char- 
acter were strengthened in their good pur- 
poses ; the indifferent and heedless were 
awakened to thoughtfulness on religious 
themes ; and multitudes, everywhere, who 
had led lives of immorality and wicked- 
ness, dangerous to society, were reclaimed, 
and henceforth walked in the path of 
virtue and honor. 

Of the many interesting incidents which 
transpired during this wonderful period, 
only a few can here be cited. 

Just after the commencement of the 
great panic, (says Rev. Mr. Adams, a well- 
known Methodist preacher in New York,) 
a young man called on me late on Satur- 
day night. He was the picture of distress 
and despair. Supposing him to be one of 
the many cases that daily came under my 
notice, I invited him in. He sat some 



minutes in perfect silence, and finally 
burst into tears. It was some time before 
he could control himself sufficiently to go 
on, and then said, "Can j'ou do anything 
for me ■;' " I requested him to state his 
case. He said he was miserable be3'ond 
description — had been blessed with pious 
parents and a religious education, but had 
gone far away from the counsels of his 
fathers ; he had fallen into shameful sin, 
until his soul loathed himself, and he had 
been on the verge of self-destruction. 
"This afternoon," said he, "feeiing a hell 
within, I went and bought poison, — went 
into my room, and was about to take it, 
when something seemed to sa^' to me, 'Go 
down and see the minister,' and I have 
come. Will you pray for me ? " He fell 
on his knees and cried aloud for mercy. 
After two hours of ju'ayer, he grew calm, 
and finally joyful. He gave me a package, 
and requested me to destroy it; there was 
laudanum in it — enough to have killed 
half a dozen men. 

One of the first conversions among the 
sailors, was that of a man who had been 
greatly addicted to gambling, and to other 
vices that usually accompany this. When 
he went to the meeting, he had just left 
the gaming-table ; but when he returned, 
his first act was to consign his cards and 
dice to the flames. He then knelt down, 
prayed, and was converted. He went to 
sea, and on board the slii]i daily prayer- 
meetings were held both in the cabin and 
forecastle. 

A merchant, after having attended one 
of the crowded prayer-meetings held in 
the city, determined, on returning home, 
to make an effort for the spiritual good of 
some of his friends and neighbors. One 
of these was a man who avowed himself an 
infidel. A israyer-meeting was organized, 
to which this man with others was invited, 
and, after several days' attendance, rose 
on one occasion, and requested that prayer 
should be made in his behalf. To the 
surprise and almost astonishment of his 
acquaintances, he shortly afterward re- 
nounced infidelity, and embraced the 
Christian religion. 



GREAT AWAKEXIXG IX THE EELIGIOUS WORLD — 1857 



283 



At many of the telegraph offices, mes- 
sages were constantly being sent to all 
parts of the land, announcing conversions. 
Some of these were exceedingly tender and 
touching, such as, ' Dear mother, the revi- 
val continues, and I, too, have been con- 
verted.' ' My dear parents, j-ou will re- 
joice to hear that I have found peace with 
God.' 'Tell my sister that I have come 
to the Cross of Christ.' 'At last I have 
faith and peace.' 

The influence of personal effort and a 
good example was forcibly- illustrated in 
the following case of a man and wife, who 
were utterly regardless even of the forms 
of religion, the husband, indeed, being an 
infidel. The wife had, however, been 
taken b^' some one to the meetings in a 
neighboring Methodist church, and, un- 
known to her husband, had become inter- 
ested in them. One day he was scoffing 
in lier presence at the revival, expressing 
his disbelief in everything of the kind, 
especially ridiculing the Methodist modes 
of labor, and winding up with a threat 
that he would soon stop any of //Is family 
who should be guilty of the folly of going 
up to the altar. " Why," said his wife, 
throwing her arms round his neck, and 
giving him a kiss, '-do you know that / 
was there last night ? " " No," he replied, 
returning her kiss; "but I am glad of it." 
He was softened ; that same evening he 
accompanied her to meeting, and went up 
to the altar himself. 

St. Paul's Episcopal church, on Broad- 
way, New York, was filled with multi- 
tudes, on Wednesday and Friday evening.s, 
in attendance on the devotional services 
performed there. On one of these occa- 
sions, soon after the exercises commenced, 
the large and fashionable congregation was 
surprised by the entrance of three Indian 
maidens, wrapped in their blue blankets. 
They paused for an instant at the door, 
aud then advanced to the front of the altar 
with quiet dignity and self-possession, and 
knelt down to their devotions. As the 
solemn ceremonies drew near to a close, 
they rose, crossed themselves, and, saluting 
the altar, glided down the aisle and from 



the church. They were of the Caughne- 
waga tribe, residing near Montreal, and 
had visited New York for the purpose of 
selling their trinkets, bead moccasins, and 
baskets. Being mostly Catholics, they 
usualh' worshiped in the church of that 
order on Canal street; but it seemed that 
they had observed the brilliantly illumin- 
ated church in passing by, and had entered, 
forgetful of form or sect, to kneel with 
their white sisters before the common 
Father of all. 

In Mr. Beecher's church, Brookljn, at 
the close of one of the morning meetings, 
a charitable collection was taken up. 
Among the audience was Mrs. Fremont 
("Our Jessie"), who, happening to have 
no money in her jjocket, as the plate was 
passed, took from her finger a heavy gold 
ring, and threw it in as the only contribu- 
tion which she was able at the moment to 
make. The ring contained on the outside 
an engraved bee, — in allusion to a beautiful 
incident in Fremont's passage of the 
Rocky Mountains, — and, on the inside, 
the in.scription, ' March 4, '57.' 

One of the most remarkable conversions 
among the dangerous and criminal classes, 
was that of Orville Gardner, commonly 
called " Awful " Gardner, a noted prize- 
fighter and trainer of pugili.sts. He was 
induced to attend one of the Methodist 
meetings, and, to the surprise of multi- 
tudes, he requested the prayers of the con- 
gregation, a. request which on three differ- 
ent occasions he repeated. At this time, 
he was residing in the vicinity of New 
York. Having some unimportant busi- 
ness to do in that city, a friend asked him 
if he would " jump into the cars and go 
down and attend to it." He replied, " I 
have more important business to attend to 
first, and I shall not go to the city till it 
is done." He had then three men under 
his training for a prize-fight. On being 
asked if he would give them further les- 
sons, he replied that "he would go to 
them soon, but on a different errand from 
boxing and training^he would try to jjer- 
suade them to reform, and to embrace 
religion." 



284 



FKO.M COLONY TO M'Oin.l) POWER. 



A young man, hearing himself prayed 

for by some friends, became so angry, that 
he resolved to sell his farm and go west, 
away from such interfering relatives. 
They continued to pray, and he finally 
sold his farm, and was going to start for 
Albany, on his way to the west. While 
going to take the cars, he passed the 
prayer-meeting, and, having some time to 
wait for the train, thought he would just 
step in, to pass the time away, and see 
what was going on. He went in, was 
deeply impressed, and his ease was imme- 
diately added to the great multitude of 
similar instances of reformation, which 
made the Great Awakening of 1857-8 so 
memorable in the religious history of the 
nation. 



world-wide fame, who had some time pre- 
viously been on a tour of active and suc- 
cessful religious labor in different parts of 
EuroiJe. Returning to their native land, 
they devoted themselves, for consecutive 
months, and with great and disinterested 
earnestness, among the lliasses, and this, 
too, as it appeared, not only without stated 
or assured pecuniary compensation, but 
absolutely without consideration of money 
or hire, beyond what was voluntarily con- 
tributed by friends for their current ex- 
penses. 

Never before, perhaps, were the fount- 
ains of the higher life in man opened up 
so abundantly and universally in our land, 
as by the efforts of these simjjle-spoken 
but intrej)id and warm-hearted reformers. 




^^enriW^ 



0.5AWKE* 



But, in addition to the Great Awaken- 
ing thus distinguishing the periods de- 
scribed, and which wrought such mighty 
results, there was to succeed another, 
which, in some of its aspects, was to prove 
even more noteworthy. Indeed, it may 
be said, without exaggeration, that one of 
the most happy, conciliatory, and widely 
useful religious movements characterizing 
the historj' of our country, and, in fact, 
the history of modern times, — creating an 
enthusiasm as genial and far-reaching as 
it was decorous and practical, — was that 
which \;ommenced in the fall of 1875, 
ander the personal auspices of Messrs. 
Moody and Sankey, lay evangelists of 



as they went from town to town and from 
city to city, with the iiroclamation, by fer- 
vent discourse, and cheering, melting song. 
of the "glad tidings of good."' 

Standing aloof from even the shadow of 
sectarian propagandism or theological dis- 
putation, they enlisted the co-operation — 
or, at least, the good will and God-speed — 
of all denominations of Christians, and, so 
conciliatory was their speech, and so ra- 
tional their methods, in appealing to the 
irreligious or indifferent, that, unlike the 
experience which would probably have at- 
tended a different course, little if any time 
was lost in provoking criticism or combat- 
ing objections. And this, in a word, was 



GEEAT AWAKEKT"yG TN THE RELIGIOUS WORLD— 1S57. 285 



the cause of the welcome extended them, 
wherever they went, and of tlie almost 
invariably rich harvests which accom- 
panied their labors. Nothing, in fact, 
could better evince the favorable impres- 
sion made by these evangelists upon soci- 
ety, than the judgments of the value of 
their work, expressed by those not holding 
their opinions. Thus, the Tablet, an in- 
fluential journal of the Roman Catholic 
faith, published in New York, spoke of 
Mr. Moody as affording, in "the midst of 
an age of mocking and unbelieving, a kind 
of earnest testimony to Jesus, and we can 
not find it in our heart to say it is not of 
God ;" and, though guarding its conces- 
sions by tlie claim for its own Church of 
possessing solely the real truth, it admit- 
ted, nevertheless, that " it is something in 
cities where the divinity of Clirist and His 
divine teaching are openly blasphemed, 
and where to the great bulk of the popula- 
tion the Chi-istian religion is a matter of 
complete indifference, when it is not one 
of scorn, that their ears should be accus- 
tomed to words of adoration and love of 
Him, and that even the dreary wastes of 
heresy should echo with the name of 
Jesus. . . . This work of Ml'. Moody's is 
not sin. It cannot l>e sin to invite men 
to love and serve Jesus Christ." 

And in a similar spirit to that just cited, 
the Jewish Messenger, referring to the 
meetings contemplated to be held by these 
evangelists, in the vast hippodrome, New 
York city, expressed it as its opinion that, 
whatever objection might be urged to 
emotional religion as spasmodic, lacking 
in substantial good, no man of sense could 
declaim against such services, if conducted 
in the same orderly and earnest way that 
had characterized the meetings else- 
where. In the same vein was the utter- 
ance of a distinguished preacher in 
Brooklyn, N. Y., — one representing the 
extreme wing of the 'liberal' school, — 
who declared, in a sermon, that, if 
Moody and Sankey could reach the 
masses of the people, " they would per- 
form a work for which all lovers of man- 
kind would be grateful." That this hope 



was largely realized, in the case of 
Brooklyn itself, is well known. 

One of the events in Mr. Moodjf's career 
which jieculiarly conspired to awaken pop- 
ular enthusiasm in behalf of him and his 
cause, on this side of the Atlantic, was the 
account, which preceded his arrival in 
America by some weeks, of the extraordi- 
nary occasion attending the close of the 
evangelists" wonderful labors in London, 
and which, on being read by their friends 
in this country, seemed like a prophecy of 
great things in store for their native land, 
when their homeward voyage should be 
accomplished. It appeared, according to 
the account of the meeting referred to — 
the last of the immense gatherings of this 
kind in that metropolis — that, for some 
days prior to its taking place, the anxiety 
of the people to obtain admission to the 
hall amounted almost to a frenzy, and not 
altogether a harmless one. Number.f were 
waiting for admission as early as three 
o'clock in the morning, or hours before the 
opening, — all the approaches were crowded 
with surging throngs, some of whom had 
come from great distances, — and, all 
around, dense masses of men, women, and 
children, were present, worked up to the 
highest point of interest and expectation. 
Mr. Moody found entrance through a pri- 
vate house adjoining, and with the help of 
a ladder. Meetings were held outside, but 
nothing less than seeing and hearing Mr. 
Moody would satisfy the densely packed 
multitude. Among the great dignitaries 
present were the Queen of the Netherlands 
and the Duchess of Sutherland. The last 
words of the evangelist were very impres- 
sive, as, indeed, was the whole scene of 
this most memorable occasion, and his sen- 
timents, as then and there uttered — rapid, 
spontaneous, gushing, — may be said to 
fitly represent the preacher's character and 
power. ' It is," he said, " the last time I 
shall have the uns]>eakable privilege of 
preaching the gospel in England. I have 
never enjoj'ed preaching so much as I have 
in this country." " Have another week," 
shouted a man. " I want to have you all 
saved to-niijht," said Mr. Moody, looking 



286 



FKOM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 




KEVIVAL MEETING !N IJKOOKLYN, CONDUCTED BV MESSRS. MOUDV .\NL1 S.\NKEY. 



toward the speaker. " If I were to stay 
another week, I eouhl tell you no more. I 
have not told yon a liumlredth part of the 
story, but I have done the best I can with 
this stammering tongue. I don't want to 
close this meeting until I see you safe 
behind the walls of the city of refuge. 
During tlie past thirty days I have been 
preaching here, I have tried to allure 
you away to that -world of light. I have 
told you of hell to warn you, and I have 
told you of the love of God. To-night I 
have been trying to illustrate salvation. 
You can i-eceive Christ and be saved, or 
reject him and be lost. By-aiid-by there 
will be a glorious future, and I want to 
know how many there are willing to join 
me for eternity. How many will stand up 
here before God and man. and say, by that 
act, you will join me f<ir heaven ? Those 
who are willing tu do so to-night, will you 
just rise ? " Multitudes rose to their feet. 



Of this remarkable European tour of the 
evangelists, one of them afterwards said, 
" I remember when we left home, not 
knowing what was before us. We landed 
in Liverpool, and found the friends who 
invited us over both dead. We were 
strangers, but God led us ; His Spirit 
directed us up to a dead town, where we 
held a prayer-meeting, at whii^h, at first, 
there were !)Ht four persons j^resciit. After- 
ward more came. People thought we were 
two Americans with sinister designs. The 
meetings, however, increased in interest 
and power, and then the work began."' 

In due time, after returning to this 
country, the evangelists commenced their 
public labors, selecting Brooklyn, N. Y., 
as their first field. No church edifice, 
however, in that cit}', having the seating 
capacity to aecoraraodate the throng of 
peojile who desired to listen to Mr. Moody's 
powerful exhortations and Mr. banke.y 3 



GEEAT AWAKENING IN THE RELIGIOUS WORLD — 1857. 



287 



singing, the large structnrp liiiown as the 
rink, on Clermont avenue, was fitted up 
for this purpose. It accommodated five 
thousand jiersons. The interior of this 
vast building, as viewed from the platform, 
a large semi-circular dais, was in the high- 
est degree inspiring. Mr. Moody's posi- 
tion, when speaking, was at the center of 
this platform, in front ; on his left were 
seats for visiting clergymen ; on his right, 
in front, was Mr. Sankey's position, at a 
small organ, on which he plaj'ed the ac- 
companiment to his admirable rendering 
of the hymns which formed such a marked 
and helpful feature of these services. It 
was in this rink, that, day after day and 
night after night, for successive weeks, 
dense throngs assembled, and discourse, 
song, and prayer united to bring thousands 
of hearts to religious consecration. Out- 
door meetings, as well as meetings in the 
neighboring churches, were also held daily, 
with the most beneficial results, the pastors 
joining heartily in the work, — and, in 
fact, all over the land, the stimulus to 
renewed zeal and activity in spiritual 
things, received from this source, was 
most decided. 

Commencing in Brooklyn, October 24th, 
and continuing some weeks, only a brief 
interval elapsed before the revivalists com- 
menced their labors in Philadelphia, 
namely, on Sunday morning, November 
21st, the meetings being held in the old 
freight depot, at Thirteenth and Market 
streets, which had been fitted up for this 
use. The inclemency of the weather did 
not prevent the assemliling of at least ten 
thousand persons at the opening services, 
including hundreds of prominent persons. 
Indeed, long before the hour of opening, 
the streets leading to the building were 
alive with people of every age and condi- 
tion, and of both sexes ; thousands came 
by the various lines of passenger railway 
running by or near the spot, and other 
thousands wended their way thither on 
foot, many of them coming weary di.s- 
tances. Within the building, the sight of 
such a vast sea of humanity — now eager to 
catch the earnest words of the sjieaker, 



and, again, with heads bowed in solemn 
prayer — was most impressive ; nor was 
it less so, when, under Mr. Sankey's in- 
spiring leadership, the joyous multitude 
united in singing those sweet and favorite 
songs, "Hold the Fort," "The Ninety and 
Nine," " Jesus of Nazareth Passeth by," 
etc. The interest and enthusiasm in these 
meetings continued without abatement for 
consecutive weeks, not the least interested 
among the attendants, during one of the 
December sessions, being President Grant, 
with members of his cabinet. 

New York city was the next field of 
labor chosen by the evangelists, the hippo- 
drome being chosen by the Young Men's 
Christian Association of that cit3-, for the 
meetings, the opening one taking place 
February 4, 1876. Both halls, the larger 
containing seven thousand persons, and 
the smaller, containing four thousand 
were filled, and sevend thousand persons 
more stood outside. Distinguished! reach- 
ers occupied the platform ; a choir of 
twelve hundred voices conducted the sing- 
ing; Mr. Moody preached with great 
power ; and the spectacle altogether was 
truly sublime. Mr. Sankey carried all 
hearts with him while he sang " Hold the 
Fort," the people joining in the chorus. 
There was not only no diminution in 
enthusiasm or attendance while the meet- 
ings were in progress, but rain and storm 
offered no obstacle to the pressing throngs. 
Mr. Moody gained favor constantly by the 
judicious judgment which he showed in 
his management both of the people and 
himself; and when, on one occasion, he 
said, " I want no false excitement," the 
expressions of approval were unmistaka- 
ble. On Sunday, February 13th, the en- 
tire attendance was estimated to be from 
twenty to twentj-five thousand ; even as 
early as eight o'clock, A. m., at a special 
meeting for Christians, the admission 
being by ticket, over four thousand per- 
sons were present; at three o'clock, P. M., 
a meeting specially for women was at- 
tended by more than six thousand of them ; 
and in the evening, when men alone were 
admitted, the audience numbered some ten 



288 



FRf).\r COI.OXY TO WORLD POWER. 



thousand. At all these services the order 
was perfect, and all hearts seemed in 
accord. Though a Roman Catholic, Dom 
Pedro, emperor of Brazil, being in the 
city on his American tour, during the 
holding of the meetings, became an audi- 
tor, and was not only deejjly moved by 



such a vast and unusual spectacle, but 
expressed his admiration of Mr. Moody's 
fervid preaching and Mr. Sankey's beauti- 
ful songs. The New York meetings were 
succeeded by visits from the evangelists to 
the south and west, with the most benefi- 
cial results. 



XXX. 



POLITICAL DEBATE BETWEEN ABRAHAM LINCOL: 
STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS, IN ILLINOIS.— 1858. 



AND 



Cause of tliis Remarkalile Oratorical Contest. — Inteuse Interest in All Parts of the Land. — the Heart of 
Every American Citizen Enlisted in the Momentous Issue Involved. — Eminent Character of the Com- 
batants. — their Extraordinary Ability and Eloquence Universally Acknowledged. — the Discussions 
Attended by Friends and Foes. — Victory, Defeat, Life and Death. — Condition of the New Territories. — 
Form of Constitution to be Decided. — Domestic Institutions : Slavery. — Mr. Douglas Advocates " Popu- 
lar Sovereignty." — " Prohibition " Urged by Mr. Lincoln. — National Importance of the Question. — The 
Public Mind Divided. — Joint Debates Proposed. — Agreement between the two Leaders. — Personal Ap- 
pearance and Style. — Plans, Places, Scenes. — Theories and Arguments Advanced. — Skill and Adroit- 
ness of the Disputants. — Immense Concourses. — Result Impartially Stated. — Mr. Douglas Re-elected 
Senator. — Mr. Lincoln Nominated for President. — His Election to that Office. — Douglas' Magnanimity 
— The Olive Branch. — Shoulder to .Shoulder as Unionists. — Sudden Decease of the Great Senator. 



" 1 regard Lincolo ai a kind, amiable, and IntelliseDt gentleman, a good citizen, and an honorable opponent." — JI7DOE DouoLAa, 
" The man who stumpa a State with Stephen A. Douglas, and meeta him, day af^er day, before the people, has got to be do fool." 

UOBACE Qbeblbi. 



HE trenipiidou-s political excitement which convulsed the nation in 1858, 
^ growing out of the agitation of the slavery 

question, in its relation to the vast terri- 
tories of Kansas and Nebraska, found two 
of the most able and conspicuous men 
in the great west, and especially Illinois, 
pitted against each other in the discussion 
uf that issue, — representing, respectively, 
the two prevailing political parties in pub- 
lic affairs, — and the interest created by 
this fact throughout that region, and, in- 
deed, from one end of the whole land to 
the other, was still farther heightened by 
those two gentlemen being not only candi- 
dates — the one of the democratic and the 
other of the anti-slivery party — for the 
senatorial seat of that State in the capitol 
at Washington, but their names were also 
looming up in the near presidential horizon of 1860. 

'I'he question at issue was immense — permanent not transient — universal not local, 
19 




STATi; CArilUL UF ILLINOIS. 



290 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



and the debate attracted profound atten- 
tion on the part of the people, whether 
democratic or free soil, from the Kennebec 
to the Rio Grande. Briefly stated, Mr. 
Douglas took the position in this contro- 
versy, that the vote of a majority of the 



man were closely scanned. Finally, after 
the true western style, a joint discussion, 
face to face, between Lincoln and Douglas, 
as the two great representative leaders, 
was proposed and agreed to, — seven public 
debates, one each at Ottawa, Freeport, 




1U:I(.\TE ItETWEEN L1^■C0L^' AND DOUGLAS. 



people of a territory should decide this as 
well as all other questions concerning their 
domestic or internal affairs, and this theory 
came to be known as that of " Popular 
Sovereignty." Mr. Lincoln, on the con- 
trary, urged in substance, the necessity 
of an organic enactment excluding slavery 
in any form, — this latter to be the condi- 
tion of its admission into the Union as a 
State. 

The public mind was divided, and the 
utterances and movements of every public 



Jonesboro', Charleston, Galesburg, Quincy, 
and Alton, — the seven oratorical tourna- 
ments being thus held in all quarters of 
the state, from the extreme of one point 
of the compass to the extreme of the op- 
posite, and everywhere the different par- 
ties turned out to do honor to their cham- 
pions. Processions and cavalcades, bands 
of music and cannon-firing, made every 
day a day of excitement But far greater 
was the excitement of such oratorical con- 
tests between two such skilled debaters. 



DEBATE BETWEEN' L12\'C0LiS" AJS'D DOUGLAS — 1S5S. 



291 



before mixed audieBces of friends and foes, 
to rejoice over every keen thrust at tlie 
adversary, and, again, to be cast down by 
each failure to " give back as good," or to 
parry the thrust so aimed. 

In person, appearance, voice, gesture, 
and general platform style and impres- 
sion, nothing could exceed the dissimilarity 
of these two speakers. Mr. Douglas 
possessed a natural build or frame and 
physique uncommonly attractive, — a pres- 
ence which would have gained for him 
access to the highest circles, however 
courtly, in any laud ; a thick-set, finely- 
built, courageous man, with an air, as 
natural to him as his breath, of self-con- 
fidence that did not a little to inspire his 
supporters with ho[ie. That he was every 
inch a man, no friend or foe ever ques- 
tioned. Ready, forceful, animated, keen 
and trenchant, as well as playful, by turns, 
and thoroughly unartificial, lie was one of 
the most admirable platform speakers that 
ever appeared before an American audi- 
ence, — his personal geniality, too, being 
so abounding, that, excepting in a polit- 
ical sense, no antagonism existed between 
him and his opponent. 

J\lr. Lincoln's personal appearance was 
in unique contrast with thai presented by 
Mr. Douglas. He stood about six feet 
and four inches high in his stockings ; 
long, lean, and wiry ; in motion, he had a 
great deal of the elasticity &nd awkward- 
ness which indicated the rough training 
of his early life ; his face genial looking, 
with good humor lurking in every corner 
of its innumerable angles. As a speaker 
he was ready, precise, fluent, and his man- 
ner before a popular assembly was just us 
he pleased to make it, being either superla- 
tively ludicrous, or very impressive. He 
employed but little gesticulation, but, 
when desiring to make a point, produced 
a shrug of the shoulders, an elevation of 
his eyebrows, a depression of his mouth, 
and a general malformation of countenance 
so comically awkward that it never failed 
to 'bring down the house.' His enuncia- 
tion was slow and emphatic, and his voice, 
though sharp and powerful, at times had 



a tendency to dwindle into a shrill and 
unpleasant sound. In this matter of voice 
and of commanding attitude, so as to af- 
fect the multitude, the odds were quite in 
favor of Mr. Douglas. 

The arrangements, places, etc., for the 
great debate, having, as already remarked, 
been perfected, the first discussion took 
place, August 21st, at Ottawa, in La Salle 
county, a strong republican district. The 
crowd in attendance was a large one, and 
about equally divided in political senti- 
ment — the enthusiasm of the democracy 
having brought out more than a due pro- 
portion, if anything, of that party, to hear 
and see their favorite leader, Douglas. 
His thrilling tones, his manly defiance to- 
wards the enemies of the party, assured 
his friends, if any assurance were wanting, 
that he was the same unconquered and 
unconquerable democrat that for twenty- 
five years he had proved to be. Douglas 
opened the discussion and spoke one hour ; 
Lincoln followed, the time assigned him 
being an hour and a half, though he 
yielded a portion of it before the expira- 
tion of its limit. 

In this first debate, Mr Douglas ar- 
raigned his opponent for the expression 
in a former speech of " a house divided 
against itself," etc., — referring to the 
slavery and anti-slavery sections of the 
country ; and Mr. Lincoln reiterated and 
defended his assertions on that subject. 
It was not until the second meeting, how- 
ever, and those held subsequently, that 
the debaters grappled with those profound 
constitutional questions and measures of 
administration which wei-e so soon to con- 
vulse the whole land and cause it to stag- 
ger almost to the verge of destruction. 
But, as Mr. Lincoln's jiosition in relation 
to one or two points growing out of the 
former speech referred to had attracted 
great attention throughout the country, 
he availed himself of the opportunity of 
this preliminary meeting to reply to what 
he regarded as common misconceptions. 
'Anything,' he said, ' that argues me into 
the idea of perfect social and political 
equality with the negro, is but a specious 



i:92 



FEOil COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



and fantastic arrangement of words, by 
which a man can prove a liorse-chestnut 
to be a chestnut horse. I will say here, 
while upon this subject, tliat I have no 
purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere 
with the institution of slavery in the 
states where it now exists. I believe I 
liave no lawful right to do so, and I have 
no inclination to do so. I have no pur- 
pose to introduce political and social 
equality between the white and the black 
races. There is a physical difference be- 
tween tlie two, whi(^h, in my judgment, 
will probably forever forbid theii- living 
together upon a footing of perfect equal- 
ity, and inasmuch as it becomes a matter 
of necessity that there must be a differ- 
ence, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in 
favor of the race to which I belong having 
the superior position. I have never said 
anything to the contrary, but I hold that, 
notwithstanding all this, there is no rea- 
son in the world why the negro is not en- 
titled to all the natural rights enumerated 
in the Declaration of Independence — tlie 
right to life, liberty, and the i)ursuits of 
liappiness. I hold that he is as much en- 
titled to these as the white man. I agree 
with Judge Douglas he is not my equal in 
many respects — certainly not in color, 
perhaps not in moral or intellectual en- 
dowment. But, in the right to eat the 
bread, without tlie leave of any one else, 
which his own hand earns, he is my equal, 
and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the 
equal of every living man.' 

Touching the question of resjiect or 
weight of opinion due to deliverances of 
the United States Supreme Court, — an 
element which entered largely into this 
national contest, — llr. Lincoln said : 
' This man sticks to a decision which for- 
bids the people of a territory from exclud- 
ing slavery, and he does so not because he 
says it is right in itself — he does not give 
any opinion on that, — but because it has 
been decided by the court, and being de- 
cided by the court, he is, and j'ou are 
bound to take it in your political action 
as law ; not that he judges at all of its 
merits, but because a decision of the court 



is to him a ' Thus saith the Lord.' He 
places it on that ground alone, and you 
will bear in mind that, thus committing 
himself unreservedly to this decision, com- 
mits him to the next one just as firnilj' as 
to this. He did not commit himself on 
account of the merit or demerit of tlie de- 
cision, but it is a ' Thus saith the Lord.' 
The next decision, as much as this, will 



U 



Thus saith the Lord.' There is 



nothing that can divert or turn him away 
from this decision. It is nothing that I 
jioint out to him that his great prototy])e. 
Gen Jackson, did not believe in the 
binding force of deci.-ions, — it is notliing 
to him that Jefferson did not so be- 
lieve. I have said that I have often heard 
him approve of Jackson's course in disre- 
garding the decision of the Supreme Court 
pronouncing a National Bank unconstitu- 
tional. He says I did not hear him say 
so ; he denies the accuracy of my recollec- 
tion, I say he ought to know better than 
I, but I will make no question about this 
thing, though it still seems to me that I 
heard him say it twenty times. I will 
tell him though, that he now claims to 
stand on the Cincinnati iilatform, which 
affirms that Congress ran not charter a 
National Bank, in the teeth of that old 
standing decision that Congress ctni char- 
ter a bank. And I remind him of another 
piece of history on the question of respect 
for judicial decisions, and it is a piece of 
Illinois history belonging to a time when 
the large party to which Judge Douglas be- 
longed were displeased with a decision of 
the Supreme Court of Illinois, because 
they had decided tiiat a Governor could 
not remove a Secretary of State. I know 
that Judge Douglas will not deny that he 
was then in favor of overslaughing that 
decision by the mode of adding five new 
judges, so as to vote down the four old 
ones. Not only so, but it ended in the 
Judge's sitting down on that very bench 
as one of the five new judges to break down 
the four old ones'. In this strain Mr. 
Lincoln occupied most of his time. 

But, if the opponents of Judge Douglas 
were elated at the animated effort put 



DEBATE BETWEEN LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS — 1S58. 



293 



forth by his rival, at Ottawa the debate 
which followed at Freeport gave ample op- 
portunity for the Judge to exhibit his 
great intellectual prowess, nor did he fail 
to improve it. 

At this meeting, Mr. Lincoln pro- 
pounded certain questions, and to these 
prompt and vigorous response was made. 
' He desires to know, If the people of 
Kansas shall form a Constitution Iiy 
means entirely proper and unobjectionable, 
and ask admission into the Union as a 
state before they have the requisite popu- 
lation for a member of Congress, whether 
I will vote for that admission ? Well, 
now, I regret exceedingly that he did not 
answer that interrogator}' himself before 
he put it to me, in order that we might 
understand, and not be left to infer, on 
which side he is. Mr. Trumbull, during 
the last session of Congress, voted from 
the beginning to the end against the ad- 
mission of Oregon, although a free state, 
because she bad not the requisite popula- 
tion for a member of Congress. Mr. 
Trumbull would not, under any circum- 
stances, consent to let a state, free or 
slave, come into the Union until it had 
the requisite population. As Mr. Trum- 
bull is in the field fighting for Mr. Lin- 
coln, I would like to have Mr. Lincoln 
answer his own question, and tell nie 
whether he is fighting Trumbull on that 
issue or not. But I will answer his ques- 
tion. In reference to Kansas, it is my 
opinion that, as she has jsopulation enougli 
to constitute a slave state, she has people 
enough for a free state. I will not make 
Kansas an exceptional case to the other 
states of the Union. I hold it to be a 
sound rule, of univei-sal application, to re- 
quire a territory to contain the requisite 
population for a member of Congress be- 
fore it is admitted as a state into the 
Union. I made that proposition in the 
Senate in 1856, and I renewed it during 
the last session, in a bill providing that no 
territory of the United States should form 
a Constitution and apply for admission 
until it had the requisite po|)ulation. On 
another occasion, I proposed that neither 



Kansas, nor anj- other territory, should be 
admitted until it had the requisite popula- 
tion. Congress did not adopt any of my 
propositions containing this general rule, 
but did make an exception of Kansas. I 
will stand by that exception. Either 
Kansas must come in as a free state, with 
whatever population she may have, or the 
rule must be applied to all the other ter- 
ritories alike.' 

Mr. Douglas next proceeded to answer 
another question proposed by Mr. Lincoln, 
namely, Whether the people of a territory 
can in any lawful way, against the wishes 
of any citizen of the United States, ex- 
clude slavery from their limits prior lo the 
formation of a state Constitution. Said 
Mr. Douglas : ' I answer emphatically, 
as Mr. Lincoln has heard me answer a 
hundred times from every stump in Illi- 
nois, that in my opinion the people of a 
territory can, by lawful means, exclude 
slavery from their limits prior to the forma- 
tion of a state Constitution. .Mr. Lincoln 
knew that I had answered that question 
over and over again. He heard me argue 
the Nebraska Bill on that principle all over 
the state in 1854, in 1855, and in 1866, and 
be has no excuse for pretending to be in 
doubt as to my position on that question. 
It matters not what way the Supreme 
Court may hereafter decide as to the ab- 
stract question whether slavery may or 
may not go into a territory under the Con- 
stitution, the people have the lawful means 
to introduce it or exclude it as they please, 
for the reason that slavery cannot exist a 
day or an hour unless it is supported by 
local police regulations Those police 
regulations can only be established by the 
local legislature, and if the people are op- 
posed to slavery they will elect representa- 
tives to that body who will, bj' unfriendly 
legislation, effectuallj' prevent the intro- 
duction of it into their midst. If, on the 
contrary, they are for it, their legislation 
will favor its extension. Hence, no mat- 
ter what the decision of the Supreme Court 
may be on that abstract question, still the 
right of the people to make a slave terri- 
tory or a free territory is perfect and com- 



204 



rRo:\[ coi.oxY to would power. 



plet(3 under the Nebraska Bill ' This 
riglit or freedom of the people thus to act, 
and which Mr. Douglas so strenuously ad- 
vocated, was commonly termed ' Popular 
Sovereignty,' and, as one of the battle- 
cries in the great contests, was most ef- 
fectivclj- used. 

One of the most interesting features of 
this memorable debate, covering as it did 
almost the whole issue involved in the 
canvass, consisted of the following inter- 
rogatories propounded by Mr. Douglas, 
and Mr Lincoln's replies: — 

Mr Douglas : I desire to know whether 
Lincoln to-day stands, as he did in 1854, 
in favor of the unconditional repeal of the 
Fugitive .'^lave law ? 

Mr. Lincoln : I do not now, nor ever 
did, stand in favor of the unconditional 
l-epeal of the Fugitive Slave law- 
Mr. Douglas : I desire him to answer 
whether he stands pledged to-day, as he 
did in 1854, against the admission cif any- 
more slave states into the Union, men if 
the people want them ? 

Mr. Lincoln : I do not now, or ever 
did, stand pledged against the admission 
of any more slave states into the Union. 

Mr. Douglas : I want to know whether 
lie stands pledged against the admission 
of a new state into the Union with such a 
Constitution as the people nf that state 
may see fit to make ? 

Mr. Lincoln : 1 ilo not stand jiledged 
against the admission of a new state into 
the Union, with such a Constitution as 
the people of that state may see fit to 
make. 

Mr. Douglas: I want to know whether 
he stands to-day pledged to the abolition 
of slavery in the District of Columbia '.' 

Mr. Lincoln : I do not stand t(Miay 
pledged to the abolition of slavery in the 
District of Columbia. 

Mr. Douglas: I desire liim to answer 
whether he stands pledged to the jirohibi- 
tion of the slave-trade between the differ- 
ent .-tates ? 

Mr. Lincoln : I do not stand jdedged 
to the prohibition of the slave-trade be- 
tween the different states. 



Mr. Douglas : I desire to know whether 
he stands pledged to prohibit slavery in 
all the territories of the United States, 
North as well as South of the Missouri 
Compromise line ? 

Mr. Lincoln : I am impliedly, if imt 
expressly, pledged to a belief in the rirj/it 
and (hifi/ of Congress to prohibit slavery 
in all the United States territories. 

Mr. Douglas : I desire hini to answer 
whether he is opposed to the acquisition 
of any new territory- unless sla^•ery is first 
lirohibited therein ? 

Mr. Lincoln : I am not generally op- 
posed to honest acquisition of territory ; 
and, in any given case. ] would or would 
not oppose such ac(juisitiou. according as 
I might think such acquisition would or 
would not aggravate the slavery question 
among ourselves. 

It was with great vigor and adroitness 
that the two distinguished combatants 
went over the ground covered by the above 
questions, at the remaining five places of 
debate, all of which were attended and 




listened to by immense concourses. On 
both sides the s])eeches were able, elo- 
quent, exhaustive. It was admitted by 
Lincoln's friends, that, on several occa- 
sions, he was partly foi'ed or, at least, 
badlv bothered. \vb'> on the other band. 



DEBATE BETWEEN LINCOLN AKD DOUGLAS —1S5S. 



295 



Douglas' admirers allowed that, in more 
than one instance, he was flatly and fairly 
floored liy Lincoln's logic, wit, good hu- 
mor and frankness. Douglas, while more 
hrusque and resolute, was also rather the 
superior of the two in a certain force, direct- 
ness and determination, that greatly helped 
his side. But it was, altogether, about an 
equal match in respect to the ability dis- 
played by these foremost champions. Both 
of them were self-made men ; both of 
them able lawyers and politicians ; both 
sprang from obscurity to distinction ; both 
belonged to the common people ; and both 
were strong and popular with the masses. 
The portrait which we give of Mr. Doug- 
las (Mr. Lincoln's will be found in another 
part of this volume i represents him at this 
victorious stage in his career. 

As for the result, Lincoln took more of 
the popular vote than Douglas, but the 
latter secured a majority in the legislature, 
— sufficient to insure his re-election to the 
United States senate, and this majority 



would probably have been greater, but for 
tile hostility towards him of a certain por- 
tion of his own party, who favored a more 
thorough southern or pro-slavery policy 
than Douglas would con.sent to. 

In May, 1860, the Kepublican Nomi- 
nating Convention met at Chicago, 111., and 
after successive ballots, Mr. Lincoln was 
chosen standard-bearer of the party in the 
presidential contest. His election followed 
iu November ensuing. Mr. Douglas failed 
of a nomination at the Democratic conven- 
tion. Secession raised its gory front. 
Forgetting past differences, Douglas mag- 
nanimously stood shoulder to shoulder 
with Lincoln in behalf of the Union. It 
was the olive branch of genuine patriotism. 
But, while proudly holding aloft the ban- 
ner of his country in the councils of the 
nation, and while yet the blood of his 
countrymen had not drenched the land, 
the great senator was suddenly stricken 
from among the living, in the hour of the 
republic's greatest need. 



XXXI. 

EXTRAORDINARY COMBAT BETWEEN THE IRON-CLADS 

MERRIMAO AND MONITOR, IN HAMPTON 

ROADS.— 1862. 



SudJen Appearance of tlie Meniiiiac Ariionj; the Feiler.il Kriuates — Tlieir Swift and Terrible Destruc 
tion by Her Steel Prow. — Unexpected Arrival of tlie " Little Monitor " at tbe Scene of Action. — Sbe 
Engages and Disables the Monster Craft in a Four Hours' Figlit. — Total Revolution in Naval War- 
fare the World Over by this Remarkable Contest. — How the Merrimao Changed Hands. — Burned and 
Sunk at Norfolk, Va — Her Hull Raised by the Confederates. — She is Iron Roofed and Plated. — Proof 
Against Shot and Shell. — A Powerful Steel Beak in Her Prow — Most Formidable Vessel Afloat — 
In Command of Commodore Buchanan. — Departs from Norfolk, March 8th — Pierces and Sinks the 
Cumberland. — Next Attacks the Congress. — The Noble Frigate Destroyed — Fight Begun with the 
Minnesota. — Suspemled at Nightfall. — Trip of the Monitor trom New York. — Her New and Singular 
Build, — Lieutenant Worden Hears of the Battles. — Resolves to Grapple with the Monster. — The Two 
Together, Next Day. — A Scene Never to be Forgotten. — Worden Turns the Tide of Fortune. — 
Repulse and Retreat of the Merrimac. 



" Be it Rrsolved, eto-.TIihI the timnks t^i' Congress and of the Aniencnn people are due. and are hereby teodercd, to Lieutenant J. 
I* Worden. of the tjnited Stalea Navv. and to the olMcerp and men ot tlie iron-clad gun-boat Monitor, under his command, for the skill and 
gallantry exhihited by them in the late remarkable battle between the Monitor and the rebel iron-clad fcteamer Merriniac."— Resolution 
Passed bt cokohess. 



UITTIXG the city of Norfolk, Va., on the eighth 
ot JSIareh, 1862, tliti confederate iron-chid steam- 
ram Merriinac sailed down Elizabeth river into 
Hampton Roads, Chesapeake Bay, and there sig- 
nalized the navai history o the civil war in Amer- 
ica by an action not only memorable beyond all 
others in that tremendous conflict, but altogether 
unprecedented in the annals of ocean warfare in 
any country or in any age. On the abandonment 
and destruction, by fire, of the Norfolk navy yard, 
in Ajiril. ISfil, by the United States officers in 
charge, among the vessels left behind was the 
steam frigate INFerrimac, of four thousand tons 
burden, then under repair. In the conflagration 
she was burned to her copper-line, and down 
INTERIOR OF Tiin TOWER OF THE MONITOR, through to hcr bcrtli-deck, which, with her spar 
and gun-decks, was al.>.;o burned. Soon after the confederate authorities took possession 
of the navy yard, the ]\Ierriinac was raised and converted into an iron-plated man-of-war 
of the most formidable character. 




Immediately after this, she was placed upon the dry 



COMBAT BETWEEN HIE MEREIMAC AND ilONITOK — lS(i2. 297 



dock, and covered with a sloping roof of 
iron plates three inches thick, the weight 
of which nearly broke her down upon the 
dock. Owing to some miscalculation when 
launched, she sank four feet deejjer than 
before, and took in considerable water. She 
was, inconsequence, obliged to be docked a 
second time. Her hull was cut down to 
within three feet of her water-mark, over 
which the bomb-proof house covered htr 
gun-deck. She was also iron-plated, and her 
bow and stern steel-clad, with a projecting 
snout of iron for the purpose of piercing 
an antagonist. She had no masts, and 
there was nothing to be seen over her gun- 
deck but the pilot-house and smoke-stack. 
Her bomb-proof was three inches thick, 
and consisted of wrought iron. Her arma- 
ment consisted of four eleven-inch navy 
guns, broadside, and two one-hundred- 
pounder rifled guns at the bow and .stern. 
She was now named the Virginia, though 
she continued to be known as the Merri- 
mac. She was commanded by Com. Frank- 
lin Buchanan, formerly commandant of the 
Washington navy yard. 

The time chosen for her departure for 
Hampton Roads was one peculiarly adapted 
for the trial of her prowess. The federal 
fleet in that vicinity comprised the sloop- 
of-war Cumberland, the sailing-frigate 
Congress, the steam-frigates Minnesota, 
St. Lawrence, and Koanoke — the latter in 
a disabled condition from a broken shaft, 
together with a number of improvised 
gun-boats of a small grade. The Cumber- 
land and Congress were anchored before 
the entrenched federal camp at Newport 
News, the Roanoke and St. Law'rence near 
the Rip Raps, and the Minnesota in front 
of Fortress Monroe. 

On the Merrimac coming out, on Satur- 
day, the eighth of March, she stood directly 
across the roads toward Newport News. 
What followed was, according to the nar- 
rative published in the Baltimore Ameri- 
can by one who had unusually favorable 
opportunities of observation, in the order 
of occurrence given below : 

As soon as the Merrimac was .nade out 
and her direction ascertained (says the 



narrative referred to), the crews were beat 
to quarters on both the Cumberland and 
Congress, and preparations made for what 
was felt to be an almost hopeless fight, but 
the determination to make it as desperate 
as possible. The Merrimac kept straight 
on, making, according to the best estimates, 
about eight miles an hour. As she passed 
the mouth of Nansemond river, the Con- 
gress threw the first shot at her, which 
was immediately answered. The Merri- 
mac passed the Congress, discharging a 
broadside at her, — one shell from which 
killed and disabled every man except one 
at gun No. Ten, — and kept on toward the 
Cumberland, which she apjjroached at full 
speed, striking her on the port side near 
the bow, her stem knocking port No. One 
and the bridle-port into one, whilst her 
ram, or snout, cut the Cvunberland under 
water. Almost at the moment of collision, 
the Merrimac discharged from her forward 
gun an eleven-inch shell. This shell raked 
the whole gun-deck, killing ten men at 
gun No. One, among whom was master- 
mate John Harrington, and cutting off 
both arms and legs of quarter-gunner 
Wood. The water rushed in from the hole 
made below, and in five minutes the ship 
began to sink by the head. Shell and 
solid shot from the Cumberland were rained 
upon the Merrimac as she j)assed ahead, 
but the most of them glanced off harm- 
lessly from the incline of her iron-plated 
bomb-proof. 

As the Merrimac rounded to and came 
up, she again raked the Cumberland with 
a heavy fire. At this fire, sixteen men at 
gun No. Ten were killed or wounded, and 
all subsequently carried dowil in the sink- 
ing ship. Advancing with increased mo- 
mentum, the Merrimac now struck the 
Cumberland on the starboard side, sma.sh- 
ing her upper works and cutting another 
hole below the water-line. 

The ill-fated Cumberland now began to 
rapidly settle, and the scene became most 
horrible. The cock-pit was filled with the 
wounded, whom it was found impossible 
to bring up. The forward magazine was 
under water, but powder was still supplied 



L'Uti 



IKOM COLOSY TO WOliLU POWEK. 



from the after-magazine, and the firinn; 
kept steadily up by men who knew that 
the ship was sinking under them. They 
worked desperately and unremittingly, and 
amid the din and horror of the conflict 
gave cheers for their flag and the Union, 
which were joined in by the wounded. 
The decks were slippery with blood, and 
arms and legs and chunks of flesh were 
strewed about. The Merrimac laid off at 
easy j)oini:-blank range, discharging lier 
broadsides alternately at the Cumberland 
and the Congress. The water b_y this time 
had reached the after-magazine of the 
Cumberland. The men, however, kept at 
work, and several cases of powder were 
passed up and the guns kept in play. A 



drowned. When the order Wvis given to 
cease tiring, and to look out for their safety 
in the best way possible, numbers scam- 
pered througli the port-holes, whilst others 
reached the spar-deck by the companion- 
ways. Some were unable to get out by 
either of these means, and were carried by 
the rapidl3'' sinking ship. 

The Cumberland sank in water nearly to 
her cross-trees. She went down with her 
^floj/ still fi/iug, and, for some time after, 
it might still be seen flying from the mast 
above the water that overwhelmed the 
noble ship, — a memento of the bravest, 
most daring, and yet most hopeless defense 
that was ever made by any vessel belong- 
ing to any navy in the world. The men 





number of men in the after shell-room lin- 
gered there too long in their eagerness to 
l)ass n\i shell and were drowned. 

By this time the water had readied the 
berth or main gun-deck, and it was felt 
hopeless and useless to continue the fight 
longer. The word was given for each man 
to save himself ; but after this order, gun 
No. Seven was fired, when the adjoining 
gun, No. Six, was actually under water. 
This last shot was fired by an active little 
fellow named Matthew Tenney, whose 
ourage had been conspicuous throughout 
tbe action. As his port was left open by 
the recoil of the gun, he jum])ed to sci-am- 
ble out, but the water rushed in with so 
much force that he was washed back and 



fought with a courage that could not be 
excelled ; there was no flinching, no thought 
of surrender. The whole number lost, of 
the Cumberland's crew, was one hundred 
and twenty. Many of the scenes on board 
were deeply affecting. Two of the gunners 
at the bow-guns, when the ship was sink- 
ing, clasped their guns in their arms, and 
would not be removed, and went down 
embracing them. One gunner had both 
his legs shot away; but he made three 
steps on his bloody thighs, seized the lan- 
yard and fired his gun, falling back dead. 
Wood, who lost both arms and legs, on 
being offered assistance, cried out, '■^Buck 
fo i/ouf fjiiiif:, hni/sf Gire'emfits! Hur- 
nih for the flag !" He lived till she sank. 



COMBAT BETWEEN THE MEREIMAC AXI) 3IOXITOB — ISOi. 299 



Having thoroughly demolished the Cum- 
berland, the INIerriiiiac now proceeded to 
deal with tlie Congress, the officers of 
which, having seen the fate of the Cum- 
berland, and aware that the Congress must 
also be sunk if she remained within reach 
of the iron monster's beak, had got all sail 
on the ship, with the intention of running 
her ashoi'e. The tug-boat Zouave also 
came out and made fast to the Cumberland, 
and assisted in towing her ashore. 

The Merriniac then surged uj), gave the 
Congress a broadside, receiving one in 
return, and getting astern, raked the Con- 
gress fore and aft. This fire was terrible- 
destructive, a shell killing ever3' man at 
one of the guns except one. Coming again 
broadside to the Congress, the Merrimac 
ranged slowlj- backward and forward, at 
less than one hundred yards distant, and 
fired broadside after broadside into the 
Congress. The latter vessel replied man- 
fully and obstinately, every gun that could 
be brought to bear being discharged rap- 
idly, but with little effect upon the iron 
monster. Some of the balls caused splint- 
ers of iron to fly from lier mailed roof, but 
still she seemed well nigh invulnerable. 
The Merrimac's guns appeared to be spe- 
cially trained on the after-magazine of the 
Congress, and shot after shot entered that 
part of the ship. 

Thus slowly drifting down with the 
current and again steaming up, the Merri- 
mac continued for an hour to fire into her 
opponent. Several times the Congress was 
on fire, but the flames were kejjt down. 
Finally, the ship was on fire in so many 
places, and the flames gathering such force, 
that it was hopeless and suicidal to keep 
up the defense any longer. The federal 
flag was sorrowfully hauled down and a 
white flag hoisted at the peak. After it 
was hoisted, the Merriniac continued to 
fire, perhaps not discovering the white flag, 
but soon after ceased firing. 

A small confederate tug that had fol- 
lowed the Merrimac out of Norfolk tlien 
came alongside the Congress, and a young 
officer gained the gun-deck through a port- 
hole, announced that he came on board to 



take command, and ordered the officers on 
board the tug. The officers of the Con- 
gress refus<?d to go, hoping from the near- 
ness to the shore that they would be able 
to reach it, and imwilling to become pris- 
oners whilst the least chance of escape 
remained. Some of the men, thinking the 
tug was a federal vessel, rushed on board. 
At this moment, the members of an Indi- 
ana regiment, at Newport News, brought 
a Parrott gun down to the beach and 
opened fire upon the tug. The latter 
hastily put off, and the Merrimac again 
opened fire upon the Congress. The fire 
not being returned from the ship, the Mer- 
rimac commenced shelling the woods and 
camps at Newport News. 

By the time all were ashore, it was 
seven o'clock in the evening, and the Con- 
gress was in a bright sheet of flame fore and 
aft. She continued to burn until twelve 
o'clock at night, her guns, which were 
loaded and trained, goingoff as they became 
heated. Finally, the fire reached her mag- 
azines, and with a tremendous concussion 
her charred remains blew up. There were 
some five tons of gunpowder in her mag- 
azines, and about twenty thousand dollars 
in the safe of paymaster Buchanan, the 
latter officer being an own brother to the 
commander of the Merrimac. The loss of 
life on board the Congress was lamentable. 

After sinking the Cumberland and firing 
the Congress, the Merrimac (with her 
companions the Yorktown and James- 
town,) stood off in the direction of the 
Minnesota, which, in trying to reach the 
scene of action, had run aground, and 
could not be moved. An exchange of shot 
and .shell, however, took place between the 
vessels, after which, nightfall setting in, 
the Merrimac steamed in under Sewall's 
Point, expecting the next day to capture 
the Minnesota as a prize, instead of destroy- 
ing her. The day thus closed dismally for 
the federal side, and with the most gloomy 
apprehensions of what would occur the 
next day. The Minnesota was at the 
mercy of the Merrimac, and there appeared 
no reason wh^' the iron monster might not 
clear the Koads of the whole fleet, and 



3U0 



PKOll COLUA'Y TO woi;ll) powek. 



destroy all the stores and warehouses on 
the beach. Saturday, therefore, was a 
night of terror at Fortress Monroe. 

But just here, the chief event of interest 
centers. It was at night, the moon shin- 
ing brightly, when, totally unexpected, 
there came into those blood-tlyed waters, 
the little gun-boat Mon itor, from New York, 
— a vessel which had just been completed, 
from designs of Mr. Ericsson, and differ- 
ing materially from any vessel ever before 
constructed, and believed by its inventor 
to be absolutely invulnerable. Externally, 
it had the appearance of a long, oval raft, 
rising only eighteen inches above the 
water, with a low, round tower upon its 
center. This raft was the upper part of 
the hull of the vessel, and was plated with 
iron so as to be ball-proof ; it projected on 
every side beyond the lower hull, which 
contained the machinery. The tower, con- 
taining two heavy guns, the only arma- 
ment of the battery, was of iron, and nearly 
a foot in thickness, and so constructed as 
to revolve, bringing the guns to bear upon 
any point. This tower, nine feet high and 
twenty in diameter, and a pilot-house, ris- 
ing three feet, were all that appeared upon 
the smooth, level deck. She was com- 
manded by Lieutenant Worden, U. S. N., 
and, though a mere pigmy, in size and 
armament, compared with the JMerrimac, 
was soon to measure her prowess with the 
latter, in a contest such as liad never 
entered into the imagination even of Mr. 
Ericsson himself. 

The succeeding day, Sunday, dawned 
fair. As the sun broke on the horizon, a 
slight haze was visible on the water, Avhich 
prevented an extended vision. At half 
past six, A. M., this haze cleared away. 
Looking toward Sewall's Point, there 
appeared the Merrimac, and her attend- 
ants, the steamers Yorktown and Patrick 
Henry. They were stationary, — the Mer- 
rimac to the right of the others, blowing 
off steam. They seemed deliberating what 
to do — whether to move on to attempt the 
destruction of the Minnesota, which was 
yet aground, or move on to the federal 
fleet anchored near the Rip Ilai)s. At 



seven o'clock, a plan seemed to have been 
adopted, and the ^Merrimac steamed in the 
direction of the Minnesota, which was still 
aground. The Yorktown and Jamestown 
were crowded with troops, and steamed 
slowly after the Merrimac. ' The latter 
steamed along with boldness until she was 
within three miles of the Minnesota, when 
the Monitor essayed from behind the lat- 
ter, and proceeded toward the Merrimac. 
It should here be mentioned, that when 
Lieutenant Worden first arrived in the 
Roads and was informed of what had 
occurred, though his crew were suffering 
from exposure and loss of rest from a 
stormy voyage around from New York, he 
at once made preparations for taking part 
in whatever might take place the next day. 
To this end, the Monitor moved up, before 
daylight on Sunday morning, and took a 
position alongside the Minnesota, lying 
between the latter ship and the fortress, 
where she could not be seen by the enemy, 
but was ready, with steam up, to slip out. 

At the sudden appearance of so strange- 
looking and diminutive a craft as the Mon- 
itor, the confederate monster seemed non- 
plussed, and hesitated, no doubt in wonder- 
ment that such an unaccountable and 
apparently insignificant an object should 
l)e making so bold an approach. 

The Merrimac now closed the distance 
lietween her and the Monitor, until they 
were within a mile of each other. Both 
batteries stopped. The Merrimac fired a 
shot at the Minnesota, to which no reply 
was made. She then fired at the ]\[onitor ; 
the latter replied, hitting the Merrimac 
near the water-line. The Merrimac then 
commenced firing very rapidly, first from 
her stern gun at the Monitor, and then 
her broadside guns, occasionally firing a 
shot at the Minnesota. The fight went on 
in this way for an hour or two, both ves- 
sels exchanging shots pretty freely. Some- 
times the Merrimac would retire, followed 
by the Monitor, and sometimes the reverse. 

While the fight between the batteries 
was going on, one hundred solid nine-inch 
shot were sent up from Fortress Monroe 
on the steamer Rancocas to the Minnesota. 



COMBAT BETWEEN THE MERRIMAC AND MONITOR — 1862. :!0l 




At a quarter-past ten o'clock, the Merri- 
mac and Monitor had come into pretty 
close quarters, the former giving the latter 
two broadsides in succession. It was 
replied to promptly by the Monitor. The 
firing was so rapid that both craft were 
obscured in columns of white smoke for a 
moment or more. The ramparts of the 
fort, the rigging of the vessels in port, the 
bouses, and the bend, were all crowded 
with sailors, soldiers and civilians. When 
the rapid firing alluded to took place, these 
spectators were singularly silent, as if 
doubtful as to the result. Their impatience 
was soon removed by the full figure of the 
Monitor, with the stars and stripes flying 
at her stern, steaming around the Merri- 
(j mac, moving with the ease of a duck on 
H the water. The distance between the ves- 
I sels was forty feet. In this circuit, the 
a Monitor's guns were not idle, as she fired 
^ shot after shot into her antagonist, two of 
a which penetrated the monster's sides. 
g At eleven, A. M., the Minnesota opened 
a fire, and assisted the Monitor in engaging 
a the Merrimac. She fired nine-inch solid 
B shot with good accuracy, but with appar- 
^ ently little effect. The Merrimac returned 
I the fire, firing shell, one of which struck 
■* ,1 5 and exploded the boiler of the gun-boat 
a Dragon, which was alongside the Minne- 
j sota, endeavoring to get her off. Eor the 
> next hour, tlie battle raged fiercely between 
'■^' the Merrimac on the one side, and her 
antagonists, the Monitor, Minnesota, and 
Wliitehall, but with no important result. 
The Minnesota being the best mark for 
the Merrimac, the latter fired at her fre- 
quently, alternately giving the Monitor a 
shot. The Merrimac made several attempts, 
also, to run at full speed past the Monitor, 
to attack and run down the Minnesota. 
All these attempts were parried, as it were, 
by the Monitor. In one of these attempts 
by the Merrimac, she ran her prow or ram 
with full force against the side of the 
Monitor; but it only had the effe"^ of 
careening the latter vessel in the slightest 
degree. The Yorktown and Patrick Henry 
kept at a safe distance from the Monitor. 
The former vessel, at the beginning of the 



302 



FROM. COLOXY TO WUltLD POWEli. 



fight, had the tenifiity to come within 
respectable range (if tlie Monitor. The 
latter fired one ?liot at her, which carried 
away hei- pilot-honse, and caused hei to lose 
no time in retiring. 

As the Monitor carried but two guns, 
whilst the Merrimac. had eight, of course 
she received two or three shots for every 
one she gave. The fight raged hotly on 
both sides, the opposing batteries moving 
around each other with great skill, ease, 
and dexterity. The Merrimac, though the 
strongest, did not move with the alertness 
of her antagonist ; hence the Monitor had 
the advantage of taking choice of position. 
At a quarter before twelve o'clock, noon, 
Lieutenant Heiiburn, the signal officer on 
the ramparts at Fortress Monroe, reported 
to General Wool that the Monitor had 
pierced the sides of the Merrimac, and in 
a few minutes the latter was in full retreat. 
Wliether true, or not. that the Merrimac's 
armor had actually been penetrated, her 
iron prow had become .so wrenched in 
striking the sides of her antagonist, that 
tlie timbers within were started, and the 
vessel leaked badly. The little Monitor 
followed the retreating Merrimac until she 
got well inside Sewall's Point, and then 
returned to the Minnesota. It is probable 
that the pursuit would have been con- 
tinued still farther, but Lieutenant Worden 
had previously had his eyes injured, and it 
was felt that, as so much depended on the 
Monitor, it was imprudent to expose her 
unnecessarily. At the time he was injured, 
Lieutenant Worden was looking out of the 
e\'e-holes of the pilot-house, which were 
simply horizontal slips, half an inch wide. 
A round shot struck against these slits as 
Lieutenant Worden was looking through, 
causing some scalings from the iron and 
fragments of cement to fly with great force 
against his ej^es, utterly blinding him for 
some days, and permanently destroying 
the power of his left eye. Stunned by 
the concussion, he was carried away 
helpless. 

On recovering sufficiently to sjieak, he 
asked — 

" Have I saved the Mia nrsutu ? " 



" Yes, and wltippcd the Merrimac" was 
the answer. 

" Then I don't cure what hecomesofme.'^ 
said Lieutenant Worden. 

No other real damage was received by 
the Monitor, during the action ; the deeji- 
est indentation received by her was on 
the side, amounting to four and one-half 
inches ; on the turret, the deepest was one 
and one-half inches; and on the deck, one- 
half inch. The Merrimac, in addition to 
the injury already mentioned, had her 
anchor and flag-staff shot away, her smoke- 
stack and steam-pipe riddled, two of her 
crew killed and eight wounded, including 
her commander, Buch.anan. The latter 
officer went out on his deck, was seen by 
the federal sliari)-shooters at Camp Butler, 
and was shot with a minie rifle ball in his 
left leg, which maimed him for life. His 
exploits gained him great favor at the 
south, and he was subsequently made 
Admiral of the Confederate States navy. 
The praises of Lieutenant Worden filled 
every loj'al mouth, and he was successfully 
promoted to the highest rank in the" ser- 
vice. 

Withdrawing to Norfolk, the Merrimac 
underwent extensive repairs for some 
weeks, and was provided with ordnance of 
great power. She tlien took her station 
at the mouth of the Elizabeth river, guard- 
ing it, and threatening the United States 
vessels in the Roads, but, on account of 
some defects in her working, not ventur- 
ing an attack. Finally, Norfolk having 
surrendered to the Union forces, M:iy 10th, 
and the Merrimac being found to draw too 
much water to admit of her being removed 
\\\) the river, she was on the 12th aban- 
doned and set on fire, and soon after blew 
up. 

The loss of two such fine war vessels as 
the Cumberland and Congress, with some 
four hundred brave men, cast a gloom over 
the nation, the weight of which was only 
relieved by the heroism displayed in their 
defense. Indeed, one of the greatest in- 
stances of patriotic devotion ever recorded 
in our own or any other nation's naval his- 
tory, is that which narrates the closing 



COMBAT BETWEEN THE JVIEREIMAC AND MONITOR — 1862. 303 



scene on board the Cumberland. Neither 
the shots of the Congress, nor of the Cum- 
berland, had any more effect, for the most 
part, upon the iron-mailed Merrimac, than 
if they had been so many peas. But if 
they could have kept the Merrimac off, she 
never could have sunk the Cumberland. 
They had then nothing to do but stand and 
fight and die like men. Buchanan asked 
their commander, Lieutenant Morris — 
" Will you sun-ender the ship ? " 
"Never," said Morris, "never will we 
surrender the shiji."' 

Buchanan then backed his huge ram off 
again, and the Cumberland fired as rapidly 
as she could, but the Merrimac came once 
more and ran her steel beak in ; and now 
it was that Buchanan asked Lieutenant 
Morris, calling him by name — 









" Mr. Morris, will you surrender that 
ship ? " 

"Never," said Morris, "siii/c her!" 

The remaining act in this startling 
drama is well known. The guns of the 
Cumberland were coolly manned, loaded 
and discharged, while the vessel was in a 
sinking condition, and the good ship went 
down with her flag tlving defiantlv at the 
gaff 

Similar was the bravery exhibited on 
board the ill-fated Congress. The father 
of the gallant commander of that ship 
(Lieutenant Joseph Smith), who lost his 
life in that terrible encounter, was Com- 



modore Joseph Smith, of Washington. It 
appears that the elder Smith had exerted 
himself specially to finish the work on the 
Monitor, and hasten her departure. The 
son, too, had written repeatedly to the 
naval authorities at Wa.shington, express- 
ing his fears for the consequences of an 
attack from the Merrimac, and urging 
plans for guarding against it. The father 
knew the spirit of his son, and tliat the 
only issue of a battle for him was death or 
^'ictory. When ho saw, therefore, by the 
first dispatch from Fortress Monroe, that 
the Congress had raised the white flag, he 
only remarked quietly, " Joe is dead ! " 
No Roman father ever paid a nobler or 
more emphatic tribute of confidence to a 
gallant son than is contained in the words 
30 uttered, nor ever gave that son to his 
country with more cheerful and 
entire devotion. The sad assur- 
ance was well founded. Tlie flag 
was not struck until liis son had 
fallen. 

Not less conspicuous was the 
conduct of Charles Johnston, boats- 
wain of the Congress — a fine speci- 
men of the thorough seaman, who 
had been in the navy some thirty 
odd years — who greatly excited the 
admiration of the officers ny his 
cool, unflinching courage. Sta- 
tioned in the very midst of the 
carnage committed by the raking 
fire of the Merrimac, he never lost 
his self-possession, and not for a 
moment failed to cheer on and encourage 
the men. Blinded with the smoke and 
dust, and splashed with the blocjil and 
brains of his shipniates, his cheering words 
of encouragement were still heard. After 
the engagement, from which he escaped 
unwounded, his kindness and care in jjro- 
viding for the removal of the wounded, 
were untiring. The fact has already been 
mentioned that the paymaster of the Con 
gress was an own brother of the com- 
mander of the Merrimac. His position 
was one of extreme agony, but his loyal 
heart did not fail him. " Just before the 
sanguinary engagement," said paymaster 



304 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



Buchanan, " I volunteered my serv- 
ices to Lieut. Commanding Joseph B. 
Smith for duty on either of the upper 
decks, although the rebel steamer Mer- 
rimac was commanded by my own 
brother, when I received an order to take 
charge of the berth-deck division, which 
order I promptly obeyed, and, thank 



God, I did some service to my beloved 
country." 

The character of this contest maj' truly 
be said to have astonished the world, and 
its effect has been to revolutionize the 
princij)les and mode of naval warfare, ren- 
dering wooden vessels of war practically 
useless for active service. 



XXXII. 

PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION, AS A WAR MEAS- 
URE, BY PRESIDENT LINCOLN.— 1863,. 



More than Three Millions, in Bondage at the South, Declared Forever Free. — Most Important Amer- 
ican State Paper Since July 4tli, 1776 — Pronounced, bj- the President, " the Great Event of the 
Nineteenth Century." — The Whole System of Slavery Finally Swept from tlie Republic, by Vic- 
tories in the Field and by Constitutional Amendments. — Mr. Lincoln's Views on Slavery. — Opposed 
to all Unconstitutional Acts. — His Orders to Union Generals. — Prohibits the Arming of Negroes. — 
Alarming Progress of Events. — The Great Exigency at Last — Slavery versus the Union. — Solemn 
and Urgent Alternative — Emancip.ation Under the War Power. — Preparation of the Great Document. 
— Its Submission to the Cabinet. — Opinions and Discussions — Singular Reason for Delay. — Mr. Lin- 
coln's Vow to God. — Waiting for a Union Triumph — Decided by the Battle of Antietam. — Final 
Adoption of the Measure. — Mr. Carpenter's Admirable Narrative. — Public Reception of ihe Procla- 
mation. — Promulgation at the South. — Scenes of Joy Among the Freedmen. — Enfranchisement 
Added to Freedom. 



'* And upon thifl act, aincerely believed to be an act or juatice. warranted by the Constitution, upon military necessity, I invoke the con- 
siderate judsment of mjnliind, and Itie gracious favor of Alinigiity God."— Tue Proclamation. 



EALOUSLY cherisliiiio' the humane personal wish, '■ that all men every- 
wiicre might he free," — as expressed by himsell' in one of his most mem- 
orable political letters, — and inflexibly' objecting to the introduction of 
slavery into the new national territories, President Lincoln, nevertheless, 
on every occasion avowed his opposition to all unconstitutional meas- 
ures of interference with that .system, as it existed in the States of the 
South. Only under the stupendous exigency precipitated upon him 
and upon the country, by the war inaugurated at Fort Sumter, and 
-, -i f, now carried on with such direful loss of blood and treasure for two long 
I? il H years, for the destruction of the Union, did he avail himself of the high 
and solemn prerogative of his position, as the sworn protector ami 
defender of the nation, to decree, substantially, the utter extinction of 
slavery throughout all the borders of the land. 

It was a war measure, done " upon military necessity," and in the 
grave performance of which President Lincoln said : " I could not feel 
that, to the best of my ability, I had even tried to preserve the Constitu- 
tion, if, to preserve slavery, or any minor matter, I should permit the 
wreck of government, country, and constitution altogether. When, early 
in the war. General Fremont attempted military emancipation, I forbade 
it, because I did not then think it an indispensable necessity. Wlien, a 
little later. General Cameron, then secretary of war, suggested the arm- 
ing of the blacks, I objected, because I did not yet think it an indispen- 
sable necessity. When, still later, General Hunter attempted military 
20 



•^06 



YllOil COLONY TO \VOi;J.D TOWEK. 



emancipation, I again forbade it, because 
I did not yet think the indispensable 
necessity had come. Wlien, in March and 
May and July, 1862, I made earnest and 
successive appeals to the border states to 
favor compensated emancijtation, I believed 
the indispensable necessity for military 
emancipation and aruiing the blacks would 
come, unless averted by that measure. 
They declined the proposition ; and I 
was, in my best judgment, driven to the 
alternative of eitlier surrendering the 
Union, and with it the Coustitution, or of 
laying strong hand upon the colored ele- 
ment. I chose the latter." It will thus 
be seen that, so far from being rash or 
aggressive in his anti-slavery policy, he 
favored no step in that direction, until 
driven to it as a last and remediless alter- 
native, froui which there seemed no possi- 
ble escape. 




Singularly enough, this great measure 
— involving as mighty a moral, social, and 
political revolution as was ever accom- 
plished in any age or in any country — was 
distinctly expounded ami foresiiailowcd by 
John Quincy Adams, in a remarkable 
debate which took place in the lower house 
of congress, in 1842, and in the course of 
which he said : " I believe that, so long as 
the slave states are able to sustain their 
institutions, without going abroad or call- 
ing uj)on other parts of the Union to aid 
them or act on the subject, so long I will 
consent never to interfere. I have said 



this; and I repeat it; but, if they come to 
the free states and say to them, ' You must 
help us to keep down our .slaves, you must 
aid us in an insurrection and a civil war,' 
then I say that, with that call, comes a full 
and plenary power to this house, and to the 
senate, over the whole subject. It is a 
war power; I say it is a war power; and 
when your country is actually in war, 
whether it be a war of invasion or a war 
of insurrection, congress'has power to carry 
on the war, and must carry it on according 
to the laws of war ; and, by the laws of war, 
an invaded country has all its laws and 
municipal institutions swept by the board, 
and martial law takes the jjlace of them. 
This power in congress has, perhaps, never 
been called into exercise under the present 
constitution of the United States. But, 
when the laws of war are in force, what, 
I ask. is one of those laws? It is this: 
that when a country is invaded, and two 
hostile armies are set in martial arraj', the 
commanders of both armies have power to 
emancipate all the slaves in the invaded 
territory." In proof of the correctness of 
his assertion, Mr. Adams cited the well- 
known historical case of the abolition of 
slavery in Colomliia. Hrst by Murillo, the 
Spanish general, and subsequently by 
Bolivar, the American general, in each case 
as a military act, and observed and main- 
tained to this day. 

Though the great American Proclama- 
tion of Emancipation did not appear until 
January 1, 1863, President Lincoln's mind 
had for some months previously been drift- 
ing in the direction of some such act. As 
he himself expressed it, everything was 
going wrong — the nation seemed to have 
put forth aliout its utmost efforts, and he 
reallv didn"t know what more to do, unless 
he did this. Accordingly, he prepared a pre- 
liminary proclamation, nearly in the form 
in which it subsequently appeared, called 
the cabinet together, and read it to them, 
with the following result, as reported: 

Mr. Montgomery Blair was startled, 
" If you issue that ju'oclamation, Mr. Pres- 
ident," he exclaimed, "you will lose every 
one of the fall elections." 



THE PKOCI.A.MATIOX OF K.MAX( IPATIOX — '1S('.:]. 



307 



Mr. Seward, on the otlier liaiul, said, "I 

approve of it, Mr. Pre.sideiit, just as it 
stands. I approve of it in principle, and 
I approve the policy of issuing it. I only 
ohject to the time. Send it out now, on 
the heels of our late disasters, and it will 
be construed as the convulsive struggle of 
a drowning man. To give it proper weight, 
you should reserve it until after some vic- 
tory." The president assented to Mr. 
Seward's view, and held the document in 
reserve. It appeared to the president, 
that Mr. Seward's opinion was of great 
wisdiim and force. 

Perhaps no account of this most memo- 
rable event can be said to equal, in relia- 
bility and graphic interest, that which is 
furnished by Mr. F. B. Carpenter, in his 
reminiscences of " Six Months at the 
White House," while employed there in 




^ ■ 



executing that unrivaled masterpiece of 
American historical painting — the Procla- 
mation of Emancipation — which, by uni- 
versal consent, has placed Mr. Carpenter's 
name second to none on the roll of eminent 
modern artists. Enjoying, too, as he did, 
the most intimate personal relations with 
the author of that proclamation, the infor- 
mation which he thus obtained from the 
president's own lips, as to its origin, dis- 
cussion, and final adoption, must forever 
be the source from which, on this subject, 
all historians must draw. 

As already stated, the opinion of the 



secretary of state in regard to the effect of 
issuing such a proclamation at such a time, 
impressed Mr. Lincoln very strongly. " It 
was an aspect of the case that" — said 
President Lincoln to Mr. Carpenter, — "in 
all my thought upon the subject, I hail 
entirely overlooked. The result was that 
I put the draft of the proclamation aside, 
as you do your sketch for a picture, wait- 
ing for a victory. From time to time I 
added or changed a line, touching it up 
here and there, anxiously watching the 
progress of events. Well, the next news 
we had was of Pope's disaster at Bull Eun. 
Things looked darker than ever. Finallj-, 
came the week of the battle of Antietam. 
I determined to wait no longer. The news 
came, I think, on Wednesday, that the 
advantage was on our side. I was then 
staying at the Soldiers' Home (three 
miles out of Washington). Here I fin- 
ished writing the second draft of the pre- 
liminary proclamation ; came up on Sat- 
urday ; called the cabinet together to hear 
it, and it was jmblished the following 
Monday." At the final meeting of Sep- 
tember 20th, another incident occurred in 
connection with Secretary Seward. Th(» 
president had written the important part 
of the proclamation in these words : — 

" That, on the first daj' of January, in 
the year of our Lord one thousand eight 
hundred and sixty-three, all persons held 
as slaves within any State or designated 
part of a State, the jjeople whereof shall 
then be in rebellion against the United 
States, shall be then, thenceforward, and 
forever Fhee ; and the Executive Govern- 
ment of the United States, including the 
military and naval authority thereof, will 
recor/uize the freedom of such persons, and 
will do no act or acts to repress such per- 
sons, or any of them, in any efforts they 
may make for their actual freedom." 

" When I finished reading this para- 
graph," resumed Mr. Lincoln, "Mr. Sewara 
stopped me, and said, ' I think, Mr. Presi- 
dent, that you should insert after the word 
" recognize," in that sentence, the words 
" and maintain." ' I replied that I had 
already considered the import of that ex- 



308 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEK. 



pression in this connectiou, but I liad nut 
introduced it, because it was not my way 
to promise what I was not entirely sure 
that I couUl perform, and I was not pre 
pared to say that I thought we were 
exactly able to 'maintain' this. But 
Seward insisted that we ought to take this 
ground, and the words finally went in. It 
is a somewhat remarkable fact,'' he subse- 
quently added, " that there were just one 
hundred days between the dates of tlie two 
proclamations issued upon the '22d of Sep- 
tember and the 1st of January." 



bany, N. Y., in 18G4 ; it is in the proper 
handwriting of Mr. Lincoln, excepting two 
interlineations in pencil, by Secretary 
Seward, and the formal heading and end- 
ing, which were written bj' the chief clerk 
of the state department. The final j)roc- 
lamation was signed on New Y'ear's T)ay, 
1863. The president remarked to Mr. 
Colfax, the same evening, that the signa- 
ture appeared somewhat tremulous and 
uneven. " Not." said he, " liecause of any 
nncertainty or hesitation on my jiart ; but 
it was just after the public reception, and 




The original draft of the proclamation 
was written upon one side of four half- 
sheets of official foolscap. " He flung down 
upon tlie table one day for me," continues 
Mr. Carpenter, " several sheets of the same, 
saying, '■ There, I believe, is some of the 
very paper which was used — if nut, it was 
at any rate just like it.' " The original draft 
is dated September 22, 1862, and was ])re- 
sented to the Army Eelief Bazaar, at Al- 



tlirec hours' hand-shaking is not calculated 
to imjjrove a man's chirography." Then 
changing his tone, he added : " The south 
had fair warning, that if they did not 
return to their duty, I should strike at 
this pillar of their strength. The promise 
must now be kept, and I shall never recall 
one word" 

In answer to a question from Mr. Car- 
penter, as to whether the policj' of eman- 



THE PROCLAilATlOA' OF E.MAXClPxVTION — 1863. 



309 



cipation was not opposed by some mem- 
bers of the cabinet, the president replied; 
"Nothing more than I have stated to you. 
Mr. Bkiir thought we should lose the fall 
elections, and opjjosed it on that ground 
only." " I have understood,'' said Mr. 
Carpenter, "that Secretary Smith was not 
in favor of your action. Mr. Blair told me 
that, when the meeting closed, he and the 
secretary of the interior went away to- 
gether, and that the latter said to him, 
that if the president carried out that pol- 
icy, he might count on losing Indiana, 
sui-e ! " "He never said anything of the 
kind to me," responded the president. 
" And what is Mr. Blair's opinion now ? '' 
I asked. " Oh," was the prompt reply, 
"he proved right in regard to the fall elec- 
tions, but he is satisfied that we have since 
gained more than we lost." " I have been 
told," I added, " that Judge Bates doubted 
the constitutionality of the proclamation." 
" He never expressed such an opinion in 
my hearing," replied Mr. Lincoln; "no 
member of the cabinet ever dissented from 
the policy, in conversation with me." 

It is well known that the statement 
found very general currency and credence, 
that, on the proclamation having been 
read to the cabinet. Secretary Chase ob- 
jected to the a[)j3earance of a document of 
such momentous character without one 
word beyond the dry phrases necessary to 
convey its meaning, and finally proposed 
that there should be added to the presi- 
dent's draft, the sentence — 'And upon this 
act, sincerely believed to be an act of jus- 
tice, warranted by tlie constitution, I 
invoke the considerate judgment of man- 
kind, and the gracious favor of Almighty 
God.' The facts of the case, however, as 
learned by Mr. Carpenter were these : 
While the measure was pending, Mr. Chase 
submitted to the president a draft of a 
proclamation embodying his views of the 
subject, and which closed with the solemn 
and appropriate words referred to. Mr. 
Lincoln adopted the sentence intact, as 
Mr. Chase wrote it, excepting that he 
inserted after the word 'constitution,' the 
woids 'upon military necessity;' and in 



that form the document went to the world, 
and to history. 

Mr. Carpenter also makes an interesting 
statement touching the religious aspect of 
Mr. Lincoln's mind, concerning this mo- 
mentous matter, as follows : Mr. Chase 
told me that at the cabinet meeting, imme- 
diately after the battle of Antietam, and 
just prior to the September proclamation, 
the president entered upon the business 
before them, b}' saying that "the time 
for the annunciation of the emiuicipation 
policy could be no longer delayed. Public 
sentiment," he thought, "would sustain it 
— many of his warmest friends and sup- 
porters demanded it — and he hud prow- 
ised his God that he would do it!" 
The last part of this was uttered in a low 
tone, and appeared to be heard by no one 
but Secretarj' Chase, who was sitting near 
him. He asked the president if he had 
correctly understood him. Mr. Lincoln 
replied : " I made a solemn vow before 
God, that if General Lee was driven back 
from Pennsylvania, I would crown the 
result by the declaration of freedom to the 
slaves." In February, 1865, a few days 
after the passage of the Constitutional 
Amendment, Mr. Carpenter went to Wash- 
ington, and was received by Mi-. Lincoln 
with the kindness and familiarity which 
had characterized their previous inter- 
course. I said to him at this time, (says 
Mr. Carpenter,) that I was very proud to 
have been the artist to have first conceived 
the design of painting a picture commem- 
orative of the Act of Emancipation ; that 
subsequent occurrences had only confirmed 
my own first judgment of that act as the 
most sublime moral event in our history. 
" Yes," said he, — and never do I remem- 
ber to have noticed in him more earnest- 
ness of expression or manner, — "as affairs 
have turned, it is the central act of my 
administration, and the great event of the 
nineteenth ceJltury.'' 

The scope of this most important state 
paper ever issued since the Declaration of 
Independence, was, to give liberty' to more 
than three millions of people, — a number 
eoual to the whole population of the 



310 



FEOM COLOXY TO \YOKLD POWEK. 







THE PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION — l.S(i3. 



311 



United States when the revolutionary 
struggle with Great Britain i-omnieneed, 
and about four-fifths of the whole slave 
population. The work of emancipation 
througliout all the borders of the land was 
completed by victories in the field, and the 
adoption of the Constitutional Amendment, 
Arti(.'le XIII., by which slavery was for- 
ever and entirely swept from the Republic. 

The reception of the proclamation by 
the millions who were ranged on the side 
of their country, praying and fighting for 
the success of the union cau.se, was warm 
and enthusiastic, the feeling being almost 
universalh^ prevalent that the nation had 
entered upon a new and auspicious era, 
and that, under such a banner, heaven 
would crown our armies with victory, and 
give perpetuitj- to our republic among the 
governments of the earth. Generally, the 
great document was the theme of earnest 
and eloquent discourses from the northern 
pulpits, the current of the preachers' 
thoughts showing itself in the various sub- 
jects or titles vmder which the event was 
discussed, such as ' The Conflict between 
Despotism and Libertj-,' 'The duty of 
uniting with our whole energies in execut- 
ing the Emancipation Edict of the presi- 
dent, to accomplish, by the blessing of 
God, its beneficent results, without possi- 
bility of failure,' 'The Jubilee of Free- 
dom,' 'The Influence of Christianit3' on 
the Abolition of Slavery,' — these, though 
but a few among thousands elicited by the 
proclamation, indicate the hearty appreci- 
ation of President Lincoln's course in issu- 
ing the decree. From countless pulpit.?, 
too, the momentous document was simjjly 
read, without comment. 

Great public meetings of congratulation 
and rejoicing were held in almost every 
large town and city in the various north- 
ern states. At the Cooper Institute, New 
York, a grand jubilee came off, the colored 
people of that city and of the surrounding 
towns for many miles, gathering together 
to do honor to so great a boon to their 
race. The large hall was completely 
packed, long before the hour at which the 
proceedings were ai)pointed to take place, 



and multitudes had to be turned away 
from the feast of eloquence and music 
which was there enjoyed for several hours. 

Two days after the issue of the procla- 
mation, a large body of people assembled 
before the White House, in Washington, 
with a band of music, and called for the 
president. He appeared, and made an 
address of thanks to them for their cour- 
tesy-, in which, alluding to the proclama- 
tion, he said, "What I did, I did after a 
very full deliberation, and under a heavy 
and solemn sense of responsibility. I can 
only trust in God I have made no mis- 
take." From the colored people of Balti- 
more, Mr. Lincoln was the recipient of a 
superb copy of the Bible, of the largest 
size, and bound in violet-colored velvet. 
The corners were bands of solid gold, and 
the event carved upon a plate also of gold, 
not less than one-fourth of an inch thick. 
Upon the left-liand cdvcr, was a design 
representing tlie president in a cotton- 
field, knocking the shackles off the wrists 
of a slave, who held one hand aloft as if in- 
voking blessings upon the head of his ben- 
efactor, — at whose feet was a scroll upon 
which was written "Emancipation ; " upon 
the other cover was a similar plate, bear- 
ing the inscription : " To Abraham Lin- 
coln, President of the United States, the 
friend of Universal Freedom. From the 
loyal colored people of Baltimore, as a 
token of respect and gratitude. Baltimore, 
July 4, 1864." 

But the greatest interest necessarily 
attaches to the recejrtion which such an 
amazing document met with on the part 
of those who were or had recently been 
slaves. Although by the terms of the 
proclamation, the cities of Norfolk and 
Portsmouth, Va., were excluded from its 
operation, the slaves fully believed that 
' Massa Lincoln ' had emancipated them all ; 
with this view, thej' refused to work with- 
out wages, and, their former masters ac- 
ceding to this, virtual emancipation was 
the result in that region. On New Year's 
day, the slaves of Norfolk, Portsmouth, 
and Gosport, with the African strangers 
gathered there, to the number of some 



312 



FKOJii COLOAY TO WUKLD i'OWEE. 



thousands, turned out en, masse, and liy 
processions, speeches, h_ymns and songs of 
jubilation, and by otiier demonstrations, 
celebrated wluit was ever afterward to be 
their Fourth of July. The exultation of 
the slaves was great, and many a notice- 
able incident presented itself. "Massa," 
said an old woman to a stranger near by, 
"I have had twenty children. My Massa 
and Missus sole 'em all off ; one of my 
gals was sole to buy young Missus lier 
piano. I used to stop my ears when I 
heard her play on dat ar; I thought I 
heard my chile a crying out dat it was 
bought wid her blood. Uey was all sole 
off, — I'se not got one left to Iniry me. 
But I'se free ! and my ole heart is glad 
agin. I'll go happy to my grave." In 
one of the colored churches in Norfolk, the 
preacher took for his text, " Stand fast, 
therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ 
has made you free," and with great inge- 
nuity, and without irreverence, the 
preacher showed how President Lincoln, 
in emancipating them, had stood in Christ's 
stead to them, and how it was now their 
duty to stand fast, and fight for the liberty 
which he, under God, had given them. 
Singular enough, tliere rose from the 
whole congregation a cry, as if with one 
voice, "Amen ! glory be to God ! we'll 
fight till de cows' tails drop off ! " 

In the Department of the South, em- 
bracing Port Royal, S. C, and other 
islands, it was very difficult to convince 
the colored people that they were free, and 
t.liat the government, or Yankees, could lie 
in earnest. Christmas v.'as to most of 
them a sad day. General Saxton, there- 
fore, who spared no effort to disabuse 
their minds and inspire them with confi- 
dence, issued his proclamation inviting the 
people to assemble at the head-quarters of 
the First South Carolina Volunteers, on 
the first of January. Missionaries, min- 
isters, superintendents and teachers, offi- 
cers and privates, joined heartily in the 
gathering. The word went out far and 
near, but the people were suspicious. 
Mischievous ones had told them it was a 
trap to force them into the army; others 



that they were to be collected on steam- 
boats that would run them to Cuba ; oth- 
ers that they were to be got away from 
their homes and sent into exile. But, at 
an early hour of the sublimely beautiful 
day, the jjeople began to arrive at the 
camping-ground, and, despite their fears, 
thousands were there. The proceedings 
opened with prayer and music, after which, 
• Judge Brisbane, of Wisconsin, but a son 
of South Carolina who, twenty-five years 
previously, set all his slaves free, read the 
emancipation act amidst the jubilant 
shouts of the vast multitude ; and when, 
succeeding this, the proclamation of Gen- 
eral Sa>.ton was read, declaring that the 
great act should be enforced, twelve deaf- 
ening cheers burst forth from the thou- 
sands of grateful and joyous hearts to 
whom the good tidings of liberty and pro- 
tection had thus come. An original ode 
was tlien sung to the tune of ' Scots wha' 
ha' wi' Wallace bled," and then came the 
crowning feature of the day, the presenta- 
tion by the Rev. Mr. French of a splendid 
silk flag, with the embroidered inscription : 

" To the First South Carolina Regiment. 
The j'ear of jubilee has come." 

It was a very elegant flag, a gift from 
Doctor Cheever's church in the city of 
New York. As it passed from the hands 
(if ]\Ir. French, the negroes struck up the 
national air, " M_y country, 'tis of thee," 
with fine effect. Colonel Higginson, who 
had received the flag, stood waiting his 
time to reply, with the golden tassels in 
his hands. After an eloquent speech by 
the colonel, he called the sergeant of Com- 
pany A, "Prince Rivers," and a corporal 
of another company, named Sutton, both 
black men, and, handing over the flag 
which had been presented, called upon 
both to speak, which they did with great 
acceptance. Other exercises of rejoicing 
took place, and then attention was paid to 
the physical wants of the happy throng. 
For this purpose, ten beeves had been 
slaughtered and were roasting in their 
pits ; and these, with several hundred gal- 
lons of molasses and water, — a favorite 
beverage of the negroes, — and a full sn]iply 



THE PR0CLA:\IATI0N of emancipation — 1863. 



513 



of hard bread, awaited the hungrj'^ expect- 
ants. Thus ended tlie grand celeliration 
of the emancipation of the slaves of South 
Carolina. 

The observance of the event in other 
parts of the south, wherever the authority 
of the union forces was present to permit 
it, was so similar in its character and 
enthusiasm to what has already been nar- 
rated, that it is unnecessary here to extend 
the descriptions. By the army and its 
officers, with here and there an exception, 
the proclamation was regarded as an act to 
which things had long been tending, and 
which, under the circumstances of peril in 
which the union had so long been placed, 
was inevitable. Of course, no such proc- 
lamation, in time of war, could have any 
weight in the section of country at which 
it was aimed, excepting as the union mili- 
tary successes made it effective. Those 
successes in due time reached every por- 
tion of the south, and the fetters of every 
bondman on American soil were thus 
broken. Congress subsequently passed an 
amendment to the constitution, forever 
prohibiting slavery in any portion of the 
republic, and this amendment, on being 
ratified by the requisite number of states, 
became a part of the organic law of the 
land. 

The original draft of the emancipation 
proclamation, in the president's handwrit- 
ing, was presented by Mr. Lincoln to the 
great Northwestern Sanitary Fair, held at 
Chicago, in the autumn of 1SG3. The fol- 
lowing letter accompanied the gift: 

Executive Man.sion, 
Washington, October 26, 1863. 

To the Lftdies having in charge the 
Northwestern Fair for the Sanitary Com- 
mission, Chicago, Illinois: — 

According to the request made in j-our 
behalf, the original di-aft of the emancipa- 
tion proclamation is herewith enclosed. 
The formal words at the top, and the con- 
clusion, except the signature, you perceive, 
are not in my handwriting. They were 
written at the State Department, by whom 
I know not. The printed part was cut 



from a copy of the preliminary proclama- 
tion and pasted on, merely to save writing. 
I had some desire to retain the paper; 
but if it shall contribute to the relief or 
comfort of the soldier, that will be better. 
Your obedient servant, 

A. Lincoln. 

This chief treasure of that great fair was 
purchased for three thousand dollars, by 
the Hon. Thomas B. Bryan, for the Chi- 
cago Soldiers' Home, of which he was 
president. Lithographic copies of the doc- 
ument were al.so sold for the benefit of the 
same institution, and netted it thousands 
of dollars. 

One of the most important results of this 
great measure, whether considered from a 
moral, political, or social point of view, 
was the Fifteenth Amendment to the Con- 
stitution of the United States, by which 
all citizens were made equal before the 
law. 

It was on the twent_y-seventh of Febru- 
ary, 1869, that congress passed a resolu- 
tion in tlie following words: 

A resolution proposing an amendment 
to the Constitution of the United States. 

Iii'soh'ed, By the Senate and House of 
Representatives of the United States of 
America, in Congress assembled, two- 
thirds of both Houses concurring, that the 
following article be proposed to the legis- 
latures of the several States as an amend- 
ment to the Constitution of the United 
Stfoes, which, when ratified by three- 
fourths of the said legislatures, shall be 
valid as a part of the Constitution, namely : 
— Article 16, Section 1. The right of 
citizens of the United States to vote shall 
not be denied or abridged by the United 
States, or by any State, on account of race, 
color, or previous condition of servitude. 
Section 2. Congress shall havt power to 
enforce this article by appropriate legisla- 
tion. 

In about one year's time from the pas- 
sage of this resolution, proclamation was 
made by the secretary of state, Hon. Ham- 
ilton Fish, that the jjroposed amendment 
had been ratified by the legislatures of the 



314 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



states of North Carolina, West Virginia, 
Mussaclnisetts, Wisconsin, Maine, Louisi- 
ana, Michigan, South Carolina, Pennsyl- 
vania, Arkansas, Connecticut, Plorida, 
Illinois, Indiana, New York, New Hamp- 
shire, Nevada, Vermont, Virginia, Ala- 
bama, Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, Iowa, 
Kansas, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Ne- 
t)raska, and Texas, — twenty-nine in all, 
and constituting three-fourths of the whole 
number of states, and thus becoming valid, 
fo all intents and purposes, as a part of 
ti>e constitution of the United States. 

Though not obligatory, as an executive 
duty. President Grant communicated the 
fact of the ratification to congress, in a 
special message, on the thirtieth of March, 
1870. "The measure" — said the presi- 
dent — " whicli makes at once four millions 
of the people voters who were heretofore 
declared by the highest tribunal in the 
land not citizens of the United States, nor 
eligible to become so, with the assertion 
that at the time of the Declaration of In- 



dependence the opinion was fixed and uni- 
versal in the civilized portion of the white 
race, and regarded as an axiom in morals 
as well as in politics, that black men had 
no rights which white men were bound to 
respect, is, indeed, a measure of grander 
importance than any other one act of the 
kind from the foundation of our free gov- 
ernment to the present time. Institutions 
like ours, in which all power is derived 
directly from the people, must depend 
mainly upon their intelligence, patriotism, 
and industry. I call the attention, there- 
fore, of the newly enfranchised race to the 
importance of their striving, in every hon- 
orable manner, to make themselves worthy 
of their new privilege. To a race more 
favored heretofore by our laws, I would 
say, withhold no legal privilege of advance- 
ment to the new citizens." So great an 
event was not suffered to pass without pub- 
lie demonstrations of joy commensurate 
with its grand, beneficent, and elevating 
scope, in almost all parts of the country. 



XXX ITT. 

THREE DAYS' BATTLE BETWEEN THE CONCENTRATED 

ARMIES OF GENERALS MEADE AND LEE, AT 

GETTYSBURG, PA.— 1863. 



Overwhelming Inyasion of Pennsylvania by tlie Confederate Forces. — The Union Army Drives Tliem 
with Great Slaughter Across the Potomac. — Unsuccessful Attempt to Transfer the Seat of War from 
Virginia to Northern Soil. — One of the Most Decisive and Important Federal Victories in the Great 
American Civil Conflict. — Lee's Army Impatient to go North — Order of March at Last. — Consterna- 
tion in the Border States. — Call for One Hundred Thousand More Men — Advance of Meade's Army. 
— Face to Face with the Foe. — Engagement ISetween the Vanguards. — Terrific Artillery Contests. — 
Movements and Counter Movements. — Severe Reverses on Both Sides. — Carnage at Cemetery 
Hill. — Longstreet's J* urious Onset. — Most Destructive Cannonade. — Gettysburg a Vast Hospital. — 
Crawford's Grand Charge — Standing by the Batteries! — Hand-to-Hand Conflict. — Following the 
Battle Flag. — Deadly and Impetuous Fighting — Forty one Confederate Standards Taken. — Un- 
bounded Joy of the Victors. — President Lincoln's Announcement. 



" this day hath made 

Much work tor tears Ml imillv a haplete mother. 
Whobe sous lie scatteted on t)ie bleedinn ground." 



_^_g?|| EE'S vast and powerful army liad long waited, with eager and restless 
expectation, for the order of march from their chieftain which should 

enable them to transfer the seat of civil war 
from the familiar encampments and blood- 
stained battle-fields of Virginia to the soil of 
the North. The plans of the commanding 
general were in due time arranged with this 
end in view, and, about the middle of June, 
18fi.3. he began to move his troops across the 
Potomac, and soon took possession of Hagers- 
town. Md., intending immediately to move 
thence, in full force, direct to Pennsylvania. 
Such a movement, on the part of the con- 
federate army, so sudden and well executed, produced great consternation 
throughout the north. President Lincoln issued a call for one hundred thousand addi- 
tional men from the loyal states nearest the theater of military operations ; and Gen- 
eral Meade, who had just succeeded General Hooker in command of the army of the 
Potomac, lost no time in advancing his army northward, as far as Harrisburg, Pa., the 
place ot destination of Lee's forces. The army of General Meade consisted of the fol- 
lowing corps : First, under command of Gen 'r:il Reynolds, and subsequently under 




MEADE'S HEAD-QUARTERS. 



316 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



General Doubleday ; second, under Gen- 
eral Hancock ; third, under General Sick- 
les ; fiftb, under General Sykes ; sixth, 
under General Sedgwick ; eleventh, under 
General Howard ; twelfth, under General 
Slocum. Total number of men, sixty to 
eighty thousand, with two hundred guns. 
The army of General Lee consisted of 
General Hill's corps. General Longstreet's, 
and General Ewell's ; in all, about ninety 
thousand men, and two hundred guns. 

On the first of July, the advanced corps 
of the union army, led by Reynolds and 
Howard, engaged the confederate forces 
near Gettysburg. General Reynolds ap- 
proached the town from the south-east, the 
confederates evacuating it on his arrival. 
He passed through and out (says the 
account of a writer in the Philadelphia 
Age) on the west side toward Chambers- 
burg. He marched several miles, was met 
by the enemy in stronger force, and after 
a slight contest was compelled to retire. 
The confederates pushed him very hard, 
and he came into the town on a run, his 
troops going along every available road, 
and rushing out on the east side, closely 
pursued. One of his brigades with a con- 
federate brigade on each side of it. All 
three were abreast, running as hard as 
they could, — the two outside ones pouring 
a heavy fire into the center, out of which 
men dropped, killed or wounded, at almost 
every footstep. This federal briga<:le, in 
running that terrible gauntlet, lost half its 
men. General Reynolds was killed, and 
Gettysburg was lost ; but the federal 
troops succeeded in mounting the Ceme- 
tery Hill, and the confederates ceased pur- 
suing. At night, the latter encamped in 
the town, and the union troops on the 
hill. During Wednesday night and 
Thursday morning, the two armies were 
concentrating on the two ridges, which 
were to be the next day's line of battle, 
and by noon on Thursday each general 
had a force of eighty thousand men at his 
disposal. Then began the great artilleri/ 
contest, the infantry on both sides crouch- 
ing behind fences and trees and in rifle- 
pits. The federal soldiers in the cemetery 



laid many of the tombstones on the ground 
to prevent injury, .so that many escajsed. 
There was but little infantry fighting on 
Thursday, and neither party made much im- 
pression on the other. The confederates in 
the other town erected barricades, and had 
their sharpshooters posted in every availa- 
ble spot, picking off federal soldiers on the 
hills to the north of the cemetery. The 
cannonade was fierce and incessant, and 
shells from both sides flew over and into 
the devoted town. Beyond killing and 
wounding, breaking trees and shattering 
houses, and making an awful noise, how- 
ever, this cannonade had but little effect 
on the result of the battle. Both sides 
fought with great ferocity, and neither 
could drive the other out of position. 

On Thursday night, fearing that the 
enemy had flank parties which might turn 
his rear. General Meade had serious inten- 
tions of a change in his plan of movements, 
and he called a council of war. The ad- 
vice of some of his generals, however, and 
the capture of a courier with dispatches 
from Richmond, from which it was learned 
that the confederates could receive no 
re-enforcements, made him decide not to 
alter his programme. On Friday morning. 
General Lee did not desire to make the 
attack. He saw the superiority of the 
federal position, and wished to entice them 
out of it and down into the valley. With 
this design in view, he withdrew all his 
sharpshooters and infantry from Gettys- 
burg. The deserted town lay there a very 
tempting bait, but General Meade's men 
hid quietly behind the fences and trees, 
and the banks upon the hills. Thej' could 
look down into the streets and see every- 
thing that was in progress. They saw the 
confederates march out and retire to the 
seminary, but made no advance, and the 
confederates gained nothing by the move- 
ment. A parting salute of musketry, 
however, from a knoll north of the ceme- 
tery, accelerated the confederate retreat. 
For some time the town had scarcely a 
soldier in it. Scores of dead and wounded 
men and horses, with broken wagons, 
brick.s, stones, timber, torn clothing, and 



THE THEEE DAYS' BATTLE AT GETTYSBURG — 1863. 



31 



abaudoned accoutrements, lay there. The 
frightened inhabitants peered out of their 
windows to see what the armies were doing 
to cause sucli a lull, and, almost afraid of 
their own shadows, they hastened away 
and crouched in corners and cellars at the 
sound of every shot or shell. 

Of the stirring scenes that so soon fol- 
lowed, the same correspondent says : Gen- 
eral Lee's evacuation, however, had no 
effect. Meade was neither to be enticed 
into the town nor into the valley. Enough 
dead bodies lay in the fields and streets to 
give him warning of what happened to 
poor Reynolds two days before, and he 
wisely determined to stay where he was 
and let events shape themselves. The 
confederates soon became impatient. They 
could wait no longer ; and after much 
solicitation from his subordinates, General 




Lee permitted General Longstreet to send 
his grand division on a charge upon the 
cemetery. The federal soldiers were on 
the alert. They were hid behind their 
embankments, some kneeling, and some 
flat on the ground. The confederate artil- 
lery opened. It was as fierce a cannonade 
as the one the day before, but instead of 
being spread all over the line, every shell 
was thrown at the cemetery. Experienced 
soldiers soon divined what was coming, 
and, in every portion of the federal line, 
the cannon were directed toward the valley 
in front of the cemetery. All were ready. 
Amidst the furious fire from the confeder- 



ate cannon scarcely a federal shot was 
heard. The artillerists, implements in 
hand, crouched in the little ditches dug 
behind their cannon. With arms loaded, 
the infantry awaited the charge. It soon 
came. From the woods of short, scrubby 
timber and the rocks near the seminary, 
there rose a yell. It ivas a long, loud, 
unremitting, hideous screech, from thou- 
sands of voices. At the yell, the federal 
cannon opened. Soon the confederate col- 
umns emerged from the woods. Tliey 
came on a rush down the hill, waving their 
arms and still screeching. They climbed 
the fences and rushed along, each one bent 
upon getting first into the cemetery. The 
cannon roared, and grape and canister and 
spherical case fell thick among them. 
Still they rushed onward, hundreds falling 
out of the line. They came within musket- 
shot of the federal troops. Then the small 
arms began to rattle. The confederates 
approached the outer line of works. They 
were laboring up the hill. As thej^ 
mounted the low bank in front of the rifle- 
pits, the federal soldiers retreated out of 
the ditch behind, turning and firing as 
they went along. It was a hand-to-hand 
conflict. Every man fought for himself 
and by himself. Myriads of confederates 
pushed forward down the hill, across into 
the works, and up to the cemetery. All 
were shouting, and screaming, and swear- 
ing, clashing their arms and firing their 
pieces. The confederate shells flew over 
the field upon the federal artillerists on 
the hills above. These, almost disregard- 
ing the storm which raged around them, 
directed all their fire upon the surging 
columns of the enemy's charge. Every 
available cannon on Cemetery Hill, and to 
the right and left, threw its shells and 
shot in the valley. The fight was terrible ; 
but, despite every effort, the confederates 
pushed up the hill and across the second 
line of works. The fire became hotter. 
The fight swayed back and forth. One 
moment the confederates would beat the 
railings of the cemetery ; then a rush 
from the federal side would drive them 
down into the valley. Then, with one of 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



their horrid screeches, they would fiercely 
run up the hill again into the cemetery, 
and have a fierce battle among the tomb- 
stones. It was the hardest fight of the 
day, and hundreds were slain there. Sev- 
eral attempts were made to take the place, 
but the}' were not successful, and late in 
the afternoon, leaving dead and wounded 
behind them, the confederate forces re- 
treated upon their own hill and into their 
woods again. They were not routed. 
They can scarcely be said to have been 
driven. They made an attack and were 
repulsed, and, after renewed attempts, 
feeling that it was useless to try any more, 
they retreated. It was now General 
Meade's turn to make an attack. Though 
they had lost heavily they felt elated. 
They saw hopes of a victory, aud were 
ready to do almost anything to secure it. 
Although there had been a battle in the 
valley below Gettysburg, yet the town was 
as quiet and as much deserted as ever. 
Shells flew over it, and now and then one 
of its houses would have a wall cracked or 
a roof hiokeu, but neither force possessed 
it. General Meade turned his attention 
there. 

The day was waning and the battle had 
lulled, and Meade determined, if possible, 
to drive the confederates out of the semin- 
ary. This was done, according to the 
writer already quoted, as follows : His 
troops were placed in order, and charged 
down the hill and into the town. They 
ran along every street chasing a few of 
the enemy still hid there, before them. 
They came out upon the west side, along 
the Emmettsburg and Chambersburg 
roads, and ascended the enemy's hills 
amidst a storm of grape and shell. At 
the seminary the confederates were not 
very strong. They had weakened that 
]iortion of the line to make their attack 
further to tlie south u]ion the cemetery. 
The}' had but few cannon ; and though 
they resisted some time, the}' finally re- 
treated from the edge of the hill and aban- 
doned the seminary. The federal troops 
did not chase them. The land back of the 
.seminary was rather flat and cut up into 



grain fields, with here and there a patch 
of woods. The rifle-pits on the brow of 
the hill proved an effectual aid to the fed- 
eral soldiers in maintaining their ground ; 
and as they lay behind the bank, with the 
ditch in front, they could pick off the 
stragglers from the retreating enemy. 
There was but little serious fighting after 
that, and night put an end to Friday's 
struggle, the confederates having retired 
abour a mile to the north, near the seniin- 
ary, aud half a mile on the south, at a 
little stream. During the night, the dead 
in the streets of Gettysburg were buried, 
and the wounded on all parts of the field 
were collected and carried to the rear. On 
the next morning. General Meade expected 
another attack ; but, instead of making it, 
the confederates retreated further, aban- 
doning their entire line of battle, and the 
pickets reported that they were intrench- 
ing at the foot of South Mountain. The 
federal army was terribly crippled and 
sadly in need of rest, and no advance was 
made, although pickets were thrown across 
the enemy's old line of battle, and toward 
the place where they were building in- 
trenchments. All the day was spent in 
feeding and resting the men. Gettysburg 
was turned into a v.ast hospital, and im- 
promptu ones were made at a dozen places 
on the field. The rain came, too, and witli 
it cool air and refreshment buth from wind 
and rain. No one could tell what the con- 
federates were doing ; every picket reported 
that they were intrenching, and the night 
of the fourth of July closed upon the field, 
the federal army being in full possession. 

The gallant charge made by the division 
under Crawford's command, contributed 
very materially to saving the left of the 
federal army. The confederates had 
massed their troops on Crawford's left. 
The third corps, Sickles's, had been en- 
gaging the enemy, but were overpow- 
ered, and several guns had been lost. 
Two divisions, of the fifth corps, Sykes's, 
had been also engaged, but nothing could 
withstand the confederate pressure, and 
their troops gave way. Several thou- 
sand arms had been lost. On came tlie 



THE THKEE DAYS' BATTLE AT GETTYSBUKG — 1863. 



519 




320 



FRo:\r f'OLoxv to world tower. 



conferlei'ates in a dark mass, across the 
wheat field, over the stoue wall, and across 
the ravine. At this moment, while the 
fugitives were rushing through Crawford's 
ranks, he ordered a charge. He was 
drawn up in line of battle, and in lohunn 
of division. His men, with loud cheers, 
rushed forward. Crawford himself rude to 
the front, and, seizing the flag of the lead- 
ing regiment, encouraged the men. They 
dasliediu; volley after volley was poured 
into the confederate ranks. The federals 
got ahead, and drove the confederates back 
across the ravine, over the stone wall, and 
through the wheat field, retaking the 
unionists" ground and an immense (juantity 
of arms. The left of the federal position 
was saved by this charge, enabling them 
to remain masters of the field. 

A fit illustration of the sanguinary char- 
acter of the afternoon struggle already de- 
scribed, is that given by Mr. Whitelaw Keid, 
one of the gifted correspondents of the Cin- 
cinnati Gazette. Mr. Reid says that some 
Massachusetts batteries — Captain Bige- 
low's, Captain Phill'ps's, and two or three 
more under Captain McGilvr3^ of Maine 
— were planted on the extreme left, ad- 
vanced now well down to the Emmettsburg 
road, with infantry in their front, — the 
first division of Sickles's corps. A little 
after five, a fierce confederate charge drove 
back the infantry aiul menaced the batter- 
ies. Orders were sent to Bigelow on the 
extreme left, to //old his position at evenj 
Itdzitrd short of sheer annihilation, till a 
couple more batteries could be brought to 
his support. Reserving his fire a little, 
then with depressed guns opening with 
double charges of grape and canister, he 
smote and shattered, but could not break 
the advancing line. His grape and canis- 
ter became exhausted, and still, closing 
grandly up over their slain, on they rushed. 
He fell back on spherical case, and poured 
this in at the shortest range. On, still 
onward, came the artillery-defying line, 
and still he held his position. They got 
within six paces of the guns — he fired 
again. Once more, and he blew devoted 
soldiers from their very muzzles. And, 



still mindful of that solemn order, he held 
his place; they spring upon his carriages, 
and shoot his horses ! And then, his 
Yankee artillerists still about him, he 
seized the guns by hand, and from the 
very front of that line dragged two of them 
off. The caissons were farther back — five 
out of the six are saved. That single com- 
pany, in that half hour's fight, lost thirty- 
three of its men, including every sergeant 
it had, and the captain himself was 
wounded. Yet it was the first time it was 
ever under fire. So tliey fought along 
that fiery line ! The confederates now 
[>oured u]ioii Phillips's battery, and it, too, 
was forced to drag off the pieces by hand 
when the horses were shot down. From a 
new position, it opened again ; and at last 
the two re-enforcing batteries came up on 
the gallop. An enfilading fire swept the 
confederate line ; Sickles's gallant infantry 
charged, the confederate line swept back 
on a refluent tide — the unionists regained 
their lost ground, and every gun they had 
just lost in this splendid fight. 

Mr. Reid, as an eye witness, character- 
izes the sanguinary struggle at four o'clock 
as tlie (jvcat, di'sju'ratr, and final cliarye. 
The confederates seemed to have gathered 
up all their strength and desjjeration for 
one fierce, convulsive effort, that should 
sweep over and wash out all resistance. 
They swept up as before ; the flower of 
their army to the front — victorj' staked 
upon the issue. In some places, they lit- 
erally lifted up and pushed back the imion 
lines ; but, that terrible ' position ' of the 
federals I — wherever they entered it, enfi- 
lading fires from half a score of crests 
swept away their columns like merest 
chaff. Broken and hurled back, they 
easily became prisoners ; and on the center 
and left, the last half hour brought more 
prisoners than all the rest. So it was 
along the whole line ; but it was on the 
second corps that the flower of the confed- 
erate army was concentrated ; it was there 
that the heaviest shock beat upon, and 
shook, and even sometimes crumbled, the 
federal line. The federals had some shal- 
low rifle-pits, with ban-icades of rails from 



TliE THREE DAYS' BATTLE AT GETTYSBURG — 1S(J3 



r.2i 



the fences. The confederate line, stretch- 
ing away miles to the left, in magnificent 
array, but strongest here, — Pickett's splen- 
did division of Longstreet's corps in front, 
the best of A. P. Hill's veterans in support 
— came steadily, and as it seemed resist- 
lessly, sweeping up. ■ The federal skir- 
mishers retired slowly from the Emmetts- 
burg road, holding their ground tenaciously 
to the last. The confederates reserved 
their lire till the}' reached this same Em- 
mettsbiirg road, then opened with a ter- 
rific crash. From a hundred iron throats, 
meantime, their artillery had been thun- 
dering on the union barricades. Hancock 
was wounded ; Gibbon succeeded to the 
command — approved soldier, and read}- for 



mere machine strength of their combined 
action — swept the confederates on. The 
federal thin line could fight, but it had not 
weight enough to oppose to this momen- 
tum. It was pushed behind the guns. 
Eight on came the confederates. They 
were upon the guns — were bayoneting the 
gunners — were waving their flags above 
the federal pieces. But they had pene- 
trated to the fatal point. A storm of 
grape and canister tore its way from man 
to man, and marked its track with corpses 
straight down their line ! They had ex- 
posed themselves to the enfilading fire of 
the guns on the western slope of Cemetery 
Hill; that exposure sealed their fate. The 
line reeled back — disjointed already — in 




^S^^Jv^->^^^^-o ^^^-<^~^JOc^aX^yvJC^ 



the crisis. As the tempest of fire ap- 
proached its height, he walked along the 
line, and renewed his orders to the men to 
reserve their fire. The confederates — 
three lines deep — came steadily up. They 
were in point-blank range. At last the 
order came/ From thrice six thousand 
guns, there came a sheet of smoky flame, 
a crash, a rush of leaden death. The line 
literally melted away ; but there came the 
second, resistless still. It had been the 
unionists' supreme effort — on the instant, 
they were not equal to another. Up to 
the rifle-pits, across them, over the barri- 
cades — the momentum of their charge, the 
21 



an instant in fragments. The union 
troops were just behind the guns. They 
leaped forward upon the disordered mass ; 
but there was little need for fighting now. 
A regiment threw down its arms, and, 
with colors at its head, rushed over and 
surrendered. All along the field, smaller 
detachments did the same. Webb's bri- 
gade brought in eight hundred ; Gibbon's 
old division took fifteen stand of colors. 
Over the fields, the escaped fragments of 
the charging line fell back — the battle 
there was over. A single brigade, Har- 
row's, came out with fifty-four less ofiicers, 
and seven hundred and ninety-three less 



FROM COLUXY TO WORLD POWER. 



men (the Seventli Michigan regiment was 
of this hri gillie,) th;ui it took in. 80 the 
whole corps fought — so too they fought 
farther down the line. It was fruitless 
sacrifice. They gathered up their liroken 
fragments, formed their lines, and slowly 
marched away. It was not a rout, it was 
a bitter, crushing defeat. 

Among the individual instances of brav- 
ery narrated of this terrible combat be- 
tween the two great armies, that of Henry 
Shaler, of Indianapolis, will bear repeti- 
tion, for he seems to have more than 
equaled the self-told mythiral performance 
of the Irishman who 'surrounded' a half- 
dizen of the enemy and bagged them 
plump. Shaler took more prisoners in 
this battle than any other man in the 
army — in all, twenty-five men, including 
one lieutenant and eighteen privates at 
one swoop. He took them liy strategy of 
the most undoubted kind; that is, he sur- 
rounded them, and they had to give up. 
On the morning of the fourth, he went out 
with his 'poncho" over Jiis shoulders, so 
that the confederates couldn't see liis coat, 
and thus they thought he was one of their 
own men. He went up and told them to 
lay down their arms and come and help 
carry some wounded off the field ; they 
did so. When he got them away from 
their arms, he rode uj) to the lieutenant 
and told him to give up his swoi-d. The 
lieutenant refused at first, but Shaler drew 
his revolver, and the lieutenant yielded 
without a shot, and the whole squad were 
then escorted by their gallant captor into 
camjJ. 

The heroism of General Kil[)atrick — 
like that of Couch, Geary, Buford, Birnej', 
Newton, Gregg, Mcintosh, Neil, and oth- 
ers — was conspicuous from first to last. 
On the thirteenth, some ten days after the 
i-.lose of the conflict. General Kilpatrick 
was anxious to make an advance, but 
could not obtain orders. Some of the 
Pennsylvania militia having been placed 
at his disposal, he thought he would try 
one regiment under fire. The Philadel- 
phia Blues were selected, and, accompa- 
nied liv the First Vermont cavalry, a dem- 



I onstration was made on the right — the 
confederates then occupying a fortified 
position. Tlie militia were now dejiloyed, 
the general desiring them to move to the 
crest of a knoll, where the bullets were 
flying pretty livel}'. There was some hes- 
itancy at first, whereupon a battle-flag pre- 
sented to the division by the ladies of 
Boonsboro' was sent to the front. Ser- 
geant Jud}-, bearer of the flag, cried out — 

" This is General KUpatrick's hattle- 
fliKj ; follow it!" 

The militia obeyed the summons 
promptly, and fell some distance in front 
of the line, and it was su])posed for some 
time that the enemj' had captured the flag; 
but at night, when Judy was brought in 
on a litter, he proudly waved the battle- 
flag. Tile novelty of being thus under 
fire for the first time was keenly felt by 
the n)ilitia. About the first man touched 
had the top of his head grazed just close 
enough to draw blood. He halted — threw 
down his musket — truly an astonished 
man ! One or two officers and a dozen or 
more privates ran hurriedly to see what 
the matter was. Running both hands over 
his pate, and seeing blood, he exclaimed, 
" .\ ball ! a ball ! " — while the others stood 
on agape with astonishment, until the 
shrill voice of the general sounded in their 
eai-s ; " Move on there ! " 

On the opening movement being made 
to baffle Lee's march toward Pennsylva- 
nia, the spirit which animated those who 
had gone forth in defense of the American 
Union — "man's last, best hope, of free 
government," — was conspicuously mani- 
fest. At a distance of fifteen miles from 
Gettysburg, where the armies were mass- 
ing, were first caught the murmurs of the 
ojiening battle, and from that time the 
scene was all enthusiasm among the weary, 
foot-sore federals, who counted as nothing 
all the pains of a march of nearly two hun- 
dred miles, now that they were within 
striking distance of the foe. Most of the 
way, the ambulance train had been crowded 
with both officers and men, weary, worn, 
and haggard; but the cannon's rattle, as 
it became more and more distinct, changed 



THE TIIKEE DAYS' BATTLE AT GETTYSBL'KU — 1SG:J. 



323 



them in a twinkling into new creatures. 
The New Jersey brigade, in Sedgwick's 
corps, was of tliis body. At about three 
o'clock on the afternoon of July 3d, the 
head of the column arrived on the battle- 
ground. As it came to a halt, a poor fel- 




SOLDIEK8' MOX0HE.NT AT GETTYSBURG. 

low, who looked the very image of death, 
hobbled out of the ambulance in which he 
had been lying, and, shouldering his 
musket, was just starting forward, when 
the surgeon stopped him with — 
" Where are you going, sir ? " 
•' To the front, doctor," — and the brave 
fellow tried hard to stand firm and speak 
boldly as he saluted the surgeon. 

"To +lie front! What ! a man in jiour 
condition ? Why, sir, you can't march 



half a mile ; you haven't the strength to 
carry yourself, let alone your knapsack, 
musket, and equipments. You must be 
crazy, surely." 

" But, doctor, my division are in the 
fight," (liere he grasped the wheel of an 
ambulance to sufiport himself,) "and I have 
a younger brother in my company. I 
must go." 

" But I am your surgeon, and I forbid 
you. You have every symptom of ty- 
phoid fever; a little over-exertion will kill 
you." 

"Well, doctor, if I miitft die, I would 
rather die in the field, than in an ambu- 
lance." 

The doctor saw it was useless to debate 
the point, and the soldier went as he de- 
sired. But on the evening of the next 
da}' he was buried where he fell — for fall 
he did — his right arm blown off at the 
elbow, and his forehead pierced by a minie 
ball. 

The impetuous bravery with which the 
confederate troops fought is illustrated by 
the fact that every brigadier in Pickett's di- 
vision was killed or wounded ; out of twen- 
ty-four regimental officers, only two escaped 
unhurt; the colonels of five Virginia reg- 
iments were killed; the ninth Virginia 
went in with two hundred and fifty men, 
and came out with only thirty-eight. 
These data show that the total casualties 
of the confederate army, though never 
officiallj' published, must have been im- 
mense — greater, probaldy, than those of 
the victorious. The latter, as given by 
General Meade, were as follows : two 
thousand and eight hundred and thirty- 
four killed; thirteen thousand and seven 
hundred and nine wounded ; six thou- 
sand and six hundred and forty-three 
missing. The union army took forty- 
one standards, nearly twentj'-five thou- 
sand small arms, and about fourteen 
thousand i)risoners. 

So great was tlie joy throughout the 
loyal states, as the tidings of victory 
flashed across the wires, that, on the fore- 
noon of July 4th, President Lincoln oiB- 
cially telegrapjied as follows : 



324 



FROM COLONY TO WOliLD TOWER. 



" The President announces to the coun- 
try tliat news from the Army of the Poto- 
mac, up to 10 p. M. of the 3d, is such as to 
cover that army with tlie higliest honor; 
to promise a great success to the cause of 
the Union, and to claim the condolence 



of all for the many gallant fallen ; and 
that for this he especially desires that 
on this day, He, whose will, not ours, 
should ever be done, be everywhere re- 
membered and reverenced with profound- 
8st gratitude." 



XXXIV. 

GRAND MARCH OF THE UNION ARMY, UNDER GEN. 
SHERMAN, THROUGH THE SOUTH.— 1804. 



Generals and Armies Baffled, and States and Cities Conquered, Without a Serious Disaster to the Vic- 
tors — Display of Military Genius Unsurpassed in Any Age or Country. — The Southern Confederacy 
Virtually Crushed Witliin the Coils of this Wide-Sweeping, Bold, and Resistless Movement. — The 
Great Closing Act in the Campaign. — Sherman's Qualities as a Commander — His Great Military Suc- 
cess. — His Own Story. — A Brilliant Campaign I'lanned. — Brave and Confident Troops. — .\tlanta, 
Ga., the First Great Prize. — Destroys that City : Starts tor the Coast — Kilpatrick Leads the Cav- 
alry. — Thomas Defends the Border States. — Successful Feints Made by Slierman. — Subsists His 
Men on the Enemy's Country. — Immense Sweep ot the Onward Columns. — Savannah's Doom 
Sealed — Fall of Fort .McAllister. — Christmas Gift to the President. — Advance Into South Carolina. — 
The Stars and Stripes in Her Capital. — All Opposition Powerless. — North Carolina's Turn Next. — 
Swamps, Hills, Quagmires, .Storms, Floods — Battles Fought: Onward to Kaleigh. — Johnston's 
Whole Army Bagged. — Sherman Described Personally. 



" I h«R to present you. as a Cbrifitmae pift. the city of Savannfth. with one hundred and fitly heavy guna, plenty of ammunition, and 
fliKrat twenty-five thousand bajea of cotton."— General Sherman to President Lincoln. 






.--v^Hv 



ff" ";^^^^ W.ALIANT, resolute and hopeful as a soldier, Gen- 
^1^ eial Slieinian added to these qualities the wisdom 

and genius of Wasliiiigton 
himself as a commander. His 
March to the Sea has been 
universally pronounced, both 
in America and Europe, one 
of the most brilliant military 
results — especially when con- 
sidered in connection with the 
slight cost of life at which it 
was achieved — presented in 
the long and varied histor}' of 
war. It was, in a word, one of the greatest and most important of modern campaigns, 
conducted with complete success, without any considerable battle. And 3'et it was his 
own native sagacity, more than anything else, which enabled General Sherman to 
plan and execute the vast undertakings which have crowned his name with imperisha- 
ble honor. " I have oftentimes," said General Sherman, in an address at West Point, 
"been asked by friends familiar with Xenophon, Hume, and Joinini, in which of these 
books I had learned the secret of leading armies on long and difficult marches, and they 
seemed surprised when I answered that I was not aware that I had been influenced by 







HEAD-QU.\RTEnS, ATLANTA, GA. 



326 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



any of them. I told them what I now tell 
yuu, in all simplicity and truth, that, wlien 
I was a J'oiing lieutenant of ai'tillery, I liiul 
often hunted deer in the swamps of the 
Edisto, the Cooper, and the Santee, and had 
seen with my own eyes that they could be 
passed with wagons ; that in the spring of 
1844, I had ridden ou horseback from 
Marietta, Ga., to the valley of the Tennes- 
see, and back to Augusta, passing in my 
course over the very fields of Altoona, of 
Kenesaw, and Atlanta, where afterward it 
fell to my share to command armies and to 
utilize the knowledge thus casually gained. 
Again, in 1849 and 1850, I was in Cali- 
fornia, and saw arrive across that wild belt 
of two thousand miles of uninhabitable 
country the caravans of emigrants, coni- 
])ose(l of men, women, and children, who 
reached thoir destination in health and 
strength ; and when we used to start on a 
journey of a thou.sand miles, with a single 
blanket as covering, and a coil of dried 
meat and a sack of parched corn meal as 
food ; — with this knowledge fairly acquired 
in actual experience, was there any need 
for me to look back to Alexander the 
Great, to Marlborough, for examples ? " 
Hut to all this kind of knowledge — useful, 
doubtless, in the highest degree. General 
Sherman added the possession of the most 
commanding military genius. 

It was early in May, 1864, that General 
Siierman began the brilliant series of his 
■campaigns. The first objective point was 
Atlanta. To reach that city, his armies 
had to pass from the northern limit to the 
center of the great state of Georgia, forcing 
their way through mountain defiles and 
across great rivers, overcoming or turning 
formidably intrenched positions defended 
by a strong, well-appointed veteran arm}', 
commanded by an alert, cautious, and skill- 
ful general. The campaign opened on the 
sixth of May, and on the second of Septem- 
ber the national forces entered Atlanta. 

For some time previously to the opening 
movement, says General Sherman's report, 
the union armies were lying in garrison 
seemingly quiet, from Knoxville to Hunts- 
ville, and the enemy lay behind his rocky- 



faced barrier at Dalton, proud, defiant, 
and exulting. He bad had time since 
Christmas to recover from his discomfiture 
at Mission Ridge, witli his ranks filled, 
and a new commander-in-chief, and second 
to none in the confederacy in reputation 
for skill, sagacity, and extreme popularity. 
All at once, the union armies assumed life 
and action, and apjieared beforo Dalton. 
Threatening Rocky Face, they threw 
themselves upon Resaca, the enemy only 
escaping by the rapidity of their retreat, 
aided by the numerous roads with which 
they only were familiar. Again the con- 
federate army took 2>ost in Altoona, but 
found no rest, for, by a circuit towards 
Dallas and subse(]uent movement to Ac- 
worth, the iniiou army gained the Al- 
toona Pass. Then followed the eventful 
battles about Kenesaw, and the escape of 
the confederates across the Chattahoochee 
river. The crossing of the Chattahoochee 
and breaking of the Augusta road was 
handsomely executed by Sherman's army. 
It was at this stage of proceedings, that the 
confederate authorities became dissatisfied 
with Johnston as commander, and selected 
one more bold and ra.sh, — General Hood. 
New tactics were adopted by the latter. 
He first boldlj' and rapidly, on the twen- 
tieth of July, fell ou the union right, at 
Peach Tree creek, and lost. Again, ou 
the 22d, he struck the extreme union left, 
and was severely punished ; and finally, 
again on the 28th, he unsuccessfully re- 
peated the attenijit on the union right. 
Sherman slowly and gradually drew his 
lines about Atlanta, feeling for the rail- 
road which supplied the confederate army 
and made Atlanta a place of importance. 
The enemj' met these efforts patiently and 
skillfully, but at last Hood made the mis- 
take which Sherman had waited for so 
long, sending his cavalry to the union 
rear, far beyond the reach of recall. In- 
stantly Sherman's cavalry was on Hood's 
only remaining road, with the principal 
army following quietly, aud Atlanta fell 
into Sherman's possession, as the fruit of 
well-concerted measures, backed by a brave 
and confident army. 



SHERMAN'S MAECH THEOUGH THE SOUTH ~18(>4. 



327 



Hood's plan was, to force General Sher- 
man from Georgia, by cutting off bis com- 
munications, and invading Tennessee and 
Kentucky. Pursuant to tbis plan, Hood, 
by a rapid marcb, gained and broke up, at 
Big Shanty, the railroad that supplied 
Sherman's army, advanced to Dalton, and 
thence moved toward Tennessee. Hood 
was followed from Atlanta by Sherman far 
enough north to cover his own purpose and 
assure him against Hood's interrupting 
the march to the sea-coast which he had in 
contemplation. The ta.sk of encountering 
Hood's formidable movements, and defend- 
ing the border states from invasion, was 
intrusted to General Thomas, who was 
ably assisted by his second in command. 
General Schofield. 

It appears from Major Nichols's graphic 
diary of the events connected with this 
great march — the narrative of his excel- 
lent observations as one of Sherman's staff 
ofBcer.s — that the general, from his camp 
at Gaylesville, while awaiting the develop- 
ment of Hood's design, sketched out the 
march to Goldsboro'. Seated in front of 
his tent, towards the end of October, 1S64, 
with his generals around him, and the 
map of the states spread on his knees 
Sherman ran his finger over the map, and 
indicated his course to Savannah. Then, 
after pondering on the map of South Car- 
olina, his finger rested on Columbia, and 
looking up, he said — 

" Howard, I believe we can go there, 
without any serious difficulty. If we can 
cross the Salkahatchie, we can capture 
Columbia.'' 

After giving expression to this strik- 
ing strategic insight. General Sherman 
passed his finger quickly over rivers, 
swamps, and cities, to Goldsboro', N. C, 
saying— 

" Tliat point is a few days' march 
through a rich country. When we reach 
that important railway junction— when I 
once plant this army at Goldsboro', — Lee 
must leave Virginia, or he will be defeated 
beyond hope of recovery. We can make 
this march, for General Grant assures me 
that Lee cannot get away from Richmond 



I without his knowledge, nor without seri- 
ous loss to his army." 

This prediction, showing at once the 
most remarkable forecast and most com- 
prehensive generalship, was at once put in 
course of fulfillment. 

Atlanta having served its purpose in 
General Sherman's plans — a resting-place 
on his way to Savannah, to Columbia, and 
to Richmond if need be, — it was given up 
to the flames, that its workshops might 
never again be employed in casting shot 
and shell for the confederacy. The rail- 
ways were torn up, the jjeople turned 
away, and torches were applied to the 
stores and magazines. A space of two 
hundred acres was soon on fire, and its 
progress watched until the conflagration 
had spread beyond the power of man to 
arrest its destructive work, and then tlip 




union forces marched out of the unfortu- 
nate city with solemn tread, their band 
playing the wild anthem, " John Brown's 
soul goes marching on." The army num- 
bered about sixty-five thousand men. 

As the news of Sherman's great move- 
ment became known at the north, intense 
interest was felt in the result, and it may 
well be supposed that not a few were filled 
with the greatest apprehensions, in view of 
the dangers to be encountered. That the 
president, however, did not share in any 
such feeling of alarm in regard to the 
i issue, is shown by the following conversa- 



328 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD ROAVER. 



tion on the subject, between him and a 
friend. 

Said Mr. Lincoln's friend: "Mr. Lin- 
coln, as Sherman's army advances, the 
rebel forces necessarily concentrate and 
increase in number. Before long, Sher- 
man will drive the columns of Johnston, 
Bragg, Hoke, and others, within a few 
days' march of Lee's main army. May 
not Lee suddenly march south with the 
hulk of his army, form a junction with 
Johnston's troops, and before Grant can 
follow any considerable distance, strike 
Sherman's column with superior force, 
break his lines, defeat his army, and drive 
his broken fragments back to the coast, 
and with liis whole army give battle to 
Grant, and j^erJiajys defeat him ? " 

President Lincoln instantly replied : 
" And 2'ei'haps not! Napoleon tried the 
same game on the British and Prussians, 
in 1815. He concentrated his forces and 
fell suddenly on Blucher, and won an inde- 
cisive victory. He then whirled round and 
attacked the British, and met his \Vater- 
loo. Bonaparte was hardlij inferior to 
Lee in military talents or experience. 
But are you sure that Lee's forces, united 
with Johnston's, could beat Sherman's 
army? Could he gain his Ligny, before 
meeting with his Waterloo when he at- 
tacks Grant." I tell you, there is a heap 
of fight in one hundred thousand western 
veterans. They are a good deal like old 
Zach. Taylor at Bueua Vista, — fhcij don't 
knoiv wlien the// are whipped ! " 

In turning his back upon Atlanta, Gen- 
eral Sherman divided his army for the 
great march into two wings, General 
Howard commanding the right, and Gen- 
eral Slocum the left ; General Kilpatrick 
handled the cavalry under Sherman's 
orders. The various corps composing the 
wings were led, respectively, by Generals 
Osterhaus, Blair, Davis, and Williams ; 
and Sherman for a time accompanied one 
wing and then the other. 

On the 13th of November, Sherman's 
communications with the north ceased. 
Spreading itself out like a fan, the extreme 
left wing swept down the Augusta road. 



and the extreme right marched towards 
Macon, the space between being covered 
by two corps, one from each wing, and the 
cavalry riding well on the flanks. Mil- 
ledgeville, the capital of Georgia, on the 
Oconee, was the first point of concentra- 
tion for the left wing. The right wing, 
preceded and flanked by cavalry, went 
down the roads towards Macon, sweeping 
away the small opposing forces mustered 
by Cobb and Wheeler, and advancing as 
far as Griffin. The left wing went by 
Covington to Madison, and there, sending 
the cavalry towards Augusta, turned south- 
ward by way of Eatonton to Milledgeville. 
The right, after maneuvering in the direc- 
tion of Macon, crossed the Ocmulgee above 
it, and, passing by Clinton, descended 
upon Gordon, whence a branch line led to 
Milledgeville. 

The movement of troops on so many 
points had confounded the confederates. 
The authorities of Augusta believed their 
town was the object of the march ; those 
of Macon were certain that it was against 
them the enemy was coming. In reality, 
Sherman had turned toward Macon, and 
had cut off at least the infantry force 
there, and rendered it useless. They 
showed fight, however, attacking a small 
union force, pushed up to Griswoldville to 
protect the confederates who were destroj'- 
ing the railroad, and were punished se- 
verely for their courage. 

In a week after quitting Atlanta, the 
left wing was united at Milledgeville and 
the right at Gordon, while the cavalry 
were scourina- the flanks. In the mean- 
time. General Wheeler had ridden round 
the right flank, and crossing the Oconee, 
had turned to defend the passage of the 
suanipv stream. But his resistance was 
vain. Slocum moved out from Milledgeville 
ujwn Sandersville, and Howard marched 
on both sides of the Savannah railway, 
thrusting Wheeler away from the bridge 
over the Oconee, and crossing himself 
without the loss of a man. The left wing 
was now converging on Louisville, while 
the right struck across the country, by 
Swainsboro', upon Milieu. It was now 



SIIERMAX'S MARCH THROUGH THE SOUTH — 1864. 



329 



l'^^.^ir"i- 







330 



FKOil f'OLOXY TO WOrj.D POWER. 



plain that the confederates had no troops 
strong enough to interrupt the march, as 
all their efforts had failed to arrest the 
forward movement of the columns. 

In this way, covering a wide front, now 
filing through swamps, now spreading out 
on a broad front under the tufted pines, 
now halting to tear up, twist, and burn 
rails and sleepers, now collecting cattle and 
forage, and everj'where welcomed and fol- 
lowed by the negroes, the army pressed 
forward to its goal. The left flankers came 
down through Sparta, the solid body of the 
left wing marc-lied through Davisboro", the 
right moved steadily forward ujion Millen, 
while Kilpatrick was in the front threat- 
ening Waynesboro', and destroying the 
bridges on the way to Augusta. At length 
the whole force, save one corps, crossed 
the Ogeechee and united at Millen. 

Here, again, Sherman kept his oppo- 
nents in doubt respecting the course he 
would pursue. At Millen he threatened 
both Augusta and Savannah, and he made 
such strong demonstrations on the Au- 
gusta road, that he led the confederates to 
fear for Augusta, and so prevented them 
from concentrating their troops at Savan- 
nah. Kilpatrick, supported by two infan- 
try brigades, very effectually disposed of 
Wheeler. The army halted two days, and, 
refreshed and united, began on the second 
of December, its final march upon Savan- 
nah. The whole force, save one corps, 
went steadily down the strip of land be- 
tween the Savannah and the Ogeechee, 
while the one corps on the right bank, 
marching in two columns, a day in ad- 
vance of the main bodj', effectually pre- 
vented the confederates from making any 
stand on the main road by constantly 
flanking every position, — a sound precau- 
tion, though not needed. 

The correspondents who accompanied 
this grand army on its triumphant march, 
have furnished abundant narrative con- 
cerning that brilliant consummation of its 
toils, the capture of Savaiinaii. It was on 
the evening of December 12th, says one of 
these, that General Howard relieved 
Kazan's second division of the fifteenth 



corps, by a part of the Seventeenth, and 
threw it across the Little Ogeechee, 
toward the Great Ogeechee, with the 
view of crossing it to Ossabaw Island, 
and reducing Fort McAllister, which held 
the river and the citj'. The confederates 
had destroyed King's bridge, across the 
Great Ogeechee, and this had to be re- 
paired ; this was done — one thousand feet 
of bridging — during the night, and, on the 
morning of the 13th, Hazen crossed and 
moved toward the point where Fort McAl- 
lister obstructed the river. KilpatricK, in 
the meantime, had moved down to St. 
Catherine's sound, opened communication 
with the fleet, and asked permission to 
storm Fort McAllister ; but Sherman 
thought the cavalry unequal to this feat. 

Hazen made his arrangements to storm 
the fort on the afternoon of the 13th, Gen- 
erals Sherman and Howard being at Che- 
roe's rice mill, on the Ogeechee, opposite 
the fort. Sherman was on the roof of the 
mill, surrounded by his staff and signal 
officers, Beckley and Cole, waiting to com- 
municate with Hazen, on the Island. 
While patiently waiting for Hazen's sig- 
nals, Sherman's keen eye detected smoke 
in the horizon, seawai'd. Up to this time 
he had received no intelligence from the 
fleet. In a moment the countenance of 
the bronzed chieftain lightened up, and he 
exclaimed — 

" Look ! Howard ; there is the gun- 
boat!" 

Time passed on, and the vessel now 
became visible, but no signal from the 
fleet or Hazen. Half an hour passed, and 
the guns of the fort opened simultaneously 
with puffs of smoke that rose a few hun- 
dred yards from the fort, showing that 
Hazen's skirmishers had opened. A mo- 
ment after, Hazen signaled — 

''I have invested the fort, and will 
assault immediately." 

At this moment, Beckley announced a 
signal from the gun-boat. All eyes now 
turned from the fort to the gun-boat that 
was coming to their assistance with news 
from home. A few messages pass, which 
apprise that Foster and Dahlgren are 



SHEEMAN'S MAKflT TITKOUOII THE SOUTH — 1S64. 



within speaking distance. The gun-boat 
now halts and asks — 

" Can we run up ? Is Fort McAllister 
ours ? "' 

" No," is the reply ; " Hazen is just 
ready to storm it. Can you assist ? " 

" Ye.s," is the response ; " What will 
you have us do ? " 

But before Sherman can reply to Dahl- 
gi-en the thunders of the fort are heard, 
and the low sound of small arms is borne 
across the three miles of marsh and river. 
Field glasses are opened, and, sitting fiat 
upon the roof, the hero of Atlanta gazes 
away off to the fort. " There they go 
grandly — not a waver," he remarks. 

Twenty seconds jiass, and again he ex- 
claims — 

" See that flag in the advance, Howard ; 
how steadily it moves ; not a man falters. 
* * There they go still ; see the roll of 
musketry. Grand, grand ! " 

Still he strained his eyes, and a moment 
after spoke without looking up — 

" That flag still goes forward ; there is 
no flinching there." 

A pause for a minute. 

"Look!" he exclaims, "it has halted. 
They waver — -no, it's the parapet ! There 
they go again ; now they scale it ; some 
are over. Look ! There's a flag on the 
works ! Another ; another. It's ours. 
The fort's ours ! " 

The glass dropped by his side ; and in 
an instant the joy of the great leader at 
the posse.ssion of the river and the open- 
ing of the road to his new base burst forth 
in words — 

" As the old darkey remarked, dis chile 
don't sleep dis night ! " — and turning to 
one of his aids, he added, " Have a boat 
for me at once ; I must go there ! " — 
pointing to the fort from which half a 
dozen battle-flags floated grandly in the 
sunset. 

But this dramatic scene is thus graphi- 
cally delineated by another correspondent, 
who brings the nai'rative down to the cul- 
minating and crowning event. The United 
States revenue cutter Nemaha, Lieutenant 
Warner, General Foster's flag-boat, left 



Hilton Head, on the morning of December 
12tli, to go down the coast with General 
Foster and staff, to endeavor to open com- 
munication with General Sherman, going 
through to Fort Pulaski and thence 
through the marsh to Warsaw Sound, 
looking toward the main canal to discover 
some traces of Sherman's advance. None 
were observed, so Foster proceeded outside, 
and entered Ossabaw Sound, where the 
gun-boat Flag, on Idockading duty, was 
communicated with. Lieutenant Fisher 
was here left on board the Flag, to proceed 
with his party up the Ogeechee, and en- 
deavor to signal to Sherman, if he should 
approach the coast at that point. 

The Nemaha returned to Warsaw, and 
moved up the Wilmington river, anchor- 
ing just out of range of a confederate bat- 
tery. During the night, rockets were 
thrown up by Captain Merrill, chief of the 
signal corps, to announce his presence to 
General Sherman's signal officers, but 
elicited no response. 

Lieutenant Fisher was more successful. 
The Flag fired six guns in rapid succes- 
sion, from a heavy gun, as a signal, and 
then Lieutenant Fisher threw up several 
rockets and closely examined the horizon 
over the mainland for the response. At 
about three o'clock on the morning of the 
13th, after a rocket had been discharged 
from the Flag, a little stream of light was 
observed to shoot up in the direction of the 
Ogeechee, and quickly die away. Another 
rocket was immediately sent up from the 
flag-ship, and a second stream of light was 
seen in the same position as the first. It 
then became a question, whether or not 
they were confederate signals to deceive 
the federal officers. 

At about seven o'clock, the navy tug 
Dandelion, acting master Williams, took 
Lieutenant Fisher and his party, and Cap- 
tain Williamson, of the flag-ship, and pro- 
ceeded up the Ogeechee, to a point within 
sight of Fort McAllister and the batteries 
on the Little Ogeechee. Here Lieutenant 
Fisher took a small boat and proceeded up 
as far as possible without drawing the 
enemy's fire. A careful reconnoissance 



FRO:\[ rOLOXY TO WORLD TOWEE. 



was made of the fort and the surrounding 
woods, from which came the reports of 
musketry, and the attention of the garrison 
seemed to be directed inland entirely. A 
flag, whicli seemed like that of the Union, 
was seen flj'ing from a house four miles off, 
and on more careful examination the stars 
were plainly visible, and all doubt of the 
character of the flag was at once removed. 
It was tJie flag that had floated over Gen- 
eral Howard's head-quarters at Atlanta, 
and now flamed out on the sea-coast, 
within eight 7iriles of the citi/ of Savari- 
nah. Lieutenant Fisher at once returned 
to the tug, and moved up to an opening 
out of range of Fort McAllister, when, 
from the top of the pilot-house of the Dan- 
delion, the American flag could be dis- 
tinctly seen. A white signal flag was at 
once raised by Lieutenant Fisher, and at 
once a signal flag of like nature was waved, 
and comuuinication opened. Lieutenant 
Fisher signaled — 



' Who 



are yon C 



" McClintock, chief signal officer of 
General Howard," was signaled back. 

A message was at once sent to General 
Sherman, tendering all aid from General 
Foster and Admiral Dahlgren. General 
Sherman then signaled that he was invest- 
ing Fort McAllister, and wanted to know 
if the boat could help with her heavy guns. 
Before any reply could be given, Sherman 
had signaled to Hazen, of the fifteenth 
corps, to take the fort immediately. In 
Ave minutes the rally had been sounded 
by the bugles. One volley of musketry 
was heard, and the next moment the three 
brigade flags of Hazen's troops were 
placed, almost simultaneously, on the j par- 
apets of Fort IMcAllister. The fort was 
captured in twenty minutes after General 
Sherman's order to take it was given. 
Sherman then sent word that he would be 
down tliat night, and to look out for his 
boat. The tug immediately steamed down 
to Ossabaw Sound, to find General Foster 
or Admiral Dahlgren ; but they not being 
there, dispatches were sent to them at 
Warsaw, announcing General Sherman's 
intended visit, and the tug returned to its 



old position. While approaching the fort 
again a small boat was seen coming down. 
It was hailed with — 

"What boat is that ? " and the welcome 
response came back — 

"Sherman." 

It soon came alongside, and out of the 
little dug-out, paddled by two men, stepped 
General Sherman and General Howard, 
and stood on the deck of the Dandelion. 
The great leader was received with cheer 
after cheer. 

The city of Savannah, strongly fortified, 
and garrisoned bj' a large force under Gen- 
eral Hardee, was summoned, but surrender 
was refused. Preparations for assault 
were made, and, during the night of De- 
cember 20th, Hardee evacuated the city, 
and, with a large part of his garrison, 
escaped under cover of darkness. The 
iinion army soon after entered the city, 
and General Sherman thus announced 
to President Lincoln this splendid tri- 
umph : 

'• / /)cg to jiresent yon, as a Christmas 
gift, the city of Savannah, with 150 heavy 
guns, and plenty of ammunition, and also 
alioiit 25,000 bales of cotton." 

Waiting at Savannah only long enough 
to refit and recruit, Sherman again began 
a march which, for peril, labor, and results, 
will compare with any ever made by an 
organized army. The floods of the Savan- 
nah, the swamps of the Combahee and 
Edisto, the high hills and rocks of the 
Santee, the flat quagmires of the Pedee 
and Cape Fear rivers, were all passed in 
mid-winter, with its floods and rains, in 
the face of an accumulating enemy. 

On the morning of February 17th, Gen- 
eral Sherman entered Columbia, the capi- 
tal of South Carolina. In about a month 
from this time, and after fighting battles 
at Averysboro' and Bentonville, he made 
a junction with General Terry's forces at 
Goldsboro', K C, and from this point 
pushed onward to Raleigh, where, on the 
26th of April he received the surrender of 
the confederate army under Johnston,— the 
only remaining formidable confederate 
army in existence at that time east of the 



SHERMAN'S MAECII TIIEOUGTI THE SOFTTI — 1SG4. 



Mississippi river,^thiis virtually crushing 
the southern confederacj'. Indeed, it was 
Sherman's intention not to stop short of 
Richmond, and only the great events con- 
summated a short time previously at that 
important point, under Grant's masterly 
generalship, rendered this part of the pro- 
gramme unnecessary. 

At this time, the great warrior, as de- 
scribed by his accomplished aid-de-camp, 
Major Nichols, was in person nearly six 
feet in height, with a wiry, muscular, and 
not ungraceful frame. His age only fort}'- 
seven years, but his face furrowed with 
deep lines, indicating care and j^rofound 
thought. With surjsrising rapidity, how- 
ever, these strong lines disappeared when 
he talked with women and children. His 
eyes dark brown, and sharp and quick in 
expression ; his forehead broad and fair, 
and sloping gently at the top of the head, 
the latter being covered with thick and 
light brown hair, closely trimmed ; his 
beard and moustache, of a sandy hue, 
were also closely cut. Of an iron consti- 
tution, exposure to cold, rain, or burning 
heat, seemed to produce no effect upon his 
powers of endurance and strength. Under 
fhf most harassing conditions, he exhibited 



no signs of fatigue. When in the field he 
retired early, but at midnight he might be 
found pacing in front of his tent, or sitting 
by the camp-fire smoking his cigar. He 
would fall asleep as easily and as quickly 
as a little child,— by the roadside or upon 
wet ground, on the hard floor or when a 
battle stirred the scene ; but the galloping 
of a Courier's horse down the road would 
instantly awaken him, as well as a voice 
or movement in his tent. As showing his 
thorough military spirit, it is related of 
him, that, before the fall of Atlanta, he 
refused a commission of major-general in 
the regular armj', saying, " These positions 
of so much trust and honor should be held 
open until the close of the war. They 
should not be hastily given. Important 
campaigns are in ojieration. At the end, 
let those who prove their capacity and 
merit be the ones appointed to these high 
honors." The great captain was in a 
short time made lieutenant-general, and, 
subsequently, on the accession of General 
Grant to the presidency, he became Gen- 
eral OF THE Akmy, — a military rank 
and title conferred only upon three per- 
sons, since the founding of the republic, 
iiamely, Washington, Gr.\nt, Sherman. 



XXXV. 

FALL OF RICHMOND, VA., THE CONFEDP^RATE 
CAPITAL.— 18G5. 



The Entrenclied City Closely Encompassei! for Months by General Grant's Brave Legions and Walls of 
Steel. — Flight ot Jellersoii l>avis. and Surrender ot General Lee's Army — Overthrow of the Four 
Years' Gl|;antic Kebellion. — The^gis and Starry Ensifjns of the Uepuhlic Everywhere Dominant. — 
Transports of Joy Fill the [..and. — A Nation's Laurels Crown the Head of the Conqueror of Peace. 
— Memorable Day in Human Affdirs — .Momentous Issues Involved — Heavy Cost of this Triumph. 
— Withont it, a Lost Republic — Unequaleil Valor Displayed. — Sherman's Grand Conceptions — 
Sheridan's Splendid Generalship. — Onward March of Events — .Strategy, Battles, Victories. — Lee's 
Lines Fatally Broken.— Approach of the Final Crisis — Richmond Evacuated by Night. — Retreat 
of Lee: Vigorous Pursuit. — His Hopeless Resistance to Grant — Their Correspondence and Inter- 
view. — The Two Great Generals Face to Face. — What was .Said and Done — Announcing the Result. 
— Parting of Lee with His Soldiers — President Lincoln's Visit to Richmond — Raising; the United 
States Flag at Fort Sumter— Davis a Prisoner in Fortress Monroe. 



•I propose to fight it out OD thia line, if it takes all Buininer."— General Gba.vt'9 Dispatch from the Field. 




N 



GRANT STATINO TERMS OF Sl'RBEKlJKU. 



> /^ERXES crossing tlie Hellespont with his miles of 



troops and flotilla, and over which vast concours \ 
he wept, it is said, as it passed in review, was not 
a more nienioralile illustration of the pomp and 
oirrunistaiice of war, than that wliich was exhibit- 
ed ill 1S64 and 1S65 Ijy the Union army under Gen- 
eral Grant, which, like a wall of steel, heleaguer- 
ed the entrenched city of Ricliniond — the strong- 
hold of his country's foes, — and brought it, in 
April of the last-named year, to submission and 
surrender ; and with which event, the hosts that 
had liocn gathered by a powerful confederacy for 
the iivcrtlu-ow of the republic, melted away in 
defeat and disaster, the disunion chieftains became 
fugitives, and the long strife of arms ceased 
tliroughout the nation. This event has been justly 
characterized as far more momentous than any 
other that is likely to happen in our time, and 
wliieh will always make 180,") one of the great 
years of liistory — putting it, in fact, in the same 
category with the first year of tlie Christian era, 
the vear in wliicli Rome was sacked, in wliieb 



THE FALL OF RICHMOND — 1865. 



Europe was saved from the Saracens, in j 
wliich Lutlier began to i)reach tJie Reform- 
ation, in which Parliament drew the sword 
against Charles I., and in which the first 
shot was fired in the American Revolu- 
tion ; a j'ear, in short, in which events 
marked the commencement of a new and 
important stage in human progress. 

That the foe thus vanquished was not 
an inferior one is shown by the single fact, 
— if by no other — as stated by one of the 
most reliable authorities in such matters, 
that, in the whole history of war, no city 
has been purchased by a conqueror at so 
heavy a price as it cost to take Richmond. 
Napoleon took Berlin, Vienna, and Mos- 
cow, each in a single campaign, and, when 
the scale of fortune turned, the Allies 
entered Paris in two successive years. 
Sebastopol resisted the English and French 
armies for thirteen or fourteen months, 
and four or five battles were fought in the 
hope of raising the siege. For nearly 
four years, Richmond was the principal 
object of siege and attack by the union 
armies, and probably half a million of men 
were at different times employed iu at- 
tempting its conquest. After the disas- 
ter at Bull Run had shown the federal 
government the deficiencies of its military 
organization. General McClellR,n command- 
ed an army of not far from two hundred 
thousand men on the Potomac, and he land- 
ed more than half the number in the Pe- 
ninsula, while his colleagues defended the 
approaches of Washington. The losses of 
the union army in the disastrous campaign 
of the Chickahominy, and in the subsequent 
defeat of Geneial Pope, were variously 
estimated from fifty thousand all the way 
up to one hundred thousand men. Burn- 
side's loss, in his attack upon the heights 
of Fredericksburg, was not far from fifteen 
thousand men, and about the same result 
attended the struggle between Generals 
Lee and Hooker, in 1863. The magnifi- 
cent union victory at Gettysburg, involv- 
ing so great a loss of life, was included in 
the same campaign. It was not till the 
early summer of 1864, that General Grant 
commenced his final advance upon Rich- 



mond, and the battles which ensued in the 
Shenandoah and in the neighborhood of 
Petersburg, added largely to the record of 
bloodshed. Great and most precious, how- 
ever, as was the cost of final victory to the 
union army, its final defeat instead would 
have been at the cost of the existence of 
the Republic ! 

The splendid militar}' conceptions of 
General Sherman, and their jierfect execu- 
tion, had much to do with hastening the 
downfall of Richmond and the collapse of 
the southern confederacy, nor can the lirave 
and effective movement of General Sheri- 
dan in the same relation be too highly 
eulogized by his countrymen. Of the lat- 
ter general's services, at this most excit- 
ing and momentous crisis. General (irant 
says : " During the 30th, (March, 1865,) 
Sheridan advanced from Dinwiddie Court- 
House towards Five Forks, where he found 
the enemy in force. General Warren 
advanced and extended his line across the 
Boydton plank road to near the White 
Oak road, with a view of getting across 
the latter ; but finding the enemy strong 
in his front, and extending lieyond his left, 
was directed to hold on where he was and 
fortify. General Humphreys drove the 
enemy from his front into his main line on 
the Hatcher, near Burgess's mills. Gen- 
erals Ord, Wright, and Parke, made exam- 
inations in their fronts to determine the 
feasibility of an assault on the enemy's 
lines. The two latter reported favorably. 
The enemy confronting us, as he did, at 
every point from Richmond to our extreme 
left, I conceived his lines must be weakly 
held, and could be penetrated if my esti- 
mate of his forces was correct. I deter- 
mined, therefore, to extend my line no 
further, but to re-enforce General Sheri- 
dan with a corps of infantry, and thus ena- 
ble him to cut loose and turn the enemy's 
right flank, and with the other corps as- 
sault the enemy's lines."' 

With what soldierly gallantry Sheridan 
and his colleagues fulfilled the parts as- 
signed them by their superior, is thus 
related by the latter. " On the morning 
of the 31st, General Warren reported fa- 



.JO() 



FKOM COLOXT TO WORLD TOWER. 



vorably to getting possession of the White 
Oak road, and was directed to do so. To 
accomplish this, he moved with one divis- 
ion, instead of his whole corps, which was 
attacked by the enemy in sujjerior force 
■and driven back on the second division 
before it had time to form, and it, in turn, 
forced back upon tlie third division, 
when the enemy was checked. A divis- 
ion of the second corps was inmiedi- 
ately sent to his support, the enemy driven 
back with heavy loss, and possession of 
the White Oak road gained. Sheridan 
advanced, and with a portion of liis cavalry 
got possession of the Five Forks, but the 
enemy, after the affair with the fifth corjis, 
re-enforced the rebel cavalry, defending 
that point with infantry, and forced him 
back towards Dinwiddle Court-House. 
Here General Sheridan displayed great 
generalshi}}. Instead of retreating with 
his whole command on the main armj', to 
tell the story of superior forces encount- 
ered, he deployed his cavalry on foot, leav- 
ing only mounted men enough to take 
charge of the horses. This compelled the 
enemy to deploy over a vast extent of 
woods and broken country, and made his 
progress slow. At this juncture, he dis- 
patched to me what had taken place, and 
that he was dropping back slowly on Din- 
widdle Court-House." Never was the trib- 
ute of praise more worthily bestowed, 
than this by the greatest of American 
heroes upon General Slieridan. 

But still more important events were 
hastening. "On the morning of the 1st 
of April," says General Grant, " General 
Sheridan, re-enforced by General Warren, 
drove the enemy back on Five Forks, 
where, late in the evening, he assaulted 
and carried his strongly fortified position, 
capturing all his artillery, and between 
five and six thousand prisoners. About 
the close of this battle, Brevet Major- 
General Charles Griffin relieved Major- 
General Warren, in command of the fifth 
corps. The report of this reached me after 
nightfall. Some apprehensions filled my 
mind lest the enemy might desert liis lines 
during the night, and by falling upon 



General Sheridan before assistance could 
reach him, drive liini from his position 
and open the way for retreat. To guard 
against this. General Miles's division of 
Humphrey's corps was sent to re-enforce 
him, and a bombardment was commenced 
and kept up until four o'clock in the morn- 
ing, April 2d, when an assault was ordered 
on the enemy's lines. General Wright 
j)enetrated the lines with his whole corps, 
sweeping everything before him and to 
the left towards Hatcher's Run, capturing 
many guns and several thousand prisoners. 
He was closely followed by two divisions 
of General Ord's command, until he met 
the other division of General Ord's that 
had succeeded in forcing the enemy's lines 
near Hatcher's Run. Generals Wright 
and Ord immediately swung to the right, 
and closed all of the enemy on that side of 
them in Petersburg, while General Hum- 
phreys jiushed forward with two divisions 
and joined General Wright on the left. 
General Parke succeeded in carrying the 
enemy's main line, capturing guns and 
prisoners, but was unable to carry his 
inner line. General Sheridan being advised 
of the condition of affairs, returned Gen- 
eral Miles to his proper command. On 
reaching the enemy's lines immediately 
surrounding Petersburg, a portion of Gen- 
eral Gibbon's corps, by a most gallant 
charge, captured two strong, enclosed works 
— the most salient and commanding south 
of Petersburg — thus materially shortening 
the line of investment necessary for tak- 
ing in the city. The enemy south of 
Hatcher's Run retreated westward to 
Sutherland's station, where they were 
overtaken by Miles's division. A severe 
engagement ensued and lasted until both 
his right and left flanks were threatened 
by the approach of General Sheridan, who 
was moving from Ford's station towards 
Petersburg, and a division sent by Gen- 
eral Meade from the front of Petersburg, 
when he broke in the utmost confusion, 
leaving in our hands his guns and many 
prisoners. This force retreated by the 
main road along the Appomattox river. 
During the nii/ht of the second, the enemy 



THE FALL OF RICHMOND — 1S65. 




22 



^38 



Fi;o:\r colony to world lower. 



evacuated Pefershiirg aiid Riclimond, and 
retreated toward Danville. On the morn- 
ing of the 3d, pursuit was commenced. 
General Sheridan jjushed for the Danville 
road, keeping near the Appomattox, fol- 
lowed by General Meade with the second 
and sixth corps, while General Ord moved 
for Burkesville along the South Side road, 
the ninth corps stretched along that road 
behind him," — these combined movements 
being made with such rapidity <iii<i effec- 
tiveness, that Lee's army could have no 
expectation of escape founded upon any 
reasonable probability. 

By the night of Tuesday, April 4th, 
Sheridan and the fifth corps had, by a 
march of thirty-six miles, gained a position 
west of Lee, near Jettersville, on the road 
to Burkesville. This movement resulted 
the next day in the capture of a train of 
three hundred wagons, with five cannon 
and a thousand prisoners. On Wednes- 
day, Grant, with the twenty-fourth corps, 
had reached Nottoway Court-House, and 
there learned by a dispatch from Sheridan 
that Lee had been intercepted. On Thurs- 
day, Grant had brought his army up to 
Sheridan's support, and with the second, 
fifth, and sixth corps, lay in line of battle 
at Burke's Station, facing to the north 
and east, and cutting Lee off from Dan- 
ville. Lee then tried to move on toward 
Lynchburg, by taking a circuitous route 
by way of Deatonsville, toward the Appo- 
mattox, which he hoped to cross, and, with 
the river between him and Grant, secure 
his retreat. Lee was compelled to fight 
at Deatonsville, where he was defeated, 
his loss amounting to thirteen thousand 
prisoners, including Lieutenant-General 
Ewell and Major-Generals Custis Lee, 
Kershaw, Corse, DeBarry, Anderson, Hun- 
ton, and Barton. Fourteen cannon were 
also taken, and several hundred wagons. 

On Friday, April 7th, Grant wrote briefly 
to Lee, asking him to surrender " that 
portion of the Confederate States army 
known as the Army of Northern Virginia." 
He said : " The result of last week must 
convince you of the hopelessness of further 
resistance on the part of the army of 



Northern Virginia in this struggle." Lee 
replied the same day, saying that though 
he was not entirely of Grant's opin- 
ion as to the hopelessness of further 
resistance, he reciprocated the desire to 
avoid useless effusion of blood, and asked 
upon what terms Grant would accept the 
surrender. On tlie 8th, Grant again wrote, 
declaring that he should insist upon but 
one condition, namely : " That the men 
surrendered shall be disqualified for taking 
up arms again against the government of the 
United States until properly exchanged." 
To this, Lee replied that he did not think 
the emergency had arisen to call for the 
surrender, but desired an interview at ten 
o'clock the next day. on the old stage 
road to Richmond, in respect to the restor- 
ation of peace. On the ninth. Grant 
wrote that he had no authority to grant 
such an interview. He said : " The 
terms upon which peace can be had are 
well understood. By the South laying 
down their arms they will hasten that 
most desirable event, save thousands of 
human lives and hundreds of millions of 
property not yet destroyed."' 

In taking the ground that he did in this 
correspondence, Grant acted expressly 
in accordance with the views entertained 
by his superiors at Washington. It ajv 
pears that among the dispatches which 
Grant had sent to the president, about 
this time, was one in which he spoke of an 
application to be made, by Lee for an 
interview to negotiate about peace. Mr. 
Lincoln intimated pretty clearly an inten- 
tion to permit extremely favorable terms, 
and to let his general-in-chief settle them ; 
and this even to an extent that overpow- 
ered the reticent habits of his secretary of 
war, who, after restraining himself as long 
as he could, broke out sternly, saying — 

" Mr. President, to-morrow is inaugura- 
tion day. If you are not to be the presi- 
dent of an obedient and united people, you 
had better not be inaugurated. Your 
work is already done, if any other author- 
ity than j-ours is for one moment to be 
recognized, or any terms made that do not 
signify that j'ou are the sujsreme head of 



THE FALL OF RICIIMOXD — 1865. 



tlie nation. If generals in the field are 
to negotiate peace, or any other chief 
magistrate is to be acknowledged on the 
continent, then you are not needed and 
you had better not take the oath of office." 

" Stanton,"' said the president — his 
whole tone changing, ''you are right. 
Let me have a pen." 

Mr. Lincoln sat down at the table and 
wrote as follows : 

"Tlie president directs me to s:iy to 
you that he wishes you to have no confer- 
ence with General Lee, unless it be for 
the capitulation of Lee's army, or on some 
niiuor or purely military matter. He 
iiLstructs me to say that j'ou are not to 
decide, discuss, or confer on any political 
question ; such questions the president 
holds in his own hands, and will submit 
them to no military conferences or conven- 
tions. In the meantime, you are to press 
to the utmost your military' advantages." 

The president now read over what he 
had written, and then said — 

"Now, Stanton, date and sign this paper, 
and send it to Grant. We'll see about 
this peace business." 

Grant's note declining anj^ interview to 
consider terms of peace was received 
l^y Lee on the spot which he had desig- 
nated for the meeting. On receipt of this, 
Lee at once dispatched another note, 
requesting a personal interview for the 
object named in Grant's previous commu- 
nication — the surrender of Lee's army. A 
flag of truce proceeded to Appomattox 
Court-House shortly after noon, and at 
about two o'clock the two generals met at 
the house of Mr. W. McLean. General 
Lee was attended by General Marshall, his 
adjutant-general ; General Grant, bj' Colo- 
nel Parker, one of his chief aids-de-camp. 
General Grant arrived about fifteen min- 
utes later than General Lee, and entered 
the parlor where the latter was awaiting 
him. 

The two generals greeted each other 
with dignified courtesy, and after a few 
moments conversation, proceeded to the 
business before them. Lee immediately 
alluded to the conditions named by General 



Grant for the surrender, characterized 
them as exceedingly lenient, and said he 
would gladly leave all the details to (ieii- 
eral Grant's own discretion. Of this inter- 
view, General Grant himself gave the 
following interesting account to some 
friends, at a private dinner-party in AVash- 
ington : 

" I felt some embarrassment in the pros- 
pect of meeting General Lee. I had not 
seen him since he was General Scott's 
chief-of-staff in Mexico; and in addition to 
the respect I entertained for him, the 
duty which I had to perform was a dis- 
agreeable one, and I wished to get through 
it as soon as possible. When I reached 
Appomattox Court-House, I had ridden 
that morning thirt\-seven miles. I was 
in my canijiaign clothes, covered with dust 
and mud ; I had no sword; I was not even 
well mounted, for I rode (turning to Gen- 
eral Ingals, who was present.) one of 
Ingals's horses. I found General Lee in a 
fresh suit of confederate gray, with all the 
insignia of his rank, and at liis side the 
splendid dress-sword which had been given 
him by the state of Virginia. We shook 
hands. He was exceedingly courteous in 
his address, and we seated ourselves at a 
deal table in Mr. McLe.m's front room. 
We talked of two of the conditions of sur- 
render, which had been left opsn by our 
previous correspondence, one of which re- 
lated to the ceremonies which were to be 
observed on the occasion ; and when I di.^- 
claimed any desire to have any parade, 
but said I should be contented with the 
delivery of arms to nij- officers, and with 
the proper signature and authentication of 
paroles, he seemed to be greatly pleased. 
When I yielded the other point, that the 
officers should retain their side arms and 
private baggage and horses, his emotions 
of satisfaction were plainly visible. We 
soon reduced the terms to writing. We 
parted with the same courtesies with which 
we had met. It seemed to me that Gen- 
eral Lee evinced a feeling of satisfaction 
and relief when the business was finished. 
I immediately mounted Ingals's horse, re- 
turned to General Sheridan's head-quarters. 



340 



FKOM COLO^'Y TO WOELD POWEE. 



and did not again present myself to the 
confederate couiuuiuJer." 

Tlie house in which this most memora- 
ble interview took place was a comfortable 
and well-built double brick bouse, with a 
small green lawn in front. The occupant, 
Mr. McLean, lived in 1861 at Bull Run, 
and owned the farm on which the first 
and famous Bull Run battle was fought. 
It was in consequence of the disturbed 
state of the country and the annoyances 
to which lie was subjected, that he aban- 
doned his place, and took refuge in the 
distant town of Appomattox. Here he 
purchased some land and settled quietly 
down, as he thought, bej'ond the tide of 
war. But fate followed him ; for, about 
four years after he left the Bull Run farm, 
tlie southern army was surrounded at 
Appomattox, and the last battle as well as 
the first was fought on his farm ! The 
large marble-topped center table, on wliidi 
the two generals signed the minutes, was 
of a somewhat antiquated style, and was 
afterwards purchased by General Ord for 
fifty dollars. General Custer purchased 
the other table, of small size, on which the 
documents were prepared, for twenty-five 
dollars. 

After the interview. General Lee re- 
turned to his own camp, about half a mile 
distant, where his leading officers were 
assembled, awaiting his return. He an- 
nounced the result and the terms, where- 
upon they expressed great satisfaction at 
the liberal conditions. They then ap- 
proached him in order of rank, shook 
hands, and assured him of their approval 
of his course, and their regret at j)arting. 
The fact of surrender and the easy terms 
were then announced to the troops, and 
when General Lee appeared among them 
he was loudly cheered. 

Immediately after the evacuation of 
Richmond, General Weitzel, with the 
second brigade of the third division of the 
twenty-fourth army corps, entered the city 
and took possession, hoisting the LTnited 
States flag at everj- prominent point, and 
on the next day President Lincoln visited 
the fallen capital. His appearance was 



greeted with tumultuous cheering, though 
he came with no pomp of attendance or 
surroundings, and totally unheralded. He 
arrived in a United States war vessel, 
early in the afternoon, at the landing 
called the Rocketts, about a mile below 
the city, and thence, accompanied bj- his 
young son and Admiral Porter, went to 
the city in a boat. Mr. C. C. Coffin, 
(" Carleton,") the accomplished corre- 
spondent of the Boston Journal, in giving 
an account of this presidential visit, says 
that somehow the negroes on the bank of 
the river ascertained that the tall man 
wearing a black hat was President Lin- 
coln. There was a sudden shout. An 
officer who had just picked up fifty negroes 
to do work on the dock, found himself 
alone. They left work, and crowded 
around the president. As he approached, 
I said to a colored woman, — 

" There is the man who made you free." 

" What, massa ? " 

" That is President Lincoln." 

" Dat President Linkuni ?" 

" Yes." 

She gazed at him a moment, clapped 
her hands, and jumped straight up and 
dowji, shouting " Glory, glory, glory !" till 
her voice was lost in the universal 
cheer. 

There was no carriage near, so the presi- 
dent, leading his son, walked three-quarters 
of a mile up to General Weitzel's head- 
quarters — Jefferson Davis's presidential 
mansion. A colored man acted as guide. 
Six sailors, wearing their round blue caps 
and short jackets and bagging pants, with 
navy carbines, were the advance guard. 
Then came the president and Admiral 
Porter, flanked by the officers accompany- 
ing him, and the correspondent of the 
Boston Journal, then six more sailors with 
carbines, — amid a surging mass of men, 
women, and children, black, white, and 
j'ellow, running, shouting, and dancing, 
swinging their caps, bonnets and hand- 
kerchiefs. The soldiers saw him and 
swelled the crowd, cheering in wild enthu- 
siasm. All could see him, he was so tall, 
so conspicuous. 



TPIE FALL OF RICHMOND — 1865. 



341 



One colored woman, standing in a door- 
way, as the president passed along the 
sidewalk, shouted, " Thank you, dear 
Jesus, for this ! thank you, Jesus ! " 
Another, standing by her side, was clap- 
ping her hands and shouting, " Bless de 
Lord ! " A colored woman snatched her 
bonnet from her head, whirled it ui the 
air, and screamed with all her might, 
" God bless you. Massa Linkum ! " 

President Lincoln walked in silence, 
acknowledging the salutes of officers and 
soldiers, and of the citizens, black and 
white. It was the man of the people 
among the people. It was the great de- 
liverer among the delivered. General 
Shepley met the president in the street, 
and escorted him to General Weitzel's 
quarters. Major Stevens, hearing that 
the president was on his way, suddenly 
summoned a detachment of Massachusetts 
cavalry, and cleared the way. After a 
tedious walk, the mansion of Mr. Davis 
was reached. The immense crowd swept 
round the corner of the street and packed 
the space in front. General Weitzel 
received the president at the door. Cheer 
upon cheer went up from the excited mul- 
titude, two-thirds of whom were colored. 
The officers who had assembled were 
presented to the piresident in the reception 
room, and then citizens innumerable paid 
him their respects ; after which the presi- 
dent took a ride through the citj-, accom- 
panied by Admiral Porter, Generals Shep- 
ley and AVeitzel, and others. 

All this took place only a few hours 
after the flight of Davis. Early in the 
forenoon of that eventful Sunday, Lee tel- 
egraphed to his chief, that his lines had 
been broken in three places and that Eich- 
niond must be evacuated in the evening. 
This message was delivered to Davis at 
eleven o'clock, while he was in church. 
He immediately left, and, arranging his 
affairs as well as time would permit, pro- 
ceeded with his cabinet to Danville. Pol- 
lard, the historian of the southern cause, 
states that the rumor was caught up in 
the streets that Eii-hmond was to be evac- 
uated, and was soon carried to the ends 



of the city. Men, women, and children, 
rushed from the churches, passing from 
lip to lip news of the impending fall. It 
was late in the afternoon when the signs 
of evacuation became apparent to the in- 
credulous. Wagons on the streets were 
being hastily loaded at the departments 
with boxes, trunks, etc., and driven to the 
Danville depot. Those who had deter- 
mined to evacuate with the fugitive govern- 
ment looked on with amazement ; then, 
convinced of the fact, rushed to follow the 
government's example. Vehicles suddenly 
rose to a premium value that was astound- 
ing. All over the city it was the same — 
wagons, trunks, boxes, bundles, and their 
hurrying owners, filling the streets. By 
order of the military authorities, all the 
spirituous liquor in the city was destroyed, 
but some of it was seized and used by the 
straggling soldiery, who thereupon commit- 
ted the grossest excesses. The great 
tobacco warehouses were also, by mili- 
tary order, set on fire, as were also the 
various bridges leading out of the city, 
and the rams in James river were blown 
up. The whole scene was awful in the 
extreme. 

At Danville, Davis set up the form and 
macliinery of his government, issuing ai, 
once a stirring address, in which he said : 
" We have now entered upon a new phase 
of the struggle. Relieved from the neces- 
sity of guarding particular jioints, our 
army will be free to move from point to 
point, to strike the enemy in detail far 
from his base.'' Waiting here, in expect- 
ation of Lee's arrival with his army, the 
news of the surrender of the latter reached 
him on the 10th of April. Dismayed at 
the tidings, Davis hastily made his escape 
to Greensboro, N. C, and afterwards, with 
various baitings, to Charlotte, N. C, and 
thence to Washington and Irwinsville, 
Ga., where he was captured. May 11th, by 
the union cavalry, and carried, a prisoner, 
to Fortress Monroe. This was, in form, 
the close of the war. General Johnston 
surrendered his army at Raleigh, N. C, 
April 26th, to General Sherman. General 
Howell Cobb, with his militia and five 



342 



yho'm colony to world power. 



generals, surrendered to General Wilson, 
at Macon, Ga., April 20tli. Gen. Dick 
Taylor surrendered all the remaining con- 
federate forces east of the Mississijjpi to 
General Canby, May 14th ; and, on the 
26th of the same month, Gen. Kirby Smith 
surrendered his entire command, west of 
the Mississippi, to the same officer. On 
the 14th of April, — just four years from 
the memorable bondiardment and evacua- 
tion, — the flag of the United States was 
planted again upon Fort Sumter, under 
the orders of the president, by the hands 
of General Anderson, its commander in 
April, 1861. 

The close of this mighty struggle, assur- 
ing the world of the continued nationality 
of the American Union, tilled the land 
with such transports and demonstrations 
of joy as were never before known among 
any people ; and the laurels of the nation 
covered the brow of Grant, the hero of 
mighty battles — the Conqueror of Peace. 
By special act of congress, the full and 
supreme rank of General — a title never 
worn by a United States commander since 
the daj's of the illustrious Washington, — 
was revived and conferred upon Grant ; 
and. as the highest honor in the gift of 
his countrymen, he was in 1869 transfer- 
red from the <'ommand of the army to the 
exalted position of President of the United 
States, in which station he remained eight 
years. 

One event, in especial, among the clus- 
ter just named in connection with the 
closing scenes of the Great Conflict, de- 
serves more than a passing mention here, 
namely, the Jie-j->ossfssion of Fort Sumter, 
and the restoration to its origiiial jylace on 
that historic spot, hy General Anderson, of 
tlie identical Ji a f/ which, after an honora- 
ble and gallant defense, he was compelled 
to lower in April, 1861. 

This ceremony of re-occupation took 
place, as ordered by President Lincoln, on 
Friday, April 14th, 1865, in presence of 
several thousands of spectators. Among 
the company were Generals Gillmore, Di.x, 
Washburne, Doubleday, Anderson, Dela- 
field, Grover, Hatch, and Saxton, Rev. 



Henry Ward Beecher, William Lloyd 

Garrison, George Thompson, Assistant Sec- 
retary Fo.x, of the Navy Department, 
Professor Davis, and some two hundred 
officers of the navy. The spectators were 
conveyed from Charleston to the fort by 
steamers, and the ceremonies were ushered 
in at noon with a song and chorus entitled 
' Victory at Last.' 

Prayer was now offered by Rev. Mat- 
thias Harris, chaplain United States Army, 
who made the prayer at the raising of 
the flag when Major Anderson suddenl}' 
removed his command from Fort Moultrie 
to Fort Sumter, December 27th, 1860. 
Rev. Dr. Storrs, of Brooklyn, then read 
selections of scripture, after which, Adju- 
tant-General Townsend read Major Ander- 
son's dispatch, dated steamship Baltic, off 
Sandy Hook, April 18th, 1861, announcing 
the fall of Fort Sumter. 

Major-General Anderson and Sergeant 
Hart then stepped forward on the platform 
and unfurled the glorious old banner, amid 
the deafening cheers of the assemblage. 
As they raised the flag, with an evergreen 
wreath attached, the occujiants on the 
stage all joined in taking hold of the hal- 
yards. The scene of rejoicing that fol- 
lowed, as the flag reached the top of the 
staff, was indescribable. The enthusiasm 
was unbounded. There was a simultane- 
ous rising, cheering, and waving of hats 
and handkerchiefs, for fully fifteen minutes. 
As the starry emblem floated out grace- 
fully to the strong breeze, the joyful dem- 
onstrations were repeated, which were 
responded to by music from the bands, a 
salute of one hundred guns at Fort Sumter, 
and a national salute from every fort and 
battery that fired ujion Sumter in A])ril, 
1861. When this was over. General Ander- 
son came forward and said — 

" I am here, friends and fellow-citizens, 
and brother soldiers, to perform an act of 
duty which is dear to my heart, and which 
all of you present appreciate and feel. Did 
I listen to the promptings of my own 
heart, I woidd not attempt to speak ; but 
I have been desired by the secretary of 
war to make a few remarks. By the con- 



THE FALL OF RICHMOND — 1S65. 



343 



siderate appointment of the honored secre- 
tary of war to fultill the cherished wish of 
my heart through four long years of bloody 
war — to restore to its proper place this 
very flag which floated here during peace, 
before the first act of this cruel rebellion 
— I thank God I have lived to see this 
day, to be here to perform this, perhaps 
the last act of duty to my country in this 
life. My heart is filled with gratitude to 
Almighty God for the signal blessings he 
has given us — blessings beyond number. 
May all the world proclaim ' Glory to God 



in the highest ; on earth, peace and good 
will toward men.' "" 

The ' Star Spangled Banner ' was then 
sung by the whole audience, with great 
feeling and effect ; after which, Eev. 
Henry Ward Beecher delivered a com- 
memorative oration of great eloquence and 
power. The doxology, with devotional 
services, closed the public exercises of the 
day ; and, with cheers for President Lin- 
coln, the old Flag, the Union, Generals 
Grant, Sherman, and others, the vast mul- 
titude separated. 



XXXV 1. 

ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN, AT FORD'S 

THEATER, WASHINGTON, BY J. WILKES 

BOOTH.— 1865. 



Conspiracy to Murder, Simultaneously, ail the Cliief Officers of the Government — The Most Exalted 
and Beloved of Mortal Rulers Falls a Viciini — A Universal Wail of Anguish and Lamentation 
Poured Forth from the National Heart. — Darkest Pa^ie in the History of the Country — Funeral Cor- 
tege Through Fifteen States. — Tragical Fate of the Conspirators. — Object of this Most Infamous of 
Crimes — Singular Time of its Perpetration. — Virtual End of the Great Civil War. — Dawn of Peace : 
Universal Joy. — President Lincoln's Happy Frame of Mind. — How He Passed His Last Day. — Con- 
versations on the Evening of April 14th. — Makes :in Engagement for the Morrow — Last Time He 
Signed His Name — Reluctantly Goes to tlie Theater. — Arrives Late : Immense Audience — Plans and 
Movements of Booth, the Assassin. — The Fatal Shot : A Tragedy of Horrors — Removal of the Presi- 
dent to a Private House. — Speechless and Unconscious to the End — Death-Bed Scenes and Incidents. 
— The Nation Stunned at the Appalling News. — Its Reception at the South, and hy General Lee. 

_ — A Continent in Tears and Mourning. — Most 

^^^ ^, ^ Imposing Obsequies Ever Known. — Booth's Switt 

^B?i^Hi _ and Bloody End. — Trial of His Male and Female 
'■j Accomplices. 




— '■ Mnurn ye for him? let him be regarded 
As the most "noble coise that ever heralil 
Did lollow to iiis urn." 



'I.N S i:.\RLV H(>MK. 



.'. ^ EVIEWING the great [jvocession of events 
wliich distinguish tlie ninety years cov- 
ered bv our national existence, up to the 
present time, there is, confessedl\', none 
of the many during that period, wliich 
shows -so dark and terriMe a page. — none which so paralyzed the heart of the nation, or 
sent such a thrill of ag.uiy through the four continents of the globe, causing world-wide 
sorrow and lamentation, — as the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, president of the 
United States, by John Wilkes Booth, at Ford's Theater, in the capital of the nation, 
on the night of April 14th, 1865. And this bloody deed was but one act in the diabol- 
ical conspiracy which contemplated tlio simultaneous murder of the chief officers of 
state, at the federal capital, to the end that panic might there seize upon the govern- 
ment and nation, and treason >and anarchy assert their sway over a republic in ruins. 

And yet, the time chosen for tliis most appalling conspiracy was that which was 
marked by the virtual close of the great war which for four long years had filled the 
land with carnage and death ; the prowess of General Grant had .shattered the plans of 
the ablest military chieftains of the south ; General Sherman had consummated his 
grand march from Atlanta to Savannah, and thence through South Carolina ; all the 



THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN — 1865. 



o-to 



chief cities of the south were occupied by 
the union forces ; Lee had surrendered 
his sword, and President Lincoln had just 
visited the city of Eiclimond, so recentl3^ 
the confederate strongliold; and Jefferson 
Davis was a fugitive, who had then barely 
escaped capture. The demonstrations of 
joy at the now certain conclusion of hostil- 
ities, and the dawn of peace, were univer- 
sal ; and by no one, in all the land, was 
this joy shared so fully as by President 
Lincoln. 

Of the president's hapjjv frame of mind, 
now that victory had everywhere crowned 
the federal arms, and he was entering on 




FOKD S THEATER, IN WASHIXGTON. 

his second presidential term under the 
auspices of prospective peace, something 
may be judged by the incidents repre- 
sented to have transpired in connection 
with his private and personal intercourse, 
during the last day of his life. On the 
morning of that fatal day, Captain Robert 
Lincoln, son of the president, and who had 
just returned from the capitulation of Gen- 
eral Lee, breakfasted with his father, and 
the president passed a happy hour listen- 
ing . to all the details. While thus at 
breakfast, he heard that Speaker Colfax 
was in the house, and sent word that he 
wished to see him immediatelv in the 



reception room. He conversed with him 
nearly' an hour, on his future policy as to 
the south, which he was about to submit 
to the cabinet. Afterwards he had an 
interview with Mr. Hale, minister to Spain, 
and with sevei-al senators and representa- 
tives. At eleven o'clock, the cabinet and 
General Grant met with him, and, in one 
of the most important and satisfactory 
cabinet sessions held since his iii-st inau- 
guration, the future j)olicy of the adminis- 
tration was harmoniously and unanimously 
agreed on, Secretarj' Stanton remarking 
that he felt that the government was 
stronger than at anj' previous period since 
the rebellion commenced. Turning to 
General Grant, Mr. Lincoln asked him if 
he had heard from General Sherman. 
General Grant replied that he had not, but 
was in hourly expectation of receiving dis- 
patches from him announcing the sur- 
render of Johnston. The jJresident re- 
plied : 

" Well, you will hear verj' soon, and the 
news will be important." 

"Why do j'ou think so?" inquired 
General Grant, somewhat in a curious 
mood. 

" Because," said Mr. Lincoln, " I had a 
dream, last night, and, ever since the war 
began, I have invariably had the same 
dream before any very important military 
event has occurred." He then instanced 
Bull Run, Antietam, Gettj'sburg, etc., and 
said that before each of those events he 
had had the same dream, and, turning to 
Secretary Welles, continued, ,'• It is in 
your line, too, Mr. Welles. The dream is, 
that I saw a .ship sailing very rapidly, and 
I am sure that it jjortends some important 
national event." 

In the afternoon, the president had a 
long and pleasant interview with General 
Oglesby, Senator Yates, and other leading 
citizens of Illinois. 

At about half-past seven o'clock in the 
evening, Hon. George Ashmun, of Massa- 
chusetts, who presided over the Chicago 
Convention in 1860, called at the White 
House, and was ushered into the parlor, 
where Mr. Colfax was seated, waiting for 



316 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD TOWEIi. 



an interview with the president, on busi- 
ness which had a bearing on his proposed 
overhuid trip. A few moments ehipsed, 
when President Lincoln entered the room, 
and engaged in conversation upon various 
matters, apjjearing to be in a very happy 
and jovial frame of mind. He spoke of 
his visit to Richmond, and when they 
stated that there was much uneasiness at 
the north while he was in that city, for 
fear that he might be shot, he replied, 
jocularly, that he would have been alarmed 
himself if any other perspn had been pres- 
ident and gone there, but that personally 
he did not feel any danger whatever. 
Conversing on a matter of business with 
Mr. Ashmun, he made a remark that he 
saw Mr. Ashmun was surprised at, and, 
though not very important, he immediately 
said, with his well-known kindness of 
heart, — 

" You did not understand me, Ashmun. 
I did not mean what you inferred, and I 
take it all back and apologize for it." 

Mr. Ashmun desiring to see him again, 
and there being no time to attend to it 
then, the president took out a card, and 
placing it on his knee, wrote as follows : 

" Allow Mr. Ashmun and friend to come 
to me at nine a. m., to-morrow. 

April 14, '65. A. Lincoln." 

These were the last words that he 
penned. It was the last time that he 
signed his name to any order, document or 
message. The last words written by him 
were thus making an engagement for the 
morrow — an engagement which he was not 
allowed to meet. Before the hour had 
arrived he was no more. After signing 
the card, he said, humorousl}', to Mr. 
Colfax,— 

" Mr. Sumner has the gavel of the Con- 
federate Congress, which he got at Rich- 
mond, to hand to the secretary of war; but 
I insisted then that he must give it to you, 
and you tell him for me to hand it over." 

Mr. Ashmun here pleasantlj' alluded to 
the gavel which he himself still had — the 
same one he had used when presiding over 
the Chicago Nominating Convention of 
1860. 



President Lincoln finally stated that he 
must go fo the theater and, saying, '■ You 
are going with Mrs. Lincoln and me to the 
theater, I hope." warmly pressed Speaker 
Colfax and Mr. Ashmun to accompany 
them, but they excused themselves on the 
score of previous engagements. It was 
now half an hour after the time when they 
had intended to start, and they spoke 
about waiting half an hour longer, — the 
president going with reluctance, as Gen- 
eral Grant had that evening gone north, 
and Mr. Lincoln did not wish the people 
to be disappointed, it having been an 
nounced in the afternoon papers that the 
president, Mrs. Lincoln, and General 
Grant, would attend the theater that even- 
ing, to witness the rejaresentation of the 
" American Cousin." At the door, Mr. 
Lincoln stopped and said, — 

" Colfax, do not forget to tell the people 
in the mining regions, as j'ou pass through 
them, what I told j'ou this morning about 
the development when peace comes, and I 
will telegraph you at San Francisco." 

Starting for the carriage, Mrs. Lincoln 
took the arm of Mr. Ashmun, and the 
president and Mr. Colfax walked together. 
As soon as the president and Mrs. Lincoln 
were seated in the carriage, Mrs Lincoln 
gave orders to the coachman to drive 
around to Senator Harris's residence, for 
Miss Harris. As the carriage rolled 
away, they both said ' Good-by, — Good- 
by," to Messrs. Ashmun and Colfax. A 
few moments later, and the presidential 
party of four persons, namely, the presi- 
dent and Mrs. Lincoln, Miss Harris, and 
Major Eathbone, arrived at the theater 
and entered the front and left-hand upper 
private box. 

The deeply-laid plan of Booth to murder 
the president was soon to culminate in 
horrid and fatal execution. According to 
the very reliable account given by the 
Hon. H. J. Raymond, in his biography of 
the martyred president, and in which 
account there is exhibited the most pains- 
taking synopsis of the accumulated evi- 
dence concerning Booth's movements, the 
murderer made his appearance at fifteen 



THE ASSASSIXATION OF PRESIDENT LIXCOLN — 1865. 347 




THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN. 

minutes aftei- ten, passed along the pas- 
sage behind the spectators in tlie dress- 
circle, showed a card to the president's 
messenger, and stood for two or three min- 
utes looking down upon the stage and the 
orchestra below. He then entered the 
vestibule of the president's box, closed the 
door behind him, and fastened it by brac- 
ing a short plank against it from the wall, 
so that it could not be opened from the 
outside. He then drew a small silver- 
mounted Derringer pistol, which he car- 
ried in his right hand, holding a long 
double-edged dagger in his left. All in 
the box were intent on the proceedings 
upon the stage ; but President Lincoln 
was leaning forward, holding aside the 
curtain of the box with his left hand, and 
looking, with his head slightly turned, 
towards the audience. Booth stepped 
within the inner door into the box, directly 
behind, the jiresident, and, holding the 



pistol just over the back of the 
chair in which he sat, shot him 
through the back of the head. 
Mr. Lincoln's head fell slightly forward, 
and his eyes closed, but in every other 
respect his attitude remained unchanged. 
The report of the pistol startled those 
in the box, and Major Eathbone, turn- 
ing his eyes from the stage, saw, through 
the smoke that filled the box, a man 
standing between him and the president. 
He instantly sprang towards him and 
seized him ; but Booth wrested himself 
from his grasp, and, dropping the pis- 
tol, struck at him with the dagger, in- 
flicting a severe wound upon his left 
arm, near the shoulder. Booth then 
rushed to the front of the box, shouted 
" Sic semper tijvannis ! '"' — put his hand 
upon the railing in front of the box, and 
leaped over it ujjon the stage below. As 
he went over, his spur caught in the flag 
which draped the front, and he fell ; but 
recovering himself immediately, he rose, 
brandished the dagger, and facing the 
audience, shouted, " The South is 
avenged ! " He then rushed across the 
stage towards the passage which led to the 



J48 



FKOM COLOA'Y TU WUiiLlJ TOWia: 



stage door in tlie rear of the theater. An 
actor naiUKil llawke was the only person 
on the stage when Bootli leaped up<in it, 
and seeing Booth coming towards him 
with tlie dagger in his Iiand, he ran off the 
stage and up a flight of stairs. Bootli ran 
through the passage-way beside the scenes, 
meeting one or two persons only, whom he 
struck from his path, went out at the door 
which stood open, and which he closed 
behind him, anil mounting a horse which 
he had brought there, and which a lad was 
holding for him, he rode over the Anacosta 
bridge, across the east branch of the Poto- 
mac, safely escaping to Lower Maryland. 

It is impossible to describe the scene 
which transpired in that box and in that 
vast audience, on the discovery that the 
president was shot. Suffice it to say, that 
the surgeon-general and other ])liysicians 
were immediately summoned, and their 
skill exhausted in efforts to restore him to 
consciousness. An examination of his 
wounds, however, showed that no hopes 
could be given that his life would be 
spared. 

Preparations were at once made to re- 
move him, and he was conveyed to a house 
immediately opposite, and there placed 
upon a bed, the only evidence of life being 




l^[|(jlrt[jfK' 




mw^ 



HOUSE WltEIiE LINCOLN- PIED. 

an occasional nervous twitching of the 
hiiud and Jieavy breathing. At about haif- 
past eleven, the motion of tlie muscles of 
ln.-i face indicated as if he were trying to 
speak, but doubtless it was merely muscu- 
lar. His >'yes protruded from their sock- 
ets and we>e suffused with blood. 



At his bedside were the secretaries of 
war, the nav\- and the interior; the post- 
master-general and attorney-general ; Sen- 
ator Sumner; General Todd, cousin to 
Mrs. Lincoln; Major Hay, Mr. M. B. 
Field, General Halleck, General Meigs, 
llev. Doctor Gurlej', the jihysicians, and a 
few other persons. All were bathed in 
tears ; and Secretary Stanton, when in- 
formed by Surgeon-General Barnes, that 
the i)resident could not live until morning, 
exclaimed, ''Oh, no. General; no — no;'" 
and with an impulse, natural as it was 
unaffected, immediately sat down and 
wept like a child. Senator Sumner was 
seated at the right of the president, near 
tlie liead, holding the right band of the 
president in his own ; he was sobbing like 
a woman, with his head bowed down 
almost upon the pillow of the bed. In an 
adjoining room were INIrs. Lincoln, and 
several others. 

ilrs. Lincoln was in a state of great 
excitement and agony, wringing her hands 
and exclaiming, '' Why did he not shoot 
me, instead of my husband ! I have tried 
to be so careful of him, fearing sometliing 
would happen, and his life seemed to be 
more precious now than ever. I must go 
with him ! " — and other expressions of like 
churactcr. She was constantly going to 
and from the bedside of the president, say- 
ing in utter grief, "How can it be so!" 
The scene was heart-rending. Captain 
Robert Lincoln bore himself with great 
firmness, and constantly endeavored to 
assuage the grief of his mother by telling 
her to put her trust in God and all would 
be well. Occasionally, however, being 
entirely overcome, he would retire by him- 
self and give vent to most piteous lamen- 
tations. 

At four o'clock, the symptoms of restless- 
ness returned, and at six the premonitions 
of dissolution set in. His face, which had 
been quite i)ale, began to assume a waxen 
transparency, the jaw slowly fell, and the 
teeth became exposed. About a quarter 
of an hour before the president died, his 
breathing became very difficult, and in 
manv instances seemed to have entirely 



THE ASSASSINATION OF PEESIDENT LINCOLN — 1865. 



349 



ceased. He would again rally and breathe 
with so great difficulty as to be heard in 
almost every part of the house. Mrs. 
Lincoln took her last leave of him about 
twenty minutes before he expired, and was 
sitting in the adjoining room when it was 
announced to her that he was dead. 
When this announcement was made, she 
exclaimed, " Oh ! why did you not tell me 
that he was dying ! '" 

The surgeons and the members of the 
cabinet. Senator Sumner, Captain Robert 
Lincoln, General Todd, Mr. Field, and 
one or two more, were standing at his 
bed-side when he breathed his last. Rob- 





ert Lincoln was resting himself tenderly 
upon the arm of Senator Sumner, the 
mutual embrace of the two having all the 
affectionateness of father and son. The 
surgeons were sitting upon the side and 
foot of the bed, holding the president's 
hands, and with their watches observing 
the slow declension of the pulse, and 
watching the ebbing out of the vital spirit. 

He lingered longer than was expected ; 
until, at twenty-two minutes past seven 
o'clock, in the morning, April fifteenth, 
the phj'sician said, with solemn accent and 
overpowering emotion, — 

" He Is gone ; he, is dead." 

Such was the deep stillness, in that 
awful presence, at the fatal announcement. 



that for the space of five minutes the tick- 
ing of the watches could be distinctly 
heard. All stood transfixed in their posi- 
tions, speechless, breathless, around the 
dead body of that great and good man. 
At length the secretary of war broke the 
silence and said to Rev. Doctor Gurley, 
"Doctor, will you say anj'thing ? " He 
replied, " I will speak to God." " Do it 
just now," responded the secretary. And 
there, by the side of the fallen chief, a fer- 
vent prayer was offered up, at the close of 
which there arose from the lips of the 
entire company a fervid and siiontaneous 
"Amen." 

No adequate portrayal can be 
given of the effect upon the 
public mind, of the murder of 
the president, as the news was 
borne along the telegraphic 
wires, from one end of the land 
to the other. Stunned, bewil- 
dered, incredulous, at first, the 
tears and wailing of a whole 
nation were soon manifest — 
deep answering unto deep — to 
an extent and degree never be- 
fore witnessed since the death 
of Washington. A pang of hor- 
ror seized every heart, in this 
darkest hour of the country's 
history, the emblems of mourn- 
ing slu'ouded the land in very 
darkness — its streets, its habita- 
tions, its churches, its halls of justice, its 
capitols, — funeral pageants everywhere 
hushed the noise of business, — and tlie 
solemn voice of eulogy and lamentation, 
and the sound of dirge and requiem, filled 
the air, from the mountains of the north 
to the prairies and valleys of the west and 
the golden slopes of the far-off Pacific. 

If, in the blind and fatal mistake of 
sectional antagonism or partisan bitterness, 
this most infamous of human crimes found 
apologists, there were, at least, some nota- 
ble exceptions to this feeling. Thus, 
when the tidings reached Richmond, Gen- 
eral Lee at first refused to hear the details 
of the horrid deed, from the two gentlemen 
who waited upon him on Sunday night 



;;50 



FROi[ COLOXY TO WOELD POWER. 



with the particulars. He said, that when 
he dispossessed himself of the command of 
the confederate forces, he kej)t in view Pres- 
ident Lincoln's benignity, and surrendered 
as much to the latter's goodness as to 
Grant's artillery. The general said that 
he regretted Mr. Lincoln's death as much 
as any man in the north, and believed him 
to be the epitome of magnanimity and good 
faith. 

On the nineteenth of April, the New 
World witnessed the most imposing fu- 
neral ceremonies that ever took place this 
side of the Atlantic, or perhaps in the 
w hole world. The body, which had been 
embalmed, lay in state in the Green Room 
of the White House, the coffin resting 
upon a magnificent catafalque, and the 



The description given bj' Holland, of 
the procession in the federal metropolis, 
will apply, in its main features, to all the 
corteges in the various cities through 
which the lionored remains passed. "Ev- 
ery piazza, window, verandah and house- 
top, was tilled with eager but mournful 
faces. Funereal music filled the sweet 
spring air ; and this was the only sound, 
excejjt the measured tread of feet, and the 
slow roll of wheels upon the pavement. 
As the hearse, drawn bj- six gray horses, 
reached the capitol grounds, the bands 
burst forth in a requiem, and were an- 
swered bj' minute-guns from the fortifica- 
tions. The body of the president was 
borne into the rotunda, where Doctor Gur- 
ley completed the religious exercises of the 




LISCUL.N'S EESIDENCE AT SPRINGFIELD, ILL. 



grand room overflowing with flowers which 
had poured in from innumerable sources. 
The public exercises took place in the East 
Room, being conducted by Rev. Drs. Hall, 
Gurlej', and Gray, and Bishop Simpson. 
The throng of dignitaries, embracing rep- 
resentatives of the army and nav}', sena- 
tors and members of congress, judges, for- 
eign ambassadors, governors of the states, 
and other high officials, was such as had 
never before been gathered together in the 
executive mansion. From tlie latter place, 
the body of the illustrious deceased was 
conveyed, along Pennsylvania Avenue, to 
the great rotunda of the nation's capitol, 
thence to be cari-ied to their last resting- 
place in Oak Ridge cemetery, Springfield, 
111. 



occasion. Here the remains rested, ex- 
posed to public view, but guarded by sol- 
diery, until the next day. Thousands 
who had no other opportunity to take their 
farewell of the beloved dust thronged the 
capitol all night. The pro"ession which 
moved from the White Hous' , April 19th, 
was but the beginning of a pageant that 
displayed its marvelous numbers and its 
ever-varying forms, through country, and 
village, and city, winding acr' -s ilie terri- 
tories of vast states, along r. ii.vK of Liiore 
than fifteen hundred miles.' During this 
period, millions gazed i pen the loved 
features of the departed president. 

It was on the twentj'-first of April, that 
the remains were started upon their mourn- 
ful journey to Springfield, 111. They were 



THE ASSASaiNATIOlS OF PEESIDENT LINCOLN — ]SG5. 



:J51 



taken to that city by the route he pursiied 
while ou his way from his western liome to 
be inaugurated in AVasliington. Balti- 
more, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New York, 
Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, In- 
dianapolis, and Chicago, were visited in 
the order named, and at each place, as 
well as all along the route, there were 
most extraordinary demonstrations of re- 
spect and sorrow. Millions of people 
manifested, by every possible means and 
token, their deep sense of the public loss, 
and their appreciation of the exalted vir- 
tues which adorned the life of Abraham 
Lincoln. All classes, without distinction 
of politics or creeds, spontaneously united 
in the posthumous honors. 

The funeral at Springfield was on a 
beautiful May day. At noon, the remains 
were brought from the state house, in the 
same hearse which had borne the bodies 




SERGEANT BOSTON COEBETT. 

of General Lyon and Thomas H. Benton. 
The hearse was surmounted by a crown of 
flowers. From the portico, as the proces- 
sion, advanced, a vast chorus of voices filled 
the air with the strains of " Children of 
the Heavenly King." The ceremonies 
were under the immediate direction of 
General Hooker. A dirge was sung ; and 
after the reading of scripture, a prayer, 
and a hymn, the president's second inau- 
gural address was read. A dirge suc- 
ceeded, after which Bishop Simpson de- 
livered the funeral oration before the great 
audience there assembled, and from the 
midst of which went forth many an ejacu- 
lation of uncontrollable sorrow. 



And the illustrious and beloved 
president, so recently the most ex- 
alted of mortal rulers, was buried 
in his own tomb. 

But before the noble de2)arted had been 
consigned, amidst the tears and lamenta- 
tions of a whole continent, to the earth's 
bosom, John Wilkes Booth, the perpetra- 
tor of the greatest of modern crimes, had 
met his doom, and most of his co-conspira- 
tors — Atzerodt, Doctor Mudd, Payne, Har- 
old, Mi's. Surratt, O'Lauglilin, Arnold, and 
Spangler — were in the clutches of the law. 
It was Payne, who, at the same time that 
Booth's bullet sped its fatal course, en- 
acted his part of the conspiracy in which 
Booth was chief, by entering the sick 
chamber of Secretary Seward, stabbing 
him in the throat, and then escaping. It 
was at Mrs. Surratt's house that the con- 
spirators had met and laid their plans. 
As alleged, Atzerodt was to have taken the 
life of Vice-President Johnson. O'Laugli- 
lin was assigned to murder General Grant 
or Secretary Stanton. Harold was the 
body companion of Booth. Spangler as- 
sisted in Booth's escape from the theater. 
Mudd had held interviews with Booth and 
John H. Surratt, son of Mrs. Surratt 
named above, and had also attended to 
Booth's leg, crippled by his getting entan- 
gled with the flag that decorated the presi- 
dent's box. Arnold was originally in the 
plot, but quarreled, and left it. Booth was 
but twenty-seven years old at the time of 
his crime, by profession an actor, long 
known for his dissipated habits, and for his 
ardent devotion to the southern cause. 
He was born in Harford county, Md., his 
father being the once celebrated actor, 
Junius Brutus Booth, and his brother 
being Edwin Booth, also famous on the 
stage. 

Immediately after the murder, Colonel 
Baker, of the detective service, set out to 
find Booth's hiding-place. He soon suc- 
ceeded in capturing Atzerodt and Mudd. 
A negro was then arrested, who said he 
had seen Booth and another man cross the 
Potomac in a fishing boat. Colonel Baker 
sent to General Hancock for twenty-five 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



mounted men to aid him in the pursuit. I 
The.se were sent under Lieutenant Dough- 
erty, and Baker placed them under the 
control of Lieutenant-Colonel Conger, and 
of his cousin, Lieutenant L. B. Baker, and 
dispatched them to Belle Plain, with 
orders to scour the country about Port 
Royal. 

At Port Royal they found one Rollins, 
a fisherman, who referred them to a negro 
named Lucas as having driven two men a 
short distance toward Bowling Green, in a 
wagon. These men perfectly answered 
the description of Booth and Harold, 
hsome disbanded men, it was learned, be- 
longing to Mosby's command, took Booth 
under their protection on the way to 
Bowling Green, a small court-house town 
in Caroline county. To that place, Baker 
and his party immediately proceeded, and 
there found the captain of the confederate 
cavalry, from whom they extorted a state- 
ment of Booth's whereabouts ; this was at 
the house of a Mr. Garrett, which they had 
already passed. 

Returning with the captain for a guide, 
the worn-out command halted at Garrett's 
gate, at two o'clock on the morning of 
April I'Gth. Witliout noise, the house 
was surrounded, and Baker went up to 
the kitchen door at the side, and rapped. 
An old man in half undress undrew the 
bolt.s, and had scarcely opened the door 
before Baker had him by the throat with 
a pistol at his ear, and asked, '• Where are 
the men who stay with j-ou ? " Under 
the menace of instant death, the old man 
seemed paralyzed, but at Baker's order lit 
a candle. The question was then i-epeated. 
" They are gone," replied the old man. 
Soon a young boy api^eared, and told 
Baker the men he sought were in the 
barn. The barn was then surrounded. 
Baker and Conger went to the door. The 
former called out, signifying his intention 
to have a surrender on the part of the men 
inside, or else to fire the barn, and shoot 
them on the spot. The young boy was 
sent in to receive their arms. To the 
boy's message Booth answered with a 
curse, accusing the boy of having betrayed 



him. The boy then came out, and Baker 
repeated his demand, giving Booth five 
minutes to make up his mind. Booth 
replied — 

'• Who are you, and what do you want 
with us ■;' " 

" We want j'ou to deliver up your arms 
and become our jarisoners," said Baker. 

" But who are you ? " 

" That makes no difference. We know 
who you are, and we want you. We have 
here fifty men with carbines and pistols. 
You cannot escape." 

" Captain," said Booth, after a pause, 
" this is a hard case, I swear. Perhaps I 
am being taken by my own friends." 

He tlien asked time to consider, which 
was granted. After a little interval. 
Baker threatened to fire the barn, if the}' 
did not come out. Booth replied that he 
was a cripple, and begged a chance for his 
life, declaring that he would fight them 
all at so many yards ajjace, and that he 
would never be taken alive. Baker an- 
swered that he did not come there to fight 
but to capture him, and again threatened 
to fire the barn. 

"Well, then, my brave boys," said 
Booth, '' prepare a stretcher for me." 

Harold now wanted to surrender, and, 
in the midst of a shower of imprecations 
from Booth, did so. Conger then set fire 
to the barn. 

The blaze lit up the black recesses of 
the great barn till every wasp's nest and 
every cobweb in the roof was visible, fling- 
ing streaks of red and violet across the 
tumbled farm-gear in the corner, and bath- 
ins: the murderer's retreat in a vivid illu- 
mination, — and, while in bold outline his 
fit;iire stood revealed, they rose like an 
impenetrable wall to guard from sight the 
dreadful enemy who lit them. Behind the 
blaze, with his eye to a crack, Conger saw 
Wilkes Booth standing upright u])on a 
crutch. At the gleam of fire. Booth 
dropped his crutch and carbine, and on 
both hands crept up to the spot to espy 
the incendiary and shoot him dead. His 
eyes were lustrous as with fever, and 
swelled and rolled in terrible anxiety, 



THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN — 1865. 



353 



while his teeth were fixed, and he wore 
the exjiressiuu of one in the calmness pre- 
ceding frenzy. In ^ain he peered, with 
vengeance in his look ; the blaze that 
made him visible concealed his pursuers. 
A second he turned glaring at the fire, as 
if to leap upon and extinguish it, but the 
flames had made such headway that this 
was a futile impulse, and he dismissed it. 
As calmly as upon the battle-field a vet- 



l)ett fired through a crevice and shot Booth 
in the neck. 

They then took up the wounded man 
and carried him out on the grass, a little 
way from the door, beneath a locust tree. 
Conger went back to the barn, to see if 
the fire could be put out, but found it 
could not, and returned to where Booth 
was lying. Before this (says Lieutenant 
Conger, in his official account), I supposed 




BURIAL PLACE OF LINCOLN. 



eran stands amidst the hail of ball and 
shell and plunging iron. Booth turned at 
a man's stride and pushed for the door, 
weapon in poise, and the last resolve of 
death — despair — set on his high, bloodless 
forehead. 

At this instant. Sergeant Boston Cor- 
2.3 



him to be dead ; he had all the appearance 
of a dead man ; but when I came back, his 
eyes and mouth were moving. I called 
immediately for water, and put some on 
his face. He seemed to revive, and at- 
tempted to speak. I put my ear down to 
I his mouth, and heard him say, "Tell my 



:!r>4 



FUO-M COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



mother I died for my country." I re-- 
peated the words to liim, and said, "Is 
that what you would say'/" He said 
" Yes." They carried hiin to the porch of 
Garrett's house, and laid him on a straw 
bed or tick. At that time lie revived con- 
siderably, and could talk in a whisper, so 
as to be intelligibly understood. He could 
not speak above a whisper. He wanted 
water; I gave it to him. He wanted to 
turn on his face ; I said he couldn't lie in 
tha*^ position. He wanted to be turned on 
his side ; we turned him on his side three 
times, but he could not lie with any com- 
fort, and asked immediately to be turned 
back. He asked me to put my hand on 
his tliroat, and press down, which I did. 
He said " Harder; " I pressed as hard as 
I thought necessary. He made a very 
strong exertion to cough, Init was unal>le 
to do so. I suiipose he thought tliere was 
blood in his throat. I asked him to jiut 
out his tongue, wiiicb he did. I said, 
"There is no blood in your throat.'' He 
repeated several times, "Kill nie ! kill 
me ! " I replied, " I do not want to kill 
you. I want you to get well." 

When the doctor arrived, whom Conger 
had sent for. Booth asked to have his 
ha-nds raised and shown him. When this 
was done, he muttered " Useless, useless ! " 
These were his last words. He died about 
four hoars after being shot. 

Tlie solemn trial of the other accom- 
plices in this great crime of conspiracy 
and murder, soon took place in the city of 
Washington, before a military commission 
consisting of Generals Hunter, Howe, 
Harris, Wallace, Kautz. Foster, Ekin ; 
Colonels Clendenin, TDUipkins, and Bur- 
nett; Judges Bingham and Holt. The 
last named held the position of Judge- 
Advocate-General of the court, and Major- 
General Hunter officiated as president. 

The charges upon which Payne was 
arrested and tried were, that he was a 
confederate of Booth in the general con- 
spiracy to kill the i)resident, vice-])resident. 
General Grant, and Secretary Seward, so 
as thus to deprive the armv and navy of a 
constitutional commander-in-chief, and to 



prevent a lawful election of president and 
vice-president 113' the vacancy thus made 
in the office of secretary of state, — the duty 
of the latter officer being, in case of the 
death of the president and vice-president, 
to cause an election to be held for presi- 
dential electors. The arraignment of all 
the parties was upon this general charge, 
with specifications in each case. 

Against Payne, the specification was 
that of attempting to kill Secretary Sew- 
ard. Presenting himself at the door of 
Ml'. Seward's residence, he gained admis- 
sion by repre.senting that he had a pre- 
scription from Mr. Seward's physician, 
wdiich he was directed to see administered, 
and liurried up to the third-story chamber, 
where Mr. Seward was lying sick. He 
here discovered Mr. Frederick Seward, 
struck him over the head, inflicting severe 
wounds, and then rushed into the room 
where Mr. Seward was in bed, attended by 
a young daughter and a male nurse. The 
assassin stablied the latter in the lungs, 
and then struck Secretary Seward with a 
<l;igger twice in the face and twice in the 
throat, inflicting terrible wounds. By this 
time Major Seward, eldest son of the sec- 
retary, and another attendant, reached the 
room, and rushed to the rescue of the sec- 
retary ; they wei-e also wounded in the 
conflict, and the assassin escaped. 

Spangler, who was employed at the the- 
ater, was tried for aiding and assisting 
Booth to (ibtain an entrance to the box in 
which President Lincoln sat in the thea- 
ter, and for barring or obstructing the 
door of the passage-way, so as to hinder 
pursuit. 

Atzerodt was charged with lying in wait 
to murder Vice-President Johnson, at the 
Kirkwood House, wdiere the latter was 
stopping. He took a room at that house, 
on the morning of April 14tli, and was 
there at different times during the day and 
evening, under suspicious circumstances. 
Though in active co-operation with Booth 
and his accomplices, he failed in executing 
the i)art particularly delegated to him. 

In the further ])rogranime of the great 
conspiracy, O'Laughlin was to take the 



THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN —1S65. 



35r, 



life of General Grant, and on this charge 
and speL-itication he was indicted and tried, 
though he failed, like Atzerodt, to accom- 
plish the hloody deed. 

Mrs. Surratt was charged with having 
'■ on or before the sixth da^' of Marcli, 
1865, and on divers other days and times 
between that day and the twentieth of 
April, 1865, received, entertained, har- 
bored and concealed, aided and assisted " 
tlie conspirators in the execution of their 
plans. She was charged with being cog- 
nizant of the intended crime almost from 
its incei3tion, becoming an active partici- 
pant and general manager. With Doctor 
Mudd, it was charged, she planned the 
means and assistance for the escape of the 
assassins, and visited Mudd at five o'clock 
on the day of the assassination, to see that 
certain weapons were in readiness. Booth 
had frequent interviews at her house, 
and was with her on the afternoon of the 
fourteenth. 

The part taken by Doctor Mudd, in the 
tragedy, was described in the indictment 
as that of an accomplice. He was, it ap- 
peared, in the confidence of Booth several 
months prior to the assassination. In 
January, he had an interview with John 
H. Surratt and Booth, at the National 
Hotel. He introduced Booth to Surratt, 
and was visited by Booth at the Pennsyl- 
vania House. When the assassins fled to 
his house, he dressed Booth's wound and 
assisted in the escape of both Booth and 
Harold. When the officers called at his 



house, soon after the assassination, he 
denied that he knew either of the crimin- 
als, but subsequently, after his arrest, he 
admitted the fact of his acquaintance with 
Booth ; both of the fugitives were well 
cared for by him at his house. 

Arnold was tried for being one of the 
original conspirators, but it was not 
charged that he maintained any active 
relation to the plot at the time appointed 
for its execution. His guilt consisted in 
being an accomplice before the act. 

Harold's complicity admitted, of course, 
of no doubt. On the night of the assas- 
sination he was seen at the livery stable 
with Booth, and on various occasions he 
was known to have held secret meetings 
with Booth, Atzerodt, and others of the 
conspiracy, at Mrs. Surratt's and else- 
where. During his flight with Booth, he 
acknowledged to confederate soldiers that 
he and Booth had made way with the 
president. 

Atzerodt, Harold, Payne, and Mrs. Sur- 
ratt, were found guilty of crimes deserving 
death, and were hanged therefor on the 
seventh of July, 1865. Arnold, O'Laugh- 
lin, and Mudd, were sent to the Dry Tor- 
tugas for hard labor during life ; and 
Spangler for six j'ears of hard labor, at the 
same place. John H. Surratt, son of Mrs. 
Surratt above named, and who was also 
indicted, fled to Europe ; being discovered, 
he was arrested and sent to Washington, 
but, after a protracted trial by jury, es- 
caped conviction. 



XXXVll. 

NATIONAL PEACE JUBILEE AND MUSICAL FESTIVAL, 

IN BOSTON, IN HONOR OF THE KESTOPxATlON 

OF THE UNION OF THE STATES.— 1869. 



Ten Thousand Singers, an Orcliestra of One Thousand Instruments, and Tens of Thousands of Spec- 
tators, in tlie Coliseum, an Immense Building Erected for tlie Occasion. — Attendance of President 
Grant. — Siiiilirne and Inspiring Harmonies. — Most Majestic Musical Demonstration of Modern Times. 
— Origin of the Jubilee. — P. S. Gilmore : His Zeal and Enthusiasm — .Ml Discouragements Overcome. 
— Magniticent Programme — Splendor of the Coliseum — It Covers Nearly Kour Acres. — Inauguration 
Ceremonies. — View of the Audience — Scene of Surpassing Enchaniment.— Beauty of the Decora- 
tions—Overtures, Clioruses. Anthems, Etc— Parejia liosa, Phillipps, Ole Bu'l —Their Professional 
Triumphs.— Zerrahn, Tourjee, Eichberg.— The Famous "Anvil" Chorus —Chiming the City Bells. 
— Novel Counniiighng of Ariillery with Music — 'rremendous Ovation to Grant — Half a Million 
People in the City — Testimonial to Mr. Gilmore — Last Day: Concert by Ten Thousand Children. 
— Triumphant Success of the .Jubilee. 



"Let 118 have peace! "— Genebal Grant, tM hi.s Letter accepting the Fbesideiitial .\ohiiiatioit. 



OUR long ami welcome year.s of peace had been enjoyed by tlie American people, 
since the greate.st of civil war.s ever waged suddenly ceased its 
wasting horrors, by the surrender of the army of Lee to General 
Grant, and that of Johnston to General Sherman. But, as yet, no 
.^peciiil commemorative celebration of the momentous event had 
taken place in any part of the land — except that outburst of joy 
and satisfaction in all parts, with which the final grounding of 
arms was greeted. A hapjiy local conception for supplying this 
omission, to some extent, was that of the well-known organizer of 
musical bands and leader of instrumental concerts, Mr. P. S. Gil- 
more, of Boston. His jdan. or programme, was that of a Grand 
National Peace Jidiilee in that city, on the 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 
anil 19th of June, 1869, — the grandest outpouring of sublime and patriotic music, ever 
heard upon the American continent. It was to be a demonstration which, in magnitude 
and splendor, would represent the greatest cause for national rejoicing which the Amer- 
ican people were ever called u]ion to celebrate, and in which the glad voices of a 
reunited nation shoulil mingle in one common .song of thaid<sgiving to the Almight}', 
for the return of those bles.^ings which years of terrible strife had withheld ; — an occa- 
sion which should bring together, in fraternal greeting, the leading men of the republic, 
throughout all its borders, and, aside from its imposing significance as the first national 
re-union since the close of the war, should also be the greatest feast of inspiring har- 
mony — majestic choruses, anthems of adoration, niiiitary and patriotic compositions, 




THE NATIONAL PEACE Jt^BILEE — 1869. 



ii,)i 



oratorio and symphony, and the divinest 
airs from Mozart and Meyerbeer — ever 
heard in any part of the world. 

The choruses, it was furtlier proposed, 
should be performed bj' ten to fifteen 
thousand voices, comjjrising the very best 
singers obtainable ; the orchestra to con- 
sist of one thousand players, including 
the leading bands and most skillful musi- 
cians in the United States ; also, a vast 
and powerful organ, together with the 
accompanying effects of artillery, chiming 
of bells, and other accessories. The whole 
to be held in an immense coliseum, cajja- 
ble of accommodating fifty thousand per- 
sons, and to be magnificently decorated 
with historical emblems of state and na- 
tional progress since the formation of the 
Union. 

So vast and novel an undertaking was 
naturally looked upon somewhat distrust- 
fully, at first, by those to whom it was 
unfolded. One of the warmest of Mr. 
Gilmore's friends, on listening to an ex- 
position of the plan, remarked, " Why, 
Gilmore, that is an idea fit for an emperor, 
and it will take an emperor to carry it 
out." "Then," laughingly responded Mr. 
Gilmore, " I must become an emperor." 
Discouraged and ridiculed by others, he 
never flagged for a moment in energetic- 
ally urging the co-operation of influential 
men in behalf of his plan, and gave wide 
publicity to itj from one end of the land 
to the other. At length, opposition began 
to die away ; men of patriotism and 
wealth pledged themselves to the enter- 
prise ; letters strongly endorsing it were 
received from eminent officials ; and prom- 
ises of participation freely flowed in from 
musicians and musical societies. An as- 
sociation was now formed of prominent 
gentlemen, conspicuous in political, pro- 
fessional, and business circles, for thorough 
and effective work, in forwarding the proj- 
ect to a speedy and complete consumma- 
tion. 

On the 29th of March, work on the great 
building was commenced, and it soon grew 
up to its full proportions, majestic in size 
and strength, — the largest edifice that had 



ever been erected on this continent. The 
size of the building was three hundred 
feet by five hundred ; the height of its 
roof, one hundred feet, and of its side 
walls thirty-six ; and the promenade was 
more than a fourth of a mile in length. 
The interior was gorgeously decorated ; 
folds of blue, brown and gold, depending 
from the galleries, and rich frescoings and 
many-tinted banners everj' where meeting 
the eye. On the side arches, colossal 
angels bore up the inscription " Peace," 
and over the central arch was the Song of 
the Annimciation, " Glory to God in the 
Highest, Peace on Earth, Good Will 
toward Men." In the rear of these arches, 
on each flank of the organ, appeared me- 
dallions, one representing St. Cecilia, at- 
tended by heavenly beings, who are listen- 
ing to her playing, and the other repre- 
senting David and his harp. The great 
roof was supported by four ranges of 
pillars, eighteen in each range. Those 
which ran along the front of the galleries 
bore each the coat-of-arms of a State of 
the Union, witli flags raj'ed from it, and 
an eagle above ; while on the two central 
ranges of pillars the banners bore the 
colors of foreign nations, the portraits of 
great composers, and other emblems. The 
main ceiling was hung with tri-colored 
streamers, and the faces of the galleries 
were elegantly frescoed. The end of the 
wall behind the spectators was also superb 
in its adornments, including a mighty 
Angel of Peace, with her right hand 
raised, and holding forward the symbols 
of harmony and peace, while with her 
left hand she waved behind her tlie 
sanguinary implements of war. The coat- 
of-arms of Massachusetts and the city seal 
of Boston appeared on either flank. The 
building covered some three or four acres. 
As the day apjwinted for the opening 
services approaclied, the interest in the 
event became intense in every part of the 
country, and Boston was crowded as it 
never had been before by hosts of strangers. 
Everybody and everything wore a holiday 
appearance. Citizens from every State in 
the Union were there. 



358 



FROM C'OLOXY TO WOItLD POWER. 



At about three oV'Iock in tlie afternoon, 
the opening exercises of the celebration 
oommeni'ed as follows : Prayer, by Rev. 
E. E. Hale ; address of welcome, b^' Mayor 
Shurtleff; oration, by Hon. A. H. Rice. 
But it was the niusiral feature of the 
occasion for which the tens of thousands 
gathered together in that vast and mag- 
nificent scene were anxiously waiting. 
The immense ami)hitheater, two hundred 
feet in depth from the front of the orches- 
tra by three hundred feet in width, was 
filled to its utmost capacity with the ten 
thousand ladies and gentlemen who formed 
the grand chorus, and its base or front 
center was occupied by the orcliestra of 
one thousand instruments. Be- 
hind the orchestra was tlie big 
drum, eight feet in diameter and 
eight feet high, and, further 
back, beyond tlie central seats 
of the choir, rose the organ, 
thirty feet in height. A look 
at the orchestra from the ex- 
treme north end of the building 
presented a sight witnessed only 
once in a life-time. 

The greatest celebrity noticed 
as yet among the musicians was 
Carl Rosa, who was seated 
among the violins, and beside 
whom there was a vacant chair. 

Presently there was burst of \ ^ / 

cheers, as the tall, graceful, and 
dignified form of Ole Bull was 
seen wending his way down from the back 
to take his seat as the leader of tlie violin- 
ists. And now there was a perfect torrent 
of applause, as Mr. Gilmore advanced to 
open the programme. It was a proud 
moment for him, as he stood there, to 
reflect that this, the greatest of musical 
festivals, sprang up under his magic wand. 
Another warm welcome was in store for 
Mr. Eichberg, Mr. Zerrahn, Mr. Tourjee, 
Madame Parepa-Eosa, Miss Phillipps, and 
other leaders, as they made their appear- 
ance. 

Luther's great choral, '• God is a castle 
and defense," began the grand perform- 
ances, and as, in magnificent strength 



and beauty, the vast volume of pure sound 
arose from ten thousand voices and a 
thousand instruments, the grandeur of the 
effect was indescribable. To this suc- 
ceeded the Tannhauser overture, exciting 
and entrancing the senses and filling the 
soul with weird and peculiar pleasure ; and 
then came the '' Gloria," from Mozart's 
Twelfth Mass. In Gounod's "Ave Maria," 
Madame Parejia-Rosa made her appear- 
ance as the first soloist of the jubilee. 
She was clad in faultless white, and re- 
ceived a trenendous ovation. The accom- 
paniment of two hundred chosen violins, 
le<l by Bull, Carl Rosa, Schultze, Suck, 
Meisel, Eichberg, and others, began sweet- 




ly, thrillingly. and tenderly, adding to the 
anxiety of the audience. Suddenly a note, 
clear, sublime, and heard above all else and 
to the farthest corner of the hall, began the 
'■Ave Maria," whicli the prima donna sang 
with matchless skill. In this, as also in 
the beautiful '' Inflammatus,'' she was en- 
cored with a fervor such as no woman ever 
saw manifested by an audience before. 
The scene was enchanting. 

At the conclusion of the first part of 
the concert, the "Star Spangled Banner" 
was given with grand and overpowering 
effect, producing the wildest excitement 
in the audience. The choral combinations 
of the parts used iu the piece were very 



I 



THE NATIONAL PEACE JUBILEE — 18G9. 



359 



ingenioua, and, in addition to these, the 
aid of a great military band, of an immense 
drum corps, and of artillery, was given to 
the chorus, orchestra and organ. The 
artillery firing, by means of electricity, 
was a novel and most striking feature in 
this piece, as was also the ringing of the 
bells of the city in unison, from the tele- 
graph stand. 

In the second 'part, the " Hymn of 
Praise," composed for the occasion by Di-. 
0. W. Holmes, and set to the music of 
Keller's American Hj^mn, was the first 
])iece, and was beautifully and nobly exe- 
cuted. After this came Rossini's overture 
to William Tell, the performance of which 
was pronounced to be the sublimest orches- 
tral rendering ever given in America — 
true, wonderful, and lovely, revealing in 
most remarkable beauty, the noble melo- 
dies and harmonies of the composition. 
After the " Coronation March," from Mey- 
erbeer, came the " Anvil Chorus " from 
" II Trovatore,'' producing a tremendous 
sensation among the audience and receiv- 
ing an uproarious encore. The jiictur- 
esque hundred firemen, in black pant.s, red 
shirts, and white caps, did their duty 
admirably, beating their anvils with fine 
effect, and with such precision as not to 
miss a note amid the rapid cadences which 
the orchestra gave with such force. " My 
Country, 'tis of Thee," with the same 
novel accessories as the " Star Spangled 
Banner," concluded the first daj-'s concert 
most appropriately, the audience joining 
in the last stanza with magnificent effect. 
The hundred anvils were ranged in four 
rows, extending from near the front of the 
platform to the back of the orchestra stage. 
No words can adequately describe the 
transporting effect of this first day's per- 
formance upon the thousands assembled 
under that vast roof. A distinguished 
gentleman sent the following telegram to 
his wife, at the close of the concert: 
"Nothing like it in a life-time. Will 
make any sacrifice to have you here Thurs- 
day. Come by express train." 

The second day of the jubilee was ren- 
dered still more exciting and memorable 



by the presence of the chief magistrate ot 
the nation, General Grant. The popular 
success of the great national festival prov- 
ed, under these circumstances, absolutely 
enormous. The Common was covered with 
people, and the streets were so crowded 
that motion was almost impossible. The 
military marched with much difficulty 
along a portion of the route, and around 
the coliseum the mass of people became so 
dense all day, that it was difficult to ap- 
proach the doors. Many of the hotels and 
restaurants were even forced to lock their 
doors, to keep out the hungry multitude 
whom they could not supply. 

A constant ovation attended the presi- 
dent's reception until he reached the 
coliseum, and there he found acres of 
humanity' waiting his entrance. The par- 
lor to which the illustrious guest was con- 
ducted exhibited most elegant taste, in 
keeping with all the appointments of the 
magnificent edifice throughout. The walls 
were tinted and paneled in fresco ; dra- 
pery, and lace curtains, and cornices en- 
riched the windows ; beautiful carpeting 
covered the floor ; splendid sets of black 
walnut furniture were provided ; and then 
there were rustic baskets filled with the 
choicest cut flowers suspended from nu- 
merous points, elegant and spacious mir- 
rors and choice paintings hung upon the 
walls, and superb works of art contributed 
to the admirable tout ensemble of the 
apartment. Here the distinguished guest 
received the courtesies of tlie originator of 
the jubilee and his colleague, after which 
he proceeded to the audience hall. 

As the president passed down the cen- 
ter aisle of the building to his seat, arm 
in arm with Governor Claflin, followed by 
Admirals Farragut and Hudson, Commo- 
dore Winslow, Secretary Boutwell, Mayor 
Shurtleff, and others, the vast assembly 
started to their feet as if by one common 
impulse, and while the hero stood, hat in 
hand, bowing to the mighty throng, a 
cheer went up from sixty thousand voices, 
and filled the far-extended structure, like 
the mighty roar of the ocean. For full 
five minut«s were these cheers continued 



^60 



FEO:\I COLONY TO WORLD TOWER 



from aiiflience and chorus and ordiostra, 
aoi-ompanied l\y tlie ^vaving of tlionsands 
of handkerclui'fs in the hands of fair 
women. la the midst of this scene of 
unparalleled enthusiasm, the powerful or- 
gan thundered forth the strains of " See 
the Conquering Hero Comes," and tlien, 
as the music jirogressed, at a signal from 
Mr. Gilmore's haton, ten thousand souls, 
in colossal chorus, gave voice to the words 
of that welcoming anthem. The climax 
of the Week of Festival was now fairly 
reached. 

In compliment to the president, the 
" Star Spangled Banner" was introduced 
between the two parts of the programme ; 
and to this was added the "Anvil Chorus," 
with the original one hundi'ed anvils and 
the one hundred red-shirted firemen to 
beat theiii — and this, with the adjuncts of 
cannon and bells, threw the audience into 
a frenzy of rapturous delight. There was 
more classical music on this occasion than 
on the day previous, but the president 
appeared to prefer the more popidar patri- 
otic airs, and the tiring of guns by elec- 
tricity appeared to interest him much. 
This battery of Parrott guns, placed im- 
mediately within the coliseum, were ma- 
nipulated in front of the conductor's stand, 
the process being that of touching, at the 
proper moment, the keys of an electrical 
instrument, to which the guns were con- 
nected by wires, precisely as the ke_ys of 
an organ or piano are struck, when har- 
mony in the measurement of time is de- 
manded. 

With evident satisfaction, the president 
listened to Parepa-Rosa, as she sang 
Handel's " Let the Bright Seraphim." 
Without the faintest appearance of effort, 
she sang as clearly and brilliantly as if in 
a concert x'oom of ordinary dimensions, the 
clear sounds of her imperial voice sweep- 
ing throughout the galleries and corri- 
dors in trumpet-like tones. The audience 
■ was electrified. Not only spectators, but 
the twelve thousand choristers and one 
thousand performers, rose and vehemently 
cheered or waved their handkerchiefs. 
Another splendid vocal triumph was that 



achieved l\v Miss Adelaide Phillipps, in 
the singing of Mozart's aria from the 
Clemenza di Tito. The chorus, "Glory to 
God in the highest, peace on earth, good 
will to men," was another of the perform- 
ances. Hardly was it finished, when 
another — " And the glory of the Lord 
shall be revealed " — was taken up by the 
thousand altos, and echoed by the basses 
and sopranos until the hall rung. Noth- 
ing in the whole range of music could be 
more thunderous and intense than the 
concluding strains of this chorus. The 
chorus from Mendelssohn, " He watching 
over Israel, slumbers not nor sleeps," had 
an almost divine pathos and melodj'. The 
great swaying grandeur of "America " 
impressed the chief magistrate deeply. As 
he left the building, salvos of artillery 
broke upon the air, fired in unison with 
the last chords of the strains of music and 
the rounds of cheers. 

Mr. Gilmore's jjrogramme for the third 
day consisted of popular and patriotic 
music, such as kept the vast crowd in a 
continual furore of jileasurable excite- 
ment. The first piece, the overture to 
Anber's " Fra Diavolo," was splendidly 
played by the full orchestra of upward of 
one thousand, and a novel and very pleas- 
ing effect was produced by placing fifty 
trumpets, or cornets, on the solo trumpet 
part, the matchless Arbuckle being at the 
head of the list. Luther's grand old 
choral, "The Judgment Hymn," was 
given by the full chorus, with full orches- 
tral and organ accompaniment. The next 
j)erformance was the " Peace Festival 
March," composed for the occasion by 
Signor Janotta. It was performed by the 
grand orchestra and military band com- 
l>ined, and was a magnificent success. 
Madame Parepa-Rosa next rendered an 
aria from " Robert le Diable ; " and the 
Anvil Chorus, and " Overture Triomphale" 
on the American national air " Hail Co- 
lumbia," composed for the festival by C. 
C. Converse, closed the first part of the 
programme. The second part included 
the "Prince Frederick" march, the "Star 
Spangled Banner," a cornet solo by Ar- 



THE NATIONAL PEACE JUBILEE — 1SC9. 



361 



' buckle, "The Harp that once through 
Tara's Halls," the overture to Elotow's 
" Stradella," and the '•One Hundredtli 
Psalm." The whole audience joined in 
the last verse of the psalm, and the accom- 
jianinient comjirised the organ, orchestra, 
and cannon. 

In the evening, a Jubilee Ball was 
given in the coliseum, which was an 
immense success. A dancing hall of colos- 
sal proportions was provided, and the 
coliseum presented a more magnificent 
appearance under the effect of fifty thou- 



superb, — the largest ball, indeed, ever 
known in this country. 

A purely classical programme was ar- 
ranged for the fourtli day, and the highest 
expectations of success were fvdly realized. 
Complete in its artistic results, no heartier 
enthusiasm was displayed at any time dur- 
ing the festival than that which followed 
the various choral and ori'hestral selections 
of this da3^ Among the performances 
were the "Gloria'' from the Twelfth Mass, 
the "Hallelujah Chorus," "Achieved is 
the Glorious Work,'' the " Prayer '' from 




NATIONAL PEACE JUBILEE AND MUSICAL FESTIVAL. AT ItOSTON. 



sand gas-lights, than in the day time. The 
decorations were thrown out boldly, while 
the rich toilets of the ladies heightened 
the general enchantment of the scene. 
The order of dances was twenty-two in 
number, and the ball opened promptly at 
half-past nine, Mr. Gilmore waving the 
baton. The orchestra was made up of a 
dance and promenade band, the former 
under the direction of Mr. Gilmore, and 
the latter under Mr. Harvej' B. Dodworth, 
of New York. Ten thousand persons were 
present, and the affair was in all respects 



Moses in Egj'pt, etc. The choral, " To 
God on High," and " Sleepers wake, a 
voice is calling," were both sung almost 
perfectly, showing, magnificently, their 
solid grandeur and beauty. The purely 
instrumental performances, Weber's " Ju- 
bilee " overture, and the Fifth Symphony 
of Beethoven, were rendered in the most 
m.ajestic style. Miss Phillipps gave Han- 
del's beautiful "Lascia chio pianga" in 
the most finished and graceful manner, so 
that the audience were excited to the very 
highest pitch of enthusiasm, and an encoi-e 



362 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



was rapturously demanded. Mr. George 
Peabody was introduced to the audience, 
during the intermisson, and was loudly 
cheered. There were also on the plat- 
form, with him, Governors Claflin and 
Jewell, Senators Sumner and Wilson, 
Generals Banks and Hawley, Bishop Simp- 
son, Dr. Lowell Mason, and other distin- 
guished guests. 

Saturday was the fifth and last day of 
this grandest musical festival of modern 
times. Ten thousand school children, 
their innocent voices pouring forth a flood 
of sweet and simple song, constituted the 
great attraction of the day. Clad in white 
dresses, with red and blue ribbons, the 
appearance of the girls was charming in 
the extreme. It was the largest chorus 
of children ever brought together in the 
world, and the concourse of spectators was 
vast. Chorals, three-part songs, national 
airs, etc., were performed with great skill 
and power by the juvenile songsters, elicit- 
ing unbounded applause. " Hail Colum- 
bia," and "Now the twilight softly steal- 
ing," were exquisitely rendered. Brinley 
Richards's song, " So merrily over the 
ocean spra\'," was one of the most telling 
features of the day ; the solo was sustained 
by five hundred pujiils of the girls' high 
and normal school, and the chorus by all 
the children. " God is a Castle and 
Defense" was given with fine effect; and 
Ole Bull's marvelous skill as a violinist 
was displayed in the solo, " A Mother's 
Prayer." The orchestra played the over- 
ture to " William Tell," and the corona- 
tion march from " The Prophet." Madame 
Rosa repeated " Let the Bright Sera- 
phim," with Mr. Arbuckle's accompani- 
ment. A duet, " Quis est homo," sung 
by Madame Rosa and Miss Phillipps, was 
a performance long to be remembered. 
During the intermission, Mr. Gilmore was 
called from the orchestra to the editors' 
room, where Mr. Carl Gartner, of Phila- 
delphia, presented to him a massive gold 
watch, of great elegance and cost, and a 
heavy gold chain, as a testimonial of re- 
spect and regard from the members of the 
orchestra. The gift was entirely unex- 



pected to Mr. Gilmore, who made a fitting 
response. The '• Russian National Hymn," 
with words of welcome to President Grant, 
was executed in a manner that showed the 
excellent vocal culture of the children ; 
and the concert was brought to a close by 
singing, in grand chorus, the One Hun- 
dreth Psalm. 

To say that the efforts and anticipations 
of those who originated the National Peace 
Jubilee and Musical Festival were crown- 
ed with triumphant success, from first to 
last, is but uttering the simple truth. It 
was a mighty conception, and the result 
was the greatest musical event in the his- 
tory of modern times. The very first 
day's performances were so satisfying and 
so enthusiastically received, as to render 
the succeeding efforts comparatively easy 
and sure. From the oj)ening to the clos- 
ing performance, the rapturous excitement 
and delight continued without abatement. 
At times it rose to almost wild delirium. 
The audience and the performers seemed 
to be actuated b_y one impulse of magnetic 
fervor. Unquestionably, the great musical 
artiste was Madame Parepa-Rosa, who 
gained new triumphs every day. Even 
the musicians, when she came to the last 
notes of the '• Star Spangled Banner," 
where in capacity of voice she almost 
rivaled Jenny Lind, laid down their in- 
struments, and gazed in wonder. Her 
jiure, full, and resonant notes seemed to 
triumph over walls and roof, and to fill all 
space with tangible and enchanting mel- 
ody. 

General Grant's presence gave magnif- 
icent eclat to the occasion. Fully half a 
million people were in the city on that 
day, and the rush to the coliseum was ter- 
rific, there being fifty thousand persons 
outside of the building, unable to obtain 
admission. Hours before the time of the 
concert, orders had to be issued prohibit- 
ing the further sale of tickets ; and, almost 
as soon as the performances commenced, 
every door was closed, secured by iron 
clamps, and guarded hy the police. Those 
who arrived late, holders of season tickets, 
purchasers of single da}' tickets bought of 



THE NATIONAL PEACE .1 FBI LEE — 18(39. 



36;! 



the speculators at a great price, ineinbers 
of parties whose friends were already 
inside, even journalists with their tickets 
and badges, were firmly refused admission. 
General Grant surveyed the vast and brill- 
iant mass of humanity with evidently 
greater interest than that with which he 
listened to the music. Indeed, it was 
well known that, among his many fine 
qualities, a taste for this divine art was 
not included. When, therefore. General 
Underwood called upon Genei-al Sherman, 
on the morning before the pi-esident's 
departure for Boston, General Sherman 
said, "Taking Grant off to that drum 
match, are you, Underwood ? " " Yes, 
general, and I am very sorry you cannot 
join us." "Well," responded Sherman, 
" it is a kind of disappointment, j-ou know, 
because I can appreciate those things ; 
but the President ! bless your soul, he'll 
be bored to death ! And, worse than all 
that, he has no ear for music. Why, do 
you know that Grant actually couldn't tell 
tlie difference between Yankee Doodle and 
Zip Coon ? " On his way from Boston, 
the evening after his attendance at the 
coliseum. President Grant was asked how 
he liked the discharge of artillery during 
the performances that afternoon. He re- 
plied that, in his opinion, '' the firing was 
the best part of the music ! " 

Much of the sustaining character of the 
choruses was due to the admirable adapt- 
eduess of the organ to the occasion. Its 
tones were heard and felt clear over and 
through the host of voices and instru- 
ments ; at times it seemed to overshadow 
all, and its thunder tones shook the whole 
vast building. It liad but a single man- 
ual, besides the pedals and sub-bass, but 
was capable of all desirable combinations, 
and was an organ complete of itself. Re- 
peated experiments were necessary to get 
pipes of sufficient compass as well as ex- 
cellence, and the result was the production 
of an instrument whicli, for volume of 
sound, could not be surpassed by a union 
of the four largest organs in Boston. This 
power was due not only to the capabilities 
of the tubes, but to the immense pressure 



of air brought to bear on them — four thou- 
sand pounds. The chief element of 
strength was the tuba mirabilis stop — 
found in but two other organs in the 
whole countrj'. There were twelve com- 
plete sounding stops, with one hundred 
and sixty pipes connected. The instru- 
ment was twenty-two feet broad and thirty 
feet high. 

Another of the wonders of this wonder- 
ful week was the monster bass drum — the 
heads measuring nearly eight feet each in 
diameter, made from the hides of two 
mammoth oxen, wliicli had been exhibited 
through the country during several years 
past. On each head was the motto, " Let 
us have Peace." Tlie drum was about 
three feet through from head to head, 
and the rim was painted red, white 
and blue. It was thoroughly perfect in 
all its parts, and, being the largest drum 
in the world — for no larger one could 
be made, without using the hides of 
elephants for the heads — created a de- 
cided sensation. 

Whatever deficiencies or shortcomings 
a critical ej'e may have detected in any of 
the various features characterizing so stu- 
pendous an undertaking, it was almost 
universally pronounced a great success, 
realizing, in the highest degree, the patri- 
otic wish of the projector and his associ- 
ates, that the restoration of Peace through- 
out the land should be celebrated by one 
of the most imposing national gatherings 
ever assembled in any land ; and that the 
return of kindly feeling and the prepetua- 
tion of National Unity, should be sealed 
by the grandest outburst of sublime and 
inspiring harmony that had ever fallen 
upon human ears. The management of 
the whole affair was such as to command 
the highest praise. 

The monster entertainment known as 
" The WorUl's Peace Jubilee and Inter- 
national Musical Festival," was opened in 
Boston, June 17, 1872, and continued, 
with varying performances, which were 
attended by multitudes of people, from all 
parts of the country, until Jul^' 4th. The 
choruB numbered twenty thousand voices, 



i64 



FROM COr.OXY TO WORLD POWER. 



embracing one hundred and sixty-five 
musical societies from tlie different states, 
but principally from New England. The 
orchestra parts numbered about two thou- 
sand, including twenty-seven brass bands, 
beside the foreign military bands, the 



United States marine band, the Em- 
peror William's cornet quartet, British 
Grenadier band, Strauss's orchestra, and 
such renowned virtuosos as Madame Ara- 
bella Goddard, PeschkarLeutner, Ruders- 
dorff, etc. 



XXXVIII. 

CONSECRATION OF THE FIRST CARDINAL IN THE 
UNITED STATES.— 1875. 



The Venerable Ai-L-libisIiop McClosky, of New York, Selected by the Romau Pontiff, for this Great 
Office. — He becomes a Prince in tlie Churcli. — The Highest Ecclesiastical Appointment in tlie Catholic 
Hierarcliv. — Reasons given for this Ste]). — Solemn Investitnre, in the Cathedral, by Clerical Dignitaries 
from All Parts of the Conntry. — An Unparalleled Scene. — Illustrious Nature of tliis Office. — Special 
Envoy sent from Rome. — Announcing the Event to the Archbishop. — Time of Public Recognition 
Assigned. — A Miglity Stream of Humanity. — Decorations of the Church. — Procession of Priests. — 
Incensing the Altars. — Sacred Vessels and Vestments. — Insignia Peculiar to tliis Rank. — The Scarlet 
Cap. — Profoundly Impressive Service. — Unprecedented on this Continent. — Imposing tlie Berretta. — 
Intoning and Chanting.— Official Letter from the Pope. — Use of the Latin Language. — Inspiring Strains 
of Music. — Incidents Attending tlie Ceremonial. — Pontifical Benediction by the Cardinal. — Retirement 
of the Celebrants. — Dispersion of the Vast Throng. 



" [t was the intent and purpose nf the holy tattler to gve honor to our whole country ; to give honor and show his deep respect and esteem 
for our giedt end liIotious repiiblie, ot" which the Catholic population form so essential a part, and who arc bo loyally devoted to her institu- 
tions."— Cardinal McCloskey's Address. 



<I H 



1 




T may not be inappropriate, perhaps, to state, first, that a 
cardinal is an ect^lesiastical ])riuce in the Roman Catholic 
uicli, — ail official of the most illustrious charac er, tliere- 
i'ore, in tliat liicrarchy, — second, in fact, only to tlie pope 
himself, in point of rank, — and, among his very highest pre- 
rogatives, is that of having a voice and vote in the conclave 
of cardinals at the election of a pope, who is taken from 
their number. The limit is seventy, and these also consti- 
tute the sacred college, and compose the pope's 
council. The distinguishing dress of a cardi- 
nal is a red sontaine or cassock, a rochet, a 
short purple mantle, and a red hat. 

As usual, in such a case, a special envoy was 
sent from Rome, to bear to the eminent ap- 
pointee the papal briefs. Count Marefoschi, 
of the pope's household, was deputed for this 
purpose, and by him the official announcement 
was duly made to the venerable prelate, and 
various insignia of his new rank presented to 
him. One special article of dress, however, 
pertaining to the cardinalate, — namelj^, the 
cappello — has to be received directly from the 



me 



FEOM CO].OXY TO WOKLI) POWKU. 



hands of the pope liimself ; the article tlms 
named is the flat-topped,wide-brimnied hat, 
from which depend two large tassels, and 
which is worn on the most exalted occa- 
sions. 

In handing to the cardinal the jjapal 
letter and the special insignia — a scarlet 
skull cap, — the envoy stated that the oh- 
jt>cts had in view by the holy father in this 
step, were, first, to recognize and reward 



in from all quarters to witness the solemn 
and impressive jiageant — the first of its 
kind since the settlement of our countrj-. 
At the gate of entrance, the scene was 
one long to Le remembered by the vast 
multitude — old men and women, j'oung 
men and maidens — who there sought, with 
almost mortal struggle, admission to the 
portals of the sacred edifice. 

In the decorations of the cathedral, the 




ARCHBISHOP MCCLUSKEV, THt; FIR.ST A-MKKIC.VN r.VKDINAL. 



the personal merits and distinguished ser- 
vices to the Church of the archbishop 
himself ; second, to testify liis regard for 
and pay a just tribute to the piety and 
zeal of the Catholics of America ; and 
third, to acknowledge, in an especial man- 
ner, his appreciation of all that the Cath- 
olics of the diocese of New York had 
accomplished for religion. 

The 27th of April was the time assigned 
for the public ceremonial of consecration, 
and a mighty stream of humanity poured 



choicest taste was exercised. The sanctu- 
ary was festooned with scarlet cloth orna- 
mented with gold lace and fringe, while 
over the cross, at the top of the altar, was 
arranged, in gas jets, ' Te Deum Lauda- 
mus,' and the floral decorations on the 
altar itself were profuse and elegant in 
the extreme. On either side of the tab- 
ernacle were floral columns of choice ex- 
otics, fully three feet in length and a foot 
in diameter, composed of roses, camellias 
and calla lilies, surmounted bj' a red cross 



THE FIRST CARDINAL IN THE UNITED STATES — 1875. 



o(j7 



of carnation pinks, while other floral de- 
signs of every description were strewn 
about in graceful profusion. The gallery, 
which had been set apart for the sole use 
of the choir, was hung with crimson cloth 
fringed with gilt, and caught up with 
heavy gold tassels ; in the centre was 
looped the papal banner, while on either 
side hung the stars and stripes. 

At the appointed hour, the pope's legate, 
supported by his secretary and the master 
of ceremonies, came from the sacristy, 
bearing the berretta and the papal briefs, 
and deposited the treasures at the left of 
the cardinal's throne, the berretta, in this 
case, being of the color peculiar to the 
cardinalshij). In a few moments came the 
procession of priests, in their priestly cas- 
socks and short surplices, and, shortly 
after, the dignitaries came forth from the 
same sacristy door; first came a company 
of acolytes ; then the archbisho2)s and 
bishops, mitred and arrayed in all the 
insignia of their order; then the pope's 
legate ; and next His Eminence the car- 
dinal, his train borne by two boys. Be- 
hind the cardinal came Count Marefoschi, 
in the uniform of the papal guard ; then 
another procession of priests, closed by 
the Dominican monks in white, and the 
Franciscans in brown robes. The bodies 
composing the jjrocession being duly ar- 
ranged, the church was now filled with 
joyous music from the choir. 

Cardinal McCloskey was, of course, the 
noteworthy figure in this dazzling assem- 
bly. He wore a light purple or mauve cas- 
sock, a white surplice, and a velvet manta- 
letta of deep purple ; about his neck was a 
gold chain, from which was suspended a 
ponderous cross, blazing with magnificent 
gems ; on his head was a black berretta — 
a small cap with three crests which run 
from the central point on top to the other 
edge, — which, upon removal, showed be- 
neath it the small scarlet skull cap, the 
well known sacerdotal insignia. His tall 
spare person, towering over the larger 
number near him, and his finely intellect- 
ual and energetic face, gave decided char- 
acter to the scene. All the bishops, with 



their gorgeous mitres and copes of gold 
and silver and sheeny satin, embroidered 
in various colors ; the cardinal tranquilly 
seated on his throne ; the gigantic guard, 
in the person of Count Marefoschi, mag- 
niiicently attired, at his left ; Archbishop 
Bayley, on the throne beyond the blazing 
altar, whose wealth of flowers and their 
tender hues became well nigh lost in the 
dazzle and blaze of the firmament of can- 
dles ; the sober j'et superb decorations of 
the whole altar and sanctuary, and the 
storm of music that swept over all ; — it 
was a spectacle never to be forgotten. 

Cardinal McCloskey, wearing his rochet, 
purple cassock, etc., knelt at the epistle 
altar; the archbishop of Baltimore sat on 
the same side ; the officiating prelate and 
clergymen stood at the altar .steps ; and 
mass was commenced. At the confiteor, 
the cardinal stood up and proceeded to 
his throne at the gospel side, he alone of 
all the prelates present having a pastoral 
staff, which was carried by an officiating 
bishop. After incensing the altar three 
times, he sat down with the deacon and sub- 
deacon. Bishop Loughliu read 'Introit,' 
recited 'Kyrie,' and intoned 'Gloria in 
Excelsis,' which was afterwards sun gljy the 
choir. Collects were read by the celebrant, 
the 'Epistle' by the sub-deacon, and, while 
Bishop Loughliu read the 'Gospel,' the 
congregation rose to their feet ; he then 
chanted 'Credo in Unum Deum,' and in a 
low voice recited the remainder of the 
ISTicene Creed. 

At this point, after the choir had fin- 
ished, Bishop Loughlin repaired to the 
altar, where, after the customarj' 'Domi- 
nus vobiscum ' and ' Oreraus,' he proceeded 
to read prayers at the offertory. The dea- 
con and sub-deacon then prepared sacred 
vessels and bread and wine. Mercan- 
dante's 'Quam dilecta' was sung during 
this period. Acolytes then advanced wiih 
censers and the altar was incensed by the 
celebrant, the archbishop and bishop ris- 
ing and removing their mitres, the priests 
and entire congregation also rising. At 
this time, the church was a level sea of 
he.ids, and, when the bells tinkled to an- 



168 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



nounce tlie opening of canon or solemn 
part of tlie ceremony, the people were un- 
aLle to kneel, so tightly were they packed 
together. Toward the end of the mass, 
was observed tlie interesting ceremony of 
giving the ' jjax,' or kiss of peace, — not 



left hand side of the altar, and the arch- 
bishoj) of Baltimore stepped down from 
his throne and knelt at the epistle side. 
Ablegate Roncetti stood beside Archbishop 
Baj'lej', and in a loud clear voice read the 
message, in Latin, from the Pope to his 




'-NSl-t ICAl ill 



llK.sr A.MI;KI< AX (AKIUNAl 



exactly a kiss, but an inclination of heads 
together, while the hands rest on others' 
arms. 'Pax' was given from one to the 
other until ir passed along to right and 
left, all through the crowded sanctuary. 

When mass was finished, the most nota- 
ble scene of the great occasion commenced. 
Cardinal McCloskey rose and knelt at the 



venerabilis frater, giving the reasons which 
induced him to confer the cardinalate upou 
Archhisho[> McCloskey, and at its close 
handed him the parchment 'brief,' author- 
izing him to confer the berretta, in the 
name of His Holiness, on this newly ap- 
pointed prince of the Church. The arch- 
bishop liaving replied, in the Latin Ian- 



THE FIRST CARDINAL IN THE UNITED STATES — 1S75. 



369 



guage, delivered the brief to a deacon of 
the mass, and, after reading it, Count 
Marefoschi surrendered the berretta to 
Mgr. Roncetti, who, handing it to Arch- 
bishop Bayley, the latter walked over to 
Cardinal McCloskey and placed the cap 
on his head, at the same time addressing 
him as 'Eminentia tua.' Cardinal Mc- 
Closkey made a suitable replj^, in the 
Latin vernacular, and, after intoning ' Te 
Deum,' retired to the vestry, where he put 
on the crimson robes of liis office, and re- 
turned to the altar, while the choir sang 
' Te Deum.' 

The interest, both ecclesiastical and 
historical, pertaining to the papal docu- 
ments referred to, entitle them to an in- 
sertion in this jilace. The first of these, 
couched in the usual phraseology of com- 
munications of such grave importance, is 
addressed — 

' To our Venerable Brother, James Roose- 
velt Bayley, Archbishop of Baltimore. 
Pius IX., Pope. Venerable Brother, 
Ileallh and Apostiilic Benediction : 
After the example of the Roman Pontiffs, 
our predecessors, it has ever been our care to 
fill the College of Cardinals, which is the Sen- 
ate of the Cliurcli, with men whose piety, 
virtue, and merits, should correspond to the 
splendor of so great a dignity. It is this that 
has moved us to proclaim Cardinal of the 
Holy Roman Church, our Venerable Brotlier, 
John McCloskey-, Archbishop of New York ; 
whose piety, learning, devotion to His Holy 
Apostolic See, and whose indefatigable zeal 
in the cultivation of the Lord's Vineyard, 
have been so conspicuously evident to Us that 
we have thought him worthy of this great 
honor. And now that we would choose a per- 
sonage for the office of conferring ujion hini 
the berretta, one of the insignia of his new 
dignity, we have thought well to select for the 
office you, venerable brother, who presides over 
so illustrious a church, and one that has the 
right of precedence over all the churches of 
the L^nited States of America. We know that 
such is your devotion toward us and toward 
this chair of the blessed Peter, that we are 
confident you will, in the discharge of this 
office, fulfill all our expectations. We, there- 
fore, by tliese presents, charge you, venerable 
brother, that, strictly observing whatever is 
prescribed by the sacred rites of the Roman 
24 



Church, you confer, in our name and in liis 
own Cathedral church, upon our beloved son, 
John McCloskey, proclaimed by us a Cardi- 
nal of the Holy Roman Church, the scarlet 
berretta, which we have sent to him by the 
hand of our beloved son, Cesar Roncetti, 
one of our private chamberlains ; and we, 
therefore, through these presents, by the same 
apostolic authority, grant you all the powers 
necessary and proper for the purpose. And it 
is our wish that nothing contained in any 
other ordinance shall be construed thwarting 
our purpose, even though such thing might 
seem to require special and individual men- 
tion. 

Given in Rome, at St. Peter's, under the 
seal of the Fisherman's Ring, on the 16th day 
of March, anno Domini 1875, and of our Pon- 
tificate the twenty-ninth. 

[l. s.] F. Cardinal Asquini.' 

The above letter was followed by one 
which announced to the distinguished pre- 
late, personally, that His Holiness had been 
pleased to make him one of the princes 
of the Church, and was addressed — • 

• To our Beloved Son, John McCloskey' — by 
the Appointment and Favor of the Apos- 
tolic of oiu- Archbishop of New York, and 
now proclaimed a Cardinal ot the Holy 
Roman Church. Plus IX., Pope. Beloved 
Son, Health, and Apostolic Benediction : 
Having been placed, through the Divine 
will, without any merit of ours, in the supreme 
dignity of this Apostolic See, with that solici- 
tude which should be characteristic of our 
pastoral office, while laboring for the welfare 
of the Catholic Church, we have ever sought 
to enroll among the number of our venerable 
brethren the Cardinals of the Holy Roman 
Church, men of such conspicuous merit as the 
dignity of their illustrious order demands. 
For this reason it is that we have chosen you, 
our well-beloved son, whose eminent piety 
virtue and learning, and zeal for the propaga- 
tion of the Catholic faith, have convinced ua 
that your ministry would be of great utility 
and honor to the Church of God. Having, 
therefore, created you a Cardinal of the Holy 
Roman Church, we send to you, by our be- 
loved son, Cesar Roncetti, one of our secret 
chamberlains, the scarlet berretta, which is 
one of the insignia of that sublime dignity. 
When, with the proper forms, it shall have 
been conferred upon you, know that its shin- 
ing crimson should ever remind him who ia 



o70 



PEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



elevated to the C:n-dinalitial dignily, that, 
fearless and uucon(]uered, lie must ever up- 
hold the rights of the Church of God through 
every danger, even to that shedding of his 
blood which is pronounced precious in the 
sight of the Lord. We also greatly desire that 
you would receive, with all niiiniier of kind- 
ness, liim who we have sent to you, both for 
the sake of the mission upon which lie is sent 
and for our sake. It is also our wish, that, 
before you receive the berretta, you should 
take and subscribe with your own hand, the oatli 
vvhich will be presented to you by the afore- 
mentioned, our beloved son, Cesar Roncetti, 
and send it to us, cither by his hand, or any 
otlier. And it is our wish that no persons, 
constitutions or ordinances, of this Apostolic 
See, or anything else whatsoever, shall be con- 
strued as invalidating this our present act. 

Given in Rome, at St. Peter's, under the 
seal of the Fisherman's Ring, on the 2(ith day 
of l^Lal■ch, anno Domini 1875, and of our Pon- 
tificate the twenty-ninth. 

[l. s.] F. Cardinal Asquini. 

The closing act in tliis solemn pageant, 
after the inspiring strains of music had 
ceased to fill the air, wa.s the pontifical bene- 
diction by the Cardinal, and, after the re- 
tirement of the celebrants in processional 
order, the vast throng of spectators dis- 
persed. The new Cardinal entered upon his 
great office with the reputation, accorded to 
him alike by Protestants and Catholics, of 
a name without a stain, and a career honor- 
able and dignified, through a long life. 

It is certainly not saying too much, tliat, 
in the annals of American Catholicism, so 
memorable a ceremonial as that now des- 
cribed must render historical, in the liigh- 
est degree, the sacred edifice in which it 
occurred. But only a few years elapsed, 
after this unprecedented occasion, wlien the 
venerable Cardinal had the satisfaction of 
officiating at the dedication of the now and 
magnificent St. Patrick's Cathedral just 
completed on Fifth Avenue, — the most 
superb ecclesiastical structure not only in 
New York city, but on the American conti- 
nent. The dedication took place May 25, 
1879, or nearly twenty-one years after the 
laying of the corner-stone. The founda- 
tions rest on a bed of solid rock, in which 
excavations therefor had to be made, and 



at the normal level of the surrounding 
ground rests a chisel-dressed base course of 
granite. From this springs a pure Gothic 
marble superstructure, similar in archi- 
tecture to the style obtaining in Europe 
during the thirteenth and fourteenth cen- 
turies, and, like the cathedrals of Amiens, 
Eheinis, and Cologne, this is free from 
heaviness and over-ornamentation. Most 
of the windows on the lower tier were do- 
nations from various churches, and some 
are of American make ; those of the nave 
were ordered by Cardinal McCloskey, when 
visiting Rome. These windows are de- 
clared by good judges to be masterpieces 
of art. The interior of the edifice is di- 
vided into three parts — transept, nave, and 
choir, — of dimensions as follows : Length 
of transept, 140 feet; height of nave, 108 
feet; internal length of the building 306 
feet, and breadth 96 feet. A series of 
chapels, each twelve feet deep, occupy 
either side of the edifice ; the nave is di- 
vided from the aisles by two rows of clus- 
tered columns, sixteen columns in a row ; 
the choir has five bays, and arranged with 
double aisles on either side of the central 
aisle. The area of the interior of the ca- 
thedral is 38,500 square feet; there is 
standing room for 19,000 people, and 
14,000 can be accommodated with seats. 
The cost of the cathedral, when completed, 
will approximate $5,000,000. The first 
event in connection with the dedication of 
the edifice was the solemn consecration, 
two days jireviously, of the High AJtar, 
the chief consecrator being the Right Rev. 
Bishop Conro^r, of Albany, N. Y. This 
grand altar, exquisite in material, design, 
and artistic beauty, stands forty-eight feet 
in lieight to the apex of the cross sur- 
mounting the tabernacle. The number of 
eminent prelates present was quite large 
comprising not less than six archbishops, 
in cope and mitre, followed by the bishops, 
similarly attired, and making in all a gath- 
ering of forty-three members of the Epis- 
copacy. The scene of the dedication, un- 
der the lead, primarily, of the eminent and 
venerable Cardinal, was impressive to a 
degree rarely witnessed on American soil. 



XXXIX. 

THE TWEED RING - 1876. 



The Cliaracter of Xew York City Government When Tweed Began Public Life. — State Inter- 
ference. — Tweed's Entry Into Politics. — Sent to Congress in 1853. — "• Tweedie Xever Goes 
Back on Tweedie."- — Becomes Grand Sachem of Tammany Hall. — The New " Wigwam." — 
The Democratic National Convention Held in It, July 4, 1868. — Tammany Forces Seymour 
nn I'arty, and Supports Hoffman for Governor. — Oaths Administered on "Ollendorff's 
French Method," Xo Bible Being at Hand. — Constitution of Tweed Ring in 1868. — The 
■■ Big Four," '■ Oakey " Hall, Sweeny, Connolly, and Tweed. — Tweed Already Very Rich. — 
Marriage of Daughter and Costly Presents From Politicians. — The Americus Club and 
Its Tiger. — Latter Becomes Emblem of Tammany. — The Xew City Charter, "Tweed's 
Charter."^ Places All Power in City in Hands of Ring Legally. — Charter Cost Tweed 
.$1,500,000. — " The Young Democracy." — Exposures by Xew York Times. — " What Are Y'ou 
Going to Do About It?". — Tweed's Hold Upon the Poor. — Ring Overthrown in the Elec- 
tion of 1871. — Statement of Enormous Thefts. — Untold Millions. — Tweed's Various Trials. 
— Exciting Escape to Spain and Recapture. — Confesses .Judgment for $6.000,000. — Unable 
to Pay or Secure $3,000,000 Bail, He Goes to Jail.— Dies in Ludlow Street Jail April 12. 
1878. — Deserted By All His Henchmen and Former Friends. — Other Ring Members Escape 
to Europe. — Effect Upon Tammany Hall. — Similar Corruption in Other Cities. 



"Corruption is a tree, whose branches are 
Of an unmeasurable length; they spread 
Ev'rywhere. — and the dew that drops from thenoe 
Hath infectod some chairs and stools of authority." 

— BEAtJMONT AND FLETCHER. 







HE year 1857 marked a turning point in the liistory of New 
York City. It was then that a great change began to be 
noticeable in the character of the voting population, as a 
result of innnigration, which became more anti more pro- 
nounced each year. About the same time, too, the State 
Legislature began to take a more positive interest in the 
city's affairs. Up to this time the municipality had been 
self governing, and had for many years practically always 
returned Democratic majorities in city elections. Naturally 
all the ofBces were held by that party, which had come to 
mean by Tammany Hall, or by those with whom Tammany 
leaders might have made trades. But the "political pickings" which had for many 
years enriched large numbers of Tammany office holders sorely tempted the statesmen 
at Albany, the majority of whom were Republicans, and many of whom were very 
hungry for some of the rich spoils which the richest city of the country afforded. It 
was decided, therefore, to take the control of the city out of the hands of the officials 
elected by the citizens, and to vest it very largely, at least, in commissioners ap- 
pointed by the State authorities. The sadly peculiar feature of the whole movement, 



372 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



fis indicated by the press of that day. was 
that while the ostensible purpose of the 
Legislature was to secure better goveru- 
iiient for the city, it was evident that the 
real inspiring force was the desire of 
many leaders in that body to share in the 
spoils. Accordingly in that year (1857) 
a new charter and laws affecting the city 
government were passed. The powers of 




WII.l.IAM MAKCS' TWEED. 

tlie city council were greatly curtaileil, 
and those of the mayor were somewhat re- 
stricted ; but the most significant change, 
in the light of after events, was the ap- 
IKiintnient of a State Board of Super- 
visors, distinct from the municipal au- 
thorities ; and in this Board were vested 
the most important administrative powers. 
— especially those of levying the local 
taxes, making appropriations, etc. This 
board was to be bi-partisan, and com- 
posed of twelve Republicans and twelve 
Democrats. A metropolitan police dis- 
trict, fire district, and health district 
were also created, the administration of 
whosi' aifairs was to be in the hands of 
boards appointed by the Governor of the 
State. This action aroused great opposi- 
tion in the city, and a spirit of rebellion 
was manifest ; so that when the metro- 
politan police undertook to displace the 
municipal police several encounters re- 



sulted with considerable bloodshed. But 
the Supreme Court deciding that such 
action on the part of the State was en- 
tirely within its powers it was seen that 
opposition was useless, and physical re- 
sistance was abandoned. There were 
other ways of securing the same ends. 
" This," says one of the historians of the 
period, " was the general character of the 
government that New York possessed 
when it fell into the hands of a band of 
statesmen of more than average ability, 
line] of quite phenomenal dishonestii, 
whose career constitutes the greatest re- 
liroach that has ever been cast upon popu- 
lar government." 

The moving spirit and directing force 
of this gang of plunderers was William 
Marcy Tweed. He was of Scotch jiarent- 
age and was born in Cherry street, in 
182.3. His father was a chair maker in 
comfortable circumstances, who gave his 
children a fair education; and for a time 
the son was associated with his father 
in business. But young Tweed's restless 
spirit yearned for a more strenuous life; 
and before he was of age he had Joined 
the old volunteer fire department, and in 
1849 he was elected forenij^n of a com- 
pany. " Free and easy in his manners," 
says a contemporary, " loyal to his friends, 
with great animal spirits, and a large 
fund of coarse humor, Tweed was just the 
man to be popular with the class from 
which the fire companies were recruited ; 
and his popularity among the ' boys ' of 
the fire brigade gave him entrance into 
city polities." His first taste of official 
life was as alderman in 1850; and he had 
no sooner assumed the duties of the office 
than he began to manifest the traits that 
characterized his whole career. Every 
contract or job that promised to advance 
his interests financially or politicall.v 
found in him an earnest and powerful 
advocate: and his political strength and 
popularity increased so rapidl.y that he 
was able to secure an election to Congress 
in 185.3. He was delegate to the Congres- 
sional convention of the 5th district, 
composed of two East Side wards and 
Williamsburg, and was elected chairman 



THE TWEED KING — 1876. 



373 



of the convention. Each section had 
forty-four votes, and a deadlock ensued. 
After several ballots the Williamsburg 
delegates dropped their candidate and 
tln-ew their forty-four votes for T^vced ; 
and claiming the privilege of the chaii-- 
man to cast the deciding vote when there 
is a tie he declared himself elected, saying 
that " Tweedie never goes back on 
Tweedic." Serving one term in the na- 
tional House of Representatives, he was 
defeated for re-election by the " Know- 
Nothings," whom he then and ever after 
fought so earnestly that he became the 
recognizcid champion of the foreign ele- 
ment. So popular had he now become that 
he was made a Sachem of the Tammany 
Society, and, in 1856, became a public 
school commissioner; and adroitly using 
the inflnences at his command he was 
elected one of the new board of super- 
visors in 1S57. Here he found a field 
suited to his abilities, and at once began 
laying the foundations of the machine, or 
ring, he built up. As has been said, the 
board of supervisors was a bi-partisan 
board, but Tweed early displayed his 
political genius by bribing one of the Re- 
publican members to remain away front 
some important meetings, for which use- 
ful service he was paid $2500. At these 
meetings the inspectors of elections were 
appointed, and the " ring " makers were 
thus enabled to put the " right " men in 
charge of each election jsrecinct. In 1861 
Tweed conducted an aggressive campaign 
for the office of sheriif, — an office at that 
time worth from $100,000 to $150,000 a 
year; but in this race he was beaten by a 
popular Irishman named James Lynch. 
Nothing daunted by this incident, he 
turned his attention to strengthening his 
position in Tammany Hall, with such 
success that before the year was over 
he was elected chairman of the Gen- 
eral Committee, and a little later, 
Grand Sachem ; and. holding these two 
offices, he held the supreme power 
in the most perfectly organized politi- 
cal machine the country has ever 
known. He was now able to dictate nom- 
inations to public offices as he would, and 



so had become a power with which every 
interest in the city must reckon and, if 
necessary, jilacate. This power he used in 
a most despotic manner, yet with such 
tact that he gave little offense to other 
members of the Tammany Society. In 
presiding over its business meetings, when 
any matter came up which he wished de- 
cided in a particular way, his usual 
method was to call for the affirmative vote, 
and then declare the measure adopted, 
without calling for the vote on the nega- 
tive side. In addition, too, to the power 
he possessed as the leader of all the Demo- 
cratic forces, his control of practically 
every department of the city employing 
men enabled him to trade in the most ef- 
fective manner. 

But there has often been a thorn in 
Tammany's flesh in the form of an opposi- 
tion society, which, during Tweed's time, 
was known as " Mozart Hall." These so- 
cieties were always organized by hungry 
politicians who had failed to get all their 
greed demanded in the distribution of 
spoils, and so gathered about themselves 
other disaffected spirits, seceded from 
Tammany, and set up their own organiza- 
tions. These movements were always in 
the nature of " strikes," though the lead- 
ers, surrounding themselves with a halo 
of righteous indignation, denounced the 
corruptions and evil influences of the old 
Society, proclaimed for themselves the 
highest principles of civic virtue, and an- 
nounced the dawn of better daj's in 
municipal affairs. Generally the public 
was deceived and anticipated improved 
conditions, but Tammany leaders never 
were; and the results have ever been the 
same, — simply a more generous division 
of the plunder, and, after a few years, the 
liolding of a " great love feast " in Tam- 
many Hall, when the political prodigal 
son was received back into the home fold, 
under guarantees of more liberal con- 
sideration for the future. Tammany Hall 
has always been the dominant society : 
and, despite intestine quarrels and exter- 
nal attacks which seemed to threaten its 
very existence, its strength and vitality 
have never been materially affected. No 



374 



FROM COLO^'Y TO WORLD POWER. 



organism has ever manifested greater re- 
cuperative powers. 

During the early " sixties " the an- 
tagonism of ]\Inzart Hall was especially 
vicious, and Tweed undertook to bring the 
hostile forces together, and so to present a 
united front to their common enemy, — the 
business interests of the city and decent 
society. Fernando Wood, a most un- 
scrupulous politician and as a clever 
schemer and spoils-monger no unworthy 
foe for Tweed to meet, was at the head of 
Mozart Hall. By giving to Wood, who had 
ambitions to figure in national politics, 
the nomination for Member of Congress, 
harmony between the hostile forces was 




THE WIGWAM. 

established, and the leading members of 
Mozart Hall returned to Tammany Hall, 
their less consequential followers being 
left out in the cold. This union greatly 
strengthened Tammany's position, and 



added to its forces many men of influence 
in the city's affairs, notably A. Oakey 
Hall and Judge Cardozo. Hall had orig- 
inally been an active member of the Re- 
publican party, but had sometime before 
allied himself for political reasons with 
Mozart Hall; and now becoming a pro- 
nounced Democrat he was recognized as a 
most valuable addition to the Tammany 
ranks. He was a man who stood well in 
the city, of marked literary tastes, and 
considerable ability as a writer. Judge 
Cardozo allied himself with Tammany in 
return for a promised nomination for a 
seat on the bench of the highest court. 
Concurrently with the consolidation of 
the Democracy Tweed became street com- 
missioner; so that now the control of all 
the offices of the city, and of all the 
avenues for levying tribute were in the 
hands of Tweed and his confederates. 
One important influence was still to be 
secured, however, and that was the mayor- 
alty. Accordingly a most estimable citizen 
was induced to become the candidate of 
Tammany in the mayoralty campaign of 
1SC5. This was John T. Hoffman, a man 
of good family and high social standing, 
but with ambitions looking toward the 
governorship : and with the promise of 
Tammany that he should have the next 
Democratic nomination for Governor, he 
consented to become the Hall's candidate 
for mayor, and was elected in that year. 
His early days in office were character- 
ized by some well-planned and earnest 
assaults upon the ring, and the public 
soon believed that the administration was 
working for the true interests of the city, 
and Hoffman's popularity was greatly in- 
creased. But gradually his opposition to 
t!ie worst elements of the Democracy be- 
came lukewarm ; and by holding over him 
a threat to recede from their agreement as 
to the gubernatorial nomination the party 
leaders were able to silence him and nul- 
lify his apparent hostility. 

The .year 1868 was one of marked prom- 
inence in the annals of Tammany and 
of supreme importance to its leaders. The 
previous year Tweed, who had for some 
time been dissatisfied with the old Hall, 



THE TWEED RING — 1S7G. 



now the New York Sun building, deter- 
mined that the Society should have a new 
home " up-town," more in keeping with 
its commanding position in the city's af- 
fairs. So Hberally had the leading mem- 
bers of the organization enriched them- 
selves out of their otBcial positions that 
when Tweed proposed his plan, and stated 
that $250,000 was needed at once to put it 
into execution, fifteen men present im- 
mediately subscribed $10,000 each and the 
balance was quickly raised. The corner- 
stone of the new " Wigwam " in East 14th 
street, between Irving Place and Third 
avenue, was laid in the fall and the build- 
ing was completed the next summer; and 
was one of the most imposing and preten- 
tious semi-public buildings then in the 
city. The Democratic National Conven- 
tion was held in the new hall on July 4, 
1808, and the occasion was one to abun- 
dantly gratify the pride and patriotism of 
the average " brave ; " while the leaders had 
planned to make this meeting the greatest 
event in their already remarkable career, 
and to secure by it the control of the gov- 
ernorship of the State, as well as the may- 
oralty of the city. The convention was a 
notable one and enthusiasm ran high, and 
flowed freely. Though the party at largo 
had other views, Tammany succeeded in 
forcing Seymour on the Convention as its 
candidate for the presidency. In the 
State convention Hoffman was nominated 
for Governor, Tammany making good 
its promise to him when he ceased 
his hostility as mayor; and Hall was 
slated to succeed Hoffman in the mayor- 
alty. The stakes for which the ring 
played were enormous; and no expendi- 
ture of money nor any trick which the 
shrewdest politicians could devise and 
their control of all the machinery of elec- 
tion enable them to carry out, was not re- 
sorted to. Owing to the tremendous in- 
crease in immigration of the previous 
few years the ignorant foreign voting ma- 
terial had become of vast importance ; and 
men were naturalized at the rate of a 
thousand a day at times. Every prepara- 
tion was made for repeating and stuffing 
ballot boxes. On October .jOth, Tweed 



made the welcome proclamation that at 
ten o'clock the next forenoon the money 
for electioneering purposes would be ready 
for distribution, and it was announced 
that one thousand dollars was ready for 
each of the 327 election precincts, making 
a total of $.327,000, to be distributed by 




HOR-iTIO SEYMOUR. 

the General Committee alone, which was 
exclusive of the amoimts derived by tlie 
district leaders from the saloons, gam- 
bling houses, and brothels in their respec- 
tive districts. By all the evil methods 
that could be devised by the clever 
schemers in charge of the election the 
total vote of the city was run up to 150,- 
288, of which a conservative estimate 
placed the fraudulent votes at not less 
tban 25,000. Tweed himself confessed 
nine years later, when on trial, that he 
thought the inspectors of elections 
" lumped " the votes and declared them 
without counting, in order to overcome 
the Republican majority in the rest of the 
state and give the electoral vote to Sey- 
mour. In those days the complete returns 
were never declared until it was known 
with what majority the Republicans " had 
come down to the Harlem;" and to pre- 
vent them from getting the use of certain 
telegraph wires that night Tweed sent out 
long and useless messages, declaring his 
intention of telegraphing the whole Bible, 



376 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



if necessary. It is said to have been at this 
election that, at tlie swearing in of elec- 
tion inspectors, no Bible being obtainable, 
they took the oath on a copy of " Ollen- 
doriFs New Method of Learning Plow to 
Read, Write and Speak French;" and 
the courts afterward held that the substi- 
tution of Ollendorff for the Bible was not 
such an act as could vitiate the election. 
The total vote was 108.31G for Seymour 
and 47,702 for Grant ; and Seymour car- 
ried the State. The same tidal wave of 
fraud carried Hoffman into the governor- 
ship; and at a special election held in 
December to fill the mayoralty office made 
vacant by the elevation of Hoffman, thi' 
ring's candidate. Hall, one " of its very 
own," was elected by a total vote of 75,10!) 
against 20,805 for the Republican camli- 
dato. The disparity between these totals 
and those of the presidential election a 
month earlier gives some idea of the nnni- 
ber of fraudulent votes cast to secure Sey- 
mour's election. To further strengthen 
the position of the thieving conspirators 
Tweed had himself elected to the State 
Senate, so that he could personally super- 
vise tlie "running'' of the JA-gisUiturc 
Already the ring which existed in the 
board of supervisors between the two 
factions of partisans in the board had 
grown into a compact ring between the 
Republican majority at Albany, the board 
of su])ervisors, and the Tammany ring; 
and Tweed recognized the necessity of be- 
ing on the ground in Albany, the centre 
of political bargaining and legislative 
manipulation. The corruption at Albany 
in those days was quite as great as that 
in the city, and the two rings were closely 
allied. But the Legislature was full of 
strikers and enormous sums were paid for 
the passage of bills. A difficult element 
to handle, too, was the famous " Black 
Horse Cavalry,"' a band of about thirty 
Republican and Democratic members who 
organized themselves under one of the 
most notorious lobbyists, mutually pledg- 
ing each other to vote as directed. 

The ring interests in the city might 
now be considered as definitel.y estab- 
lished, and its membership was distinctly 



recognized. Besides Tweed, the men con- 
stituting the " Big Four," as they were 
familiarly known, were A. Oakey Hall 
(popularly called "Oakey" Hall), whom 
they had just caused to be elected mayor, 
Peter B. Sweeney, and Richard B. Con- 
ihilly. As has already been stated Hall's 
general reputation in the city was good, 
and his intellectual attainments marked, 
so tliat his election was not regarded as 
offensive by citizens of either party. 
Sweeney had for years been one of the 
cdeverest lobbyists at Albany, and so had 
liccome an experienced judge of men, as 
well as a master in the art of handling 
them; and for this reason w-as selected by 
'I'weed for the important position of City 
( 'hamberlain. Connolly was the weakest 
member of the "Four" and was the one 
least trusted by his confederates. He was, 
liowever, recognized as a man of consider- 
able financial experience and ability, and 
SI) was made Controller. His nickname of 
" Slippery Dick," however, illustrates the 
oi)inion held of him by his associates. 

" By the election of 1868," said S. J. 
Tilden in his report as president of the 
( 'iininiitlee of Seventy, "the ring became 
iMiinpletely organized and matured." Its 
Icailers had now become rich men. When 
Tweed entered the board of supervisors he 
ilcrlared that he would soon be among the 
largest hiilders of real estate in the city; 
and the fact that in 1805 he was a com- 
jjaratively poor man and in 1809 was gen- 
erally estimated to be worth ten to twelve 
million dollars ought surely to give him a 
high place among the prophets. Of these 
men at tliis period one writer says: 
" Tweed was an enormously rich man. He 
had investments in real estate and iron 
mines; he was interested in every street 
oiM'uing and widening- scheme; he had a 
hand in all city and in many State con- 
tracts; and held directorships in many 
railroads, gas companies, and other cor- 
pcn-ations. Connolly, wdio some years be- 
fore bad left a position as bookkeeper at 
a moderate salary, to engage in politics 
' as a financial speculation,' Sweeney, 
and the rest of the ring suddenly became 
millionaires. Fvery active Tammanv 



THE TWEED KING — 1S76. 



377 



mail and many Republican accomplices 
shared according to the degree of eacli in 
the sacking of the city.'' It was about 
this time, too, that Tweed became actively 
interested in Erie, and other railroad af- 
fairs; and one who wrote a life of the 
notorious " Jim Fisk," said: " Jay Gould 
and Fisk took William M. Tweed into 
their (the Erie) board ; and the State 
Legislature, Tammany Hall, and the 
' Erie King ' were fused in interest, and 
have continued to serve each other faith- 
fully." From this source alone Tweed at 
one time declared his profits for the pre- 
ceding three months were $650,000. 

Kor did Tweed aim alone to establish 
a position in political life. The modest 
home in Henry street was exchanged for 
a most pretentious one on Fifth Avenue, 
where he kept up an elaborate and expen- 
sive establishment. The marriage of his 
daughter was one of the sensational events 
of the day, and through Tweed's influence 
with the papers most detailed and spicy 
accounts of the event were sent broadcast 
through the country. Most costly gifts 
were showered upon the bride, those from 
her father's political friends alone costing 
over $100,000. Among them were forty 
complete sets of solid silver, and fifteen 
diamond sets, one of which was valued at 
$4r),000. Her wedding dress, we are told, 
cost $4,000 and the trimmings $1,000 
more. Tweed spent money everywhere 
with a lavish hand. His summer place 
near Greenwich, Ct., was one of the most 
beautiful on Long Island Sound. The 
stables alone cost over $100,000, even the 
stalls being built of ' the finest polished 
mahogany. The Americus Club was 
his favorite social organization, and its 
house on the Sound was one of the best 
appointed and most sumptuously fur- 
nished club houses in the land. His fol- 
lowers gladly paid their initiation fee of 
one thousand dollars in addition to the 
two thousand charged for the furnishings 
of the room to which each member was 
entitled. The crest of the club was a 
tiger's head, and in the cartoons of the 
period the tiger figured largely with a 
collar oil which was stamped " Americus," 



and it was through this association of the 
club emblem with the acts of its members 
that the tiger gradually became the sym- 
bol of Tammany Hall, and has so figured 
to the present day. Evei-ywhere the same 
prodigality of expenditure was manifest. 
Trifles like a thousand dollars were 
thrown about as freely as the average cit- 
izen spends five dollars, or even one. 

" Oakcy " Hall took his seat as mayor, 
January 1, 18(39. The ring now con- 
trolled the common council of the city, the 
Legislature of the State, and its Governor 
was the State's executive officer. Hall was 
mayor; Sweene.v was city chamberlain, or 
treasurer of both city and county; Tweed 
was supreme in the street department; 




A. OAKEY HALL. 



Connolly was city controller, and as such 
had charge of the city's finances; and to- 
gether they controlled the entire political 
machinery of Tammany Hall, so that 
there was little chance of their being dis- 
lodged through election methods. The ac- 
count that has been given of the wealth 
and extravagance of these men and their 
satellites is sufficient evidence of the 
amount that must have been stolen up to 
this time. But when it is remembered 
that what they had personally kept bore 
only a small proportion to the amount 



378 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tliat had been spent in bribing men whom 
they needed in the city, in tlie legislature, 
and on the bench, one can easily see that 
the aggregate of plunder must already 
have reached scores of millions of dollars. 
Yet the orgy had only begun. As the 
election of 1S(59 had given the Democrats 
a clear majority in both branches of the 
Legislature, the ring determined to se- 
cure clianges in the city charter which 
should make their work still easier and 
less expensive. And strangely, though the 
changes proposed were only in the interest 
of the ring, yet their general provisions 
were so good that the new charter received 
the unqualified indorsement of nearly the 
entire press of the city, and of the best 
citizens irrespective of party; and its prin- 
ciples accorded with the most advanced 
modern theories of municipal administra- 
tion. The city secured a greater power 
over its own affairs; the complex admin- 
istrative institutions were greatly simpli- 
fied, and responsibility for administration 
was centred in very few hands. " But," 
as was .said, " the only fault was that these 
hands at the moment were unclean and 
grasping hands." This charter restored to 
the city all the powers that had been taken 
from it by the charter of 1857; and on the 
specious plea that all the misgovernment 
of the few years previous was due to the 
various State commissions, the ring- 
turned suspicion away from itself and 
secured the support of the majorit.v of the 
best citizens for its measures. The old 
board of supervisors was abolished, the 
entire executive power, with that of ap- 
pointment, was placed in the hands of the 
mayor, and an entirely new board was 
created, styled the Board of Apportion- 
ment. This was composed of the mayor, 
the controller, the commissioner of pub- 
lic works, and president of the pai-k 
board, that is of ILxll, Connolly, Tweed, 
and Sweeney; and they thus received 
power to make all appropriations neces- 
sary for carrying on the government. The 
ring thus legally became judges of 
the necessities of expenditures and were 
empowered to provide for their jjayment. 
Auntlicr law was passed creating a B(iard 



of Audit, whose duty should be to close 
up all the affairs of the late board of 
supervisors. This law made the mayor. 
Hall; the comptroller, Connolly; and the 
president of the old board of supervisors, 
Tweed, the members of the new board of 
audit, with power to examine and allow 
all claims against the county previous to 
1S70. This was the richest single mine 
yet struck by the ring. The new charter 
had cost them a frightful sum, generally 
estimated from $1,000,000 to $1,500,000; 
and this was the means taken to recoup 
themselves for this outlay, and replenish 
their exchequers. Claims to the amount 
of more than $6,000,000 were audited and 
]iaid out of the city treasury in less than 
three months. This charter came to be 
known as " Tweed's Charter." As a re- 
sult of later investigations Samuel J. 
Tilden testified that it was evident that it 
cost Tweed about $1,000,000 to get it 
through the Legislature. Tweed himself 
afterward testified that he gave to one 
man $000,000, with which to buy votes, 
this being only part of the fund. He 
further testified that he bought the vote 
of five Republican senators for $40,000 
apiece, giving one of them $200,000 to dis- 
tribute. It is not surprising, therefore, to 
learn that the vote in both houses was 
practically unanimous in its favor. Dur- 
ing the session of 1870-1871 the ring also 
got other bills through the Legislature en- 
larging their powers to raise money and 
increase the city's debt, with the result 
that from these sources they secured con- 
trol of about $48,000,000 for the year 1871. 
But the most colossal single effort of the 
ring had been prosecuted in the building 
(if the County Court House, which stands 
in the City Hall park. When the work 
began it was stipulated that the total cost 
should not exceed $250,000; yet by the end 
of 1871 over $8,000,000 had been paid out 
on this accovmt, and it was still un- 
finished. The method of procedure here 
was that whenever a bill was brought in 
b.v one of the contractors he was ordered 
to greatly increase the amount of his total 
charge; and if he demvirred. he was in- 
fornied that he nnist wait indefinitelv for 



THE TWEED RING — 1876. 



379 



his pay. The result was that he always 
yielded. A warrant was then drawn for 
the amount of the bill as raised, the con- 
tractor was paid the original amount, or a 
little more, and the balance was divided 
between the members of the ring. In his 
" History of Tammany Hall," Myers says : 
"At a single sitting — on May 5, 1870 — the 
board of audit made out an order for the 
payment of $(i,312,500 on account of the 
building of the new court house. Of this 
sum barely a tenth was realized by the 
city. Payments under the 'Adjusted 
( 'laims Act ' were first made by the con- 
troller in July, 1868, and were continued 
until January, 1869. During this time 
tifty-five per cent of the claims was di- 
vided among members of the ring, twenty- 
five per cent to Tweed, twenty to Con- 
nolly, and ten to Sweeney. In July, 1869, 
payments under the act were resumed, but 
the percentage of spoils was raised to 
sixty, and after November, to sixty-five. 
Of this increase a small amount was al- 
lotted to three clerks and ' go-betweens,' 
and five per cent was reserved for ' Ex- 
penses,' — that is, for bribery. Later in 
making payments on the court house the 
spoils rate was raised to eighty-five per 
cent. 'Jobs' signiticant of untold millions 
lurked in every possible form. One of 
Tweed's favorite schemes was to create on 
paper a fictitious institution, jot down the 
names of three or four of his friends as 
ofiicers, put a large amount in the tax levy 
for that institution, and pocket the money. 
Asylums, hospitals, and dispensaries that 
were never heard of and never existed ex- 
cept on paper, were i^ut down as benefici- 
aries of state and city." To cover up the 
real condition of affairs the controller 
failed to make a public statement of the 
financial conditions which was due Janu- 
ary 1, 1S70, until the following- October. 
In this report everything of a suspicious 
character was in an account entitled 
" General Purposes." — and in a total ex- 
penditure of $21,000,000. it appeared that 
$9,000,000 had been paid oat for such 
" general purposes." This naturally 
aroused suspicion in the public mind ; but 
so earnestly did the controller "court" 



an investigation of his office and methods 
by a committee of the citizens that the 
suspicions were quieted for a time. A 
little later, however-, such a committee, 
composed of some six or seven of the fore- 
most lawyers and business men of the 
city, was named for the purpose of ex- 
amining the books and the workings of 
the controller's office; and so well did 
Connolly cover up the tracks of the ring 
and conceal the true state of affairs that, 
after their examination, the committee 
published a " card " in the daily papers 
stating that the financial affairs of the city 
under the charge of the controller were 
administered in a correct and faithful 
manner. And they further stated that the 
debt of the city was about $20,000,000 less 
than it was afterwards proved to be; also 
that if the then existing rate of redemp- 
tion ivas Tcept up the total debt of the 
cilj/ would he extinguished in less than 
twelve years. This statement read very 
strangely in the light of subsequent de- 
velopments, which showed that the dol)t 
of the city actually increased during the 
years 1870 and 1871 at the rate of $28.- 
652,000 a year; and that it had grown 
from $20,000,000 in 1860, when Tweed 
first began to get his work in, to $100.- 
955,330 in July, 1871, as reported in the 
New York Tribune of August 8, 1871. 

But without any warning to its luembers 
the days of the ring were being numbered. 
An oppositioai political society had sprung 
up called the " Young Democracy," and in 
the spring of this same year, at the solici- 
tation of James O'Brien, the leader of the 
Young Democracy, Connolly appointed 
one Copeland to a clerkship in the audi- 
tor's ofiice. Soon after his ai)pointment 
there came into Copeland's hands certain 
vouchers which seemed to him peculiar 
and excited his curiosity. Upon investi- 
gating the matter further he found an 
account entitled " County Liabilities." 
which contained some of the enormous 
bills paid by the city for plastering and 
furniture. Awaiting his opportunity he 
copied the entire account and gave it to 
O'Brien. The latter decided not to make 
it pulilic at once, but to use it as an aid in 



380 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



collecting certain large fees he claimed 
were due him from the ring', which had 
accrued while he was sheriff. Failing in 
this, early in the summer of 1871 O'Brien 
took the statement to the New York 
Times, and immediately that paper began 
its exposure of the operations of the ring. 
It boldly denounced the members, in large 
capitals, as thieves and swindlers, and 
defied them to sue that paper for libel. 
Commencing July 22d it published in suc- 
cessive issues extracts from the secret ac- 
counts obtained from O'Brien, and on the 
29 til summed up all the charges against 
the ring in a supplement. This general 
statement was published in both English 
and German, and showed that over $10,- 
000,000 had already been paid out for the 
furnishings of the court house and 
armories. The innnediate result was a 
mass meeting of the leading citizens in 
Cooper Union, and the appointment of the 
famous " Connnittee of Seventy," with 
whom Samuel J. Tilden acted most 
energetically, though cluurman of the 
Democratic State Committee. Seeing 
that the storm was not going to blow over, 
the other members of the ring undertook 
to make a scapegoat of Connolly. But he 
vigorously protested, refusing as he said to 
be oifered as a " vicarious sacrifice," and 
hastened to make ti>rms with ]\[r. Tilden. 
At the latter's suggestion Connolly ap- 
pointed Andrew IT. Green, a leading mem- 
ber of the Committee of Seventy, his 
deputy with full powers, a course provided 
for in the city charter. The committee 
now had complete access to all the records 
and accounts in the controller's office. Un- 
fortunately, however, after the storm broke 
the ring's servants burned over thirty-five 
hundred of the most compromising vouch- 
ers, so that it was with difficulty that the 
connnittee gathered legal evidence. 

Meanwhile Tweed's hold on the people 
was manifested in many ways. It was 
during the winter of 1870-71 that, partl.v 
to ease his conscience, as was surmised, 
and partly to pose as a philanthropist, he 
gave to each of the Aldermen $1,000 to be 
\ised in buying coal and wood for the poor 
of his ward; and among the needy in his 



own ward he distributed $50,000. "When, 
therefore, charges began to be made 
against his honesty a ci-y went up from 
thousands in protest and the general re- 
frain was " Oh ! but he was so good to the 
poor.'' Moreover the New Y'ork Sun 
seriously proposed in March, 1871, that a 
statue should be erected to Tweed, an 
idea which his adherents immediately 
seized upon, and $8,000 was raised in a 
\-ery short time. But Tweed emphatically 
declined the honor, and published a letter 
in the Sun discountenancing the project. 
This was printed in the Sun of March 14, 
1871, imder the bold heading 

"A Great Man's Modesty 

" The Hon. Wm. M. Tweed declines the 
Sun's Statue — Characteristic letter from 
the great New York Philanthropist — lie 
ibinks that virtue should be its own re- 
ward — The most remarkable letter ever 
written by the noble benefactor of the 
people." 

For the fall election of 1871 Tweed 
midertook to make the fight of his life, 
believing that if he succeeded it would be 
taken as a vindication of his course and 
eliaracter. With the other members of the 
ring he affected an air of unconcern re- 
garding the disclosures; and when ques- 
tioned as to the charges made his famous 
ici)ly, "What you going to do about it?" 
Sooner than he anticipated, however, he 
received a very practical and positive 
answer to his query. The exposures al- 
ready made had so aroused the public con- 
science that all the forces outside of Tam- 
many Hall united in an effort to over- 
throw the dominance of that organization. 
During the excitement of the campaign, 
on Oetober 26th, Tweed was arrested on 
the affidavit of Samuel J. Tilden, and held 
to bail in the sum of $1,000,000. This was 
speedily furnished, and Tammany at once 
undertook to make capital from the 
" hounding of Tweed." The result of the 
election was a sweeping victory for the 
entire citizens' ticket. But one Tammany 
candidate for the Senate was elected, and 
that was the " boss" himself, who received 
over nine thousand majority. 

But the snell was now broken and the 



THE TWEED KING — 187G. 



381 



L-ollapse of the ring was sudden and com- 
plete. On November 25th, Connollj' was 
arrested and placed under $1,000,000 bail ; 
and being unable or declining to furnish 
this he was sent to jail. In October the 
subcommittee of the Committee of 
Seventy, which had been appointed to 
examine the books of the controller's office, 
reported among other things that $3,- 
200.000 had been paid for repairs on 
armories and drill-rooms, the actual cost 
of which was less than $250,000; that 
over $11,000,000 had been charged for out- 
lays on the unfinished court house, the 
entire cost of which, on an honest esti- 
mate, would be less than $3,000,000; that 
safes, carpets, furniture, cabinet-work, 
painting, ijlumbing, gas and ijlastering 
had cost $7,289,486, the real value of which 
was found to be $624,180; that $400,000 
had been paid for lumber worth $48,000; 
that the printing, advertising, stationery, 
etc., of the city had cost in two years and 
eight months, $7,168,212. etc. It was on 
the basis of this showing that Tweed had 
been arrested, and on January 30, 1873, 
he was tried, the jury disagreeing. lie 
was again tried and found guilty on 
ninety out of one hundred and twenty 
counts, and sentenced fo BlackiveU's 
island for twelve years, and to pay a 
fine of $12,000. Anticipating his release 
by the Supreme Court on a technicality 
the Committee of Seventy secured the 
passage of a special bill by the legislature 
authorizing the people to institute a 
special civil suit against Tweed. Accord- 
ingly when set free on his appeal, he was 
at ones arrested in a new suit for $6,- 
000,000 under the Sijecial Act, and bail 
was fixed at $3,000,000. Not being able 
to secure this he lay in prison until De- 
cember 4th. when, while visiting his home 
in the custody of two keepers, he was 
allowed to escape. This privilege he after- 
wards testified cost him $60,000. Fleeing 
from place to place he was finally arrested 
at Vigo, in the North of Spain, and re- 
turned to the United States in the warship 
Vranllin, reaching New Yoi'k November 
23, 1876. In one of the civil suits judg- 
ment had been given against him for 



$6,000,000. Confessing this he was sent 
to jail until he should be able to satisfy it. 
No pei-sonal property of his could be 
found on which levy could be made. Dur- 
ing his trial Tweed stated that he was 
never worth more than $3,000,000, and 
that he had recklessly thrown his money 
away. As soon as his star began to de- 
cline, he was set upon by all his old 
henchmen and unmercifully blackmailed. 

'■ Yesterday, Cresar might have stood 
against the world ; 
Now none so poor as to do him rever- 
ence." 

Deserted by all his political associates 
and most of his friends, disgraced, with 
the memoi-y of his crimes as his only com- 
panion, he lingered in Ludlow street jail 
until released by death on April 12, 1878. 
By failures of juries to convict, and by 
various compromises, all the other mem- 
bers of the ring escaped punishment, and 
went into exile in Europe. 

Thus ended the Tweed Ring, the most 
infamous and most successful band of 
tliieves that ever plundered a great city. 
The fame of the ring and its spectacular 




THE TOMBS. 



ending spread throughout the world, and 
Tammany became a by-word and reproach 
among all civilized peoples. But — that 
was all ! It is doubtful whether any other 
political organization could have survived 
the exposures made. But Tammany has 
a charmed life ! It has been overthrown, 
crushed, paralyzed, wiped out of exist- 
ence, time and time again, only to revive 
before the next election, and probably 
o\-erthrow the very reform organizations 
that defeated it two or four vears before. 



382 



FROM COLOXY TO WOliLD I'OWEK. 



For one hundred years it has continued 
this very existence, and the defeats as well 
as the victories are taken simijly as a part 
of the ga]ne. It is easy to hold up one's 
hands in horror at the suggestion of Tam- 
many; and its name has become a synonym 
for greed and plmider in municipal ailairs. 
But it should not be forgotten that every 
large city in the country has, and has had, 
its Tammany. Except in the few years 
of the ascendency of the Tweed ring, the 
role of Tammany has been no worse than, 
generally not so bad as, that of the Re- 
publican ring which has held the city of 
Philadelphia and the State of Pennsyl- 
vania by the throat for the past forty 



years. The scandals connected with the 
building of the new eapitol at Harrisburg 
ivcently exposed are identical with those 
connected with the building of the court 
house in Tweed's time, even down to the 
minutest details; while in Chicago, St^ 
Louis, Cincinnati, San Francisco, — where- 
ever the searchlight of investigation has 
been turned on, the same rottenness in 
municipal government has been exi^osed. 
The government of its cities is one of 
the most serious questions that confronts 
the American peoi>le ; and unless some 
solution shall be found, the very existence 
of the nation is imj)erilled. 



XL. 

NEW FORMS OF RELIGIOUS ACTIVITY.- YOUNG PEOPLE'S 
SOCIETY OF CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR — 1S8L 



Recent Organizations of Young People Into Immense Societies. — Meaning of Such Movements. 

— Dr. Hale and the Lend-a-Hand Clubs. — ilottoes of the Clubs. — Mrs. Bottome and the 
King's Daughters. — An Outgrowtli of the Lend-a-Hand ilnvenient. — Rapid Growth of Order. 

— Changed to " International Order of the King's Daughters and Sons." — Rev. F. E. Clark 
as a Pastor. — Origin of Young People's Societ.y of Christian Endeavor. — Its First Elect- 
ing. — Dr. Clark's Statement of Results. — October. 1S84, Mure Tlian 150 Societies Witli 
Upwards of Eight Thousand ilembers. — Incorporation of United Societj' of Cliristian En- 
deavor, 1885. — Mighty Force Toward Christian Unity. — Organizations not Denominational 
but Interdenominational. — Third World's Convention at Geneva, Switzerland, in 1906 — 
Sixty-four Thousand Societies Reported; Close to Four Million Members. — Withdrawal of 
Methodists and Baptists in 1891. — The Epworth League Strictly Denominational and L'nder 
Control of Church. — Organization of Baptist Young People's Union the Same Year. — Edu- 
cational Features of Later Societies. — Tlie Brotlierhood of St. Andrew, Organized October, 
1886. — "Object" and "Rules" of the Society. — The Rule of Prayer and Rule of Service. 
— ^ Contrast of Working of These Societies With That of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciations. — A Mighty Power For tlie L'plifting of All Peoples. 



" Whatever makes men good Christians makes them good citizens." 

— Daniel Webster. 




XE of the distinctive developments in tlie evolution of the 
-ueial and religious life of the last half century has been 
the rapid organization of young people into immense 
societies, both within and without the Church. Fifty years 
ago elderly men and women were still regarded as import- 
ant factors in the orderly arrangement and working of 
human and divine institutions and movements; and, to 
claim the least, the adage " Old men for counsel, young 
men for action " was recognized as voicing the precepts 
of wisdom, as well as the results of a wide and varied pop- 
ular experience. But between the association of the youth 
of the land into societies that have either assumed, or had thrust upon them, so large 
a share in the direction and working out of all social and religious movements, and 
the dictum of Science, as voiced by Dr. Osier, that the only proper course for those 
who have passed middle life is either to resignedly submit themselves to the heads- 
man's axe, or enter a home for the aged, there seems now little left for the counselors 
of old but to quietly take their scats in the grand stand, and admiringly, and without 
criticism, watch the progress of the game. Whether the change simply represents 
the extreme swing of the pendulum in one direction, or the young giant shall main- 



384 



FKOM COLOXY TO WORLD POWEK. 



tain his control, remains to be seen. But 
whatever the outcome, the movement is a 
most interesting: one. and demands seri- 
ous consideration. That the plasticity of 
mind and enthusiasm of youth were too 
■nuch neglected until very recently, no 
thoughtful person will deny. It is but 
little more than a centui? since the first 
Sunday School was organized by Robert 
Raikes. and the Young Men's Christian 
Association has but recently passed its 
lialf-century mark; while within the last 
forty years probably not less than ten mil- 
lions of young people have been banded 
together in different great societies, in- 
spired by a common purpose and desire to 




REV. EDW.^HD EYEHETT H.\LE, D.D. 

cultivate a higher life among themselves 
and, by united effort, to bring others to 
share in the advantages they are dei-iving 
from such union. It is evident, therefore, 
that a tremendous force which, a century 
ago. was ignored or carefully and studi- 
ously restrained, has now^ been set free, 
which, if wisely directed, must work 
mightily for the spread of righteous 
thought and righteous action. It is not 
our purpose to make any attempt to 
measure the successes or mistakes that 
have attended this revolution, but simply 
to outline briefly the origin, aim. and 
growth of some of its leading forces. 



When, in 1S70, the Rev. Dr. Eilward 
Everett Hale sent his little book " Ten 
Times One Is Ten " out into the world, he 
had little idea how many thousands of his 
readers were really waiting for some an- 
nouncement of a " Lend-a-TIand " gospel. 
But the immediate and spontaneous re- 
sponse to his thought proved that he had 
struck a chord whose vibration has 
brought good cheer, help, and comfort 
1() millions. " Lend-a-IIand " clubs and 
" Ten Times One " clubs were at once or- 
ganized in many places; and the noble 
father of the movement was soon buried 
under the avalanche of letters from 
earnest incjuirers who sought guidance or 
advice as to the best form for such organ- 
izations to take, and the most promising 
lines along which to direct their work. 
The first " Lend-a-IIand " club was 
formed in Boston in 1870, and it largely 
took over the work of directing the move- 
ment, under Dr. Hale's wise supervision. 
Xo effort was made to unite the many 
scattered clubs into one central society, 
but it was advised that each individual 
I lub should organize as it preferred, 
choose its own name, make its own consti- 
tution, and select its own work. The only 
common basis for thought and work was 
embodied in the great principles of Eaith, 
Hope and Love, which were expressed in 
the mottoes : 

"Look up and not down; (Faith) 
Look forward and not back; (Hope) 
Look out and not in ; 
and lend a hand" (Love). 
From the first, the general advice as to 
organization was summed up tersely in the 
suggestion "Go as you please. — oiih/ go." 
But in every case it was urged that each 
society should have for one of its objects 
the uplifting of some i^erson, neighbor- 
hood, or institution outside the club itself. 
In 1874 a " Look ITp Legion " was formed 
at Chautauqua, which gave occasion to 
Dr. Hale and his fellow workers to pub- 
lish successive circulars, which soon gave 
place to a " Journal of Organized Benefi- 
cence," entitled " Leud-a-IIand." As the 
number of clubs multiijlied rapidly 



NEW FORMS OF EELIGIOUS ACTIVITY. 



^85 



through the country a central organiza- 
tion became a necessity; and in Novem- 
ber, 1891, "The Ten Times One" cor- 
poration was formed. This action, how- 
ever, did not involve the abridgment of 
the independence of any local societies, 
but simply established a general clearing' 
liouse for work, and a legal depository 
f(jr any property of the central society. 
The badge of the " Lend-a-hand " clubs is 
tlie ^Maltese cross; and their watchword, 
" In His Name." But in these matters, 
as in all others, each individual club de- 
cides whether it will adopt one, or both, 
or neither. In all the jaarent society's 
work the desire has been not to suggest 
liow individual societies shall work, or go, 
— Ijut simply to inspire the impulse to 
work and go in some way, " In His 
Name." 

One of the earliest results of the 
'"' Lond-a-IIand " movement was the 
formation in New York of an independ- 
ent organization which first took the name 
of " The King's Daughters." The secre- 
tary of the club later wrote to Dr. Hale: 
" In October, 1885, I went to Mrs. Bot- 
tome (wife of Rev. Dr. F. Bottome), who 
received the outline of the ' Sisterhood ' 
wliich you sent with enthusiasm. I read 
' Ten Times One ' before her class in her 
husband's church to-night. She is carried 
away with it." As a result ten women 
met at the home of Mrs. Bottome on Jan- 
uary 1.3, 1886, and organized a " Ten," 
adopting the four mottoes Of the " Lend- 
a-IIand " clubs quoted above, the watch- 
word " In His Name," and the silver 
Maltese cross as their badge. This move- 
ment proved very contagious, while the 
character and special gifts of the mem- 
bers of the original " Ten " constituted 
it a natural centre for counsel and co-o]i- 
eration. They wisely, however, guarded 
against governing too much, " disclaiming 
any purpose to control any circle in its 
choice of a field." In 1887. " after urgent 
requests, membership in the order was 
opened to men and boys," and the cor- 
porate title was changed to " The Inter- 
national Order of the King's Daughters 
and Sons." Early in the histoi-y of the 



sisterhood a " Declaration of Independ- 
ence " was issued, which distinctly cir- 
cumscribed its field. Among other things 
this declaration said : " In answer to the 
repeated (jucstion that comes to us, ' Do 
you belong in any way to the other 




MES. MARGARET BOTTOME. 

" Ten," " Lend-a-Hand " clubs, " Look Up 
Legions," etc.?' we desire to clearly state 
that we have no connection with any other 
orders whatsoever. The Daughters of the 
King recognize that they are indebted to 
these friends for admirable suggestions, 
which they have thankfully adopted. Ours 
is distinctly a spiritual organization, based 
on strictly evangelical principles. Our 
foundation is Jesus Christ, our Lord, in 
whose atonement we rely for salvation, 
and by whose power, and in whose name, 
and to whose glory, all our work is done." 
This declaration of dogmatic orthodoxy 
was, however, modified later by an official 
announcement that the order " demanded 
no uniformity in choice of labors. It de- 
clined to make of its central council a 
board of examiners into the theological 
views of its members. It had no right to 



3S6 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



question tlie love of those who accepted a 
call to commit themselves to labor for 
His sake and in His name. It did not 
found a church. It only summoned 
women to greater and sweeter service, in 
and beyond their own churches." The 
constitution of the order provides for cir- 
cles, chapters of circles, and State sec- 
retaryships, under the general direction 
and advice of the central council, with 
which they are expected to keep in close 
correspondence. " In the development of 
the idea the direction specially empha- 
sized is: first, the heart; next, the home; 
then the church; and after that the great 
outside." The growth of the order was 
niarvelous, and at the end of the first dec- 
ade of its history the original " Ten " 
had become more than four hundred thou- 
sand, with circles in nearly every coun- 
try on the globe. " Hardly any class," 
states one of the official reports, " has been 
forgotten in its ministrations. Among 
the poor and the sick, in hospitals and 
jails, among the victims of flood, and fire, 
and disease, the little cross has gone with 
its loving service. Special interest has 
always been shown in the care of the aged 
and little children. And the distinctly 
educational work in scliool and college 
extension by correspondence among mem- 
bers of the order has no insignificant 
place among the varied activities of the 
King's Daughters and Sons." Tlie otfice 
of the Central Council is in New York 
city, where is published the official paper 
of the order, "The Silver Cross." The 
present total membership of the order is 
estimated at about half a million. 

In the j'ear ISsl the young ami earnest 
pastor of a new and aggressive church in 
the city of Portland, Me., conceived the 
not very novel idea of interesting his 
young people in the active work of the 
church. This young man had not out- 
grown the old-fashioned idea of revivals 
as a feature of the church life, nor 
did he fear the evil of enthusiasm which 
it is now proper to deprecate. As was not 
wholly luicommon in those days in evan- 
gelical churches, he believed that the 
i^taled week of praj'er should bring re- 



sults ; and so successfully had he inocu- 
lated his iseople with the same idea, that 
during each of the years of his service 
the exijected, — not the unexpected, — had 
happened, and the church had been 
blessed with a period of pronounced re- 
ligious awakening, as a result of which 
many people, and especially many young 
people, had been brought into the church 
fold. It was just toward the close of such 
a period in the spring of 1881 that the 
Rev. F. E. Clark was anxiously stud.ving 
liow the full force of enthusiasm engen- 
dered by the revival might be made a per- 
manent asset in the character of the new 
converts, as well as of enduring benefit to 
the whole church. As a step in this direc- 
tion he invited forty or fifty of the young 
people to meet at his house, that in a 
social way he might stimulate their zeal, 
and thinking that perhaps together some 
helpful plan might be worked out. But 
uiKJU the day of the meeting he hit upon 
tlie idea of a pernuinent organization of 
file young people into a society whose 
constitution should bind each signer to 
certain collective and individual effort ; 
luid at what seemed the psychological 
nninient. after a pleasant entertainment 
and during a social talk, he presented the 
proposition to his young guests for their 
consideration. The document which he 
had prepared provided for the formation 
of the Williston Young People's Society 
of Christian En<leavor, "Williston" be- 
ing the name of the local church. Its 
proposed object was " to promote an 
earnest Christian life among its members, 
to increase their mutual acquaintance, 
and to make them more useful in the 
service of Ood.'' But it was to the prayer 
meeting that the constitution looked as 
the pivotal point in the whole scheme, and 
its most important clause relating to it 
read as follows: " It is expected that all 
active members of the society will be 
l^resent at every meeting, unless detained 
by some absolute necessity, and that each 
one will take some part, however slight, 
in every meeting." This article further 
provided that once each month an " ex- 
perience meeting " (this was later called 



NEW FOKMS OF EELIGIOUS ACTIVITY. 



.SST 



a " consecration meeting ") should be 
hold, " at which each member shall speak 
concerning his progress in the Christian 
life for the past month. If anyone 
chooses he can express his feelings by an 
appropriate verse of Scripture." It was 
still further provided that at the close of 
each monthly experience meeting, " the 
loll shall be called, and the response of the 
active members who are present shall be 
considered a renewed expression of alle- 
giance to Christ." A look-out committee 
vias appointed to follow up any who ab- 
sented themselves from the experience 
meetings ; and if any member persisted in 
such absences for three successive months, 
without suiBcient excuse, his name was 
dropped from the roll. Brief as this state- 
ment is, it embodies all the principles of 
the constitutions of the thousands of so- 
cieties that have since been formed in all 
parts of the world. When the proposition 
was first laid before the young people of 
the Williston church by Dr. Clark it 
rather terrified them, as it seemed as if 
they were covenanting to perform more 
than they might have the grace to execute. 
But after a little deliberation one leader 
signed, and then in turn all present affixed 
their names and the greatest religious or- 
ganization of young people the world has 
ever known was born. Dr. Clark has told 
ns with what anxiety he attended the first 
prayer meeting after the organization of 
the society to see how the young people 
realized the character of their undertak- 
ing. " The result," he says, " was that, 
instead of three or four little sermonettes 
and long prayers which had heretofore 
filled the hour of the young people's meet- 
ing, forty young people, more or less, with 
Scripture verses and sentences of prayer, 
and some of the more experienced with 
longer testimonies or exhortation, were 
heard in the precious and prophetic sixty 
minutes devoted to the first genuine 
Christian Endeavor prayer meeting." And 
he adds: "But this meeting, though the 
first, was by no means the last of the 
series, nor was it the best; for each suc- 
cessive meeting seemed to grow in in- 
terest and power. Numbers increased 



rapidly, young men and women who never 
thought of going to a prayer meeting be- 
fore were attracted to this one, and when 
they came once they came again." After 
a thorough test of the plan for about six 
montlis Dr. Clark felt that its efficiency 
was so well established that he wrote of 
his experiment and its results to " The 
Congregationalist " under the caption 
" How One Church Looks After Its 
Young People." This letter was copied in 
the " Sunday School Times " and other 
religious papers; and thus the idea was 
successfully launched and started on its 
world-wide career. The second society 
formed was in the fall of the same year, 
in Newburyport, Mass., and before the 
end of 1881 societies had been formed in 
a Rhode Island and a Vermont church, 
and in another of the Portland churches. 
Our space does not permit of our follow- 
ing the interesting development of the 



■ 






1 


H 




w 


aJI 


P^ 






1 


K^^H 






1 



REV FRANCIS E. CL.iuis. 

young organization; and it is, moreover, 
so well known that it is hardly necessary. 
SuflSce it to say that even at the third 
annual convention in October, 1884, one 
hundred and fifty-six societies were re- 
ported, with an active membership of 



388 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



8,005, and that among tlie number were 
societies in China, India, and Hawaii. 

In 1885 the need of incorporation hav- 
ing become manifest the " United Society 
of Christian Endeavor " was organized, 
M-ith headquarters at Boston; and in 1886 
the oificial paper of the society, " The 
Golden Eule," was first published, on 
October 7. In 1898 its name was changed 
to the " Christian Endeavor World." At 
the sixth annual convention, held at Sar- 
atoga, N. Y., in 1887, the Eev. Erancis E. 
Clark, the father of the movement, was 
elected president of the United Society, 
resigning his pastorate shortly after to 
give his entire attention to Endeavor 
work. Dr. Clark has visited every coun- 
try of the world, practically, establishing 
new societies and stimulating the energies 
of those already organized ; and the so- 
ciety's literature is now published in 
about fifty distinct languages and dialects. 
In 1906 the twenty-fifth anniversary of 
the society's organization was observed in 
all parts of the world, meetings of special 
importance being held at Portland, Bos- 
ton, Xew York, and W^ashington, in the 
United States. The second European, 
and the third World's Convention, was 
also held that year at Geneva, in Switzer- 
land, at which ovei- 61,000 societies, with 
a membership of about 4,000.000, were re- 
ported. On February :iS, 1909, President 
Clark issued a birthday message to the 
members of the society, in the course of 
which he said: "To-day, on the 28th 
birthday of Christian endeavor, we find 
more than 71,000 societies, in practically 
every land on the face of the earth. Here 
is the inspiring list: Africa 503; Ar- 
gentina 1; Australia 2,926; Austria 9; 
Barbardos 3; Belgiinn 2; Bermuda 8; 
Bohemia 7; Brazil 93; British Guiana 
11 ; Bulgaria 11 ; Burmah 15 ; Canada 
3.669; Caroline Islands 4; Chili 7; China 
391; Colombia 6; Coeta Rica 10; Crete 4; 
Cuba 44; Denmark 2; Dutch Guiana 1; 
Egypt 17; Ellice Islands 9; England 
11,550; Fiji Islands 1; Finland 31; For- 
mosa 1; France 141; Germany 400; Gib- 
raltar 3; Gilbert Islands 4; Greece 4; 



Grenada, West Indies, 2; Guatemala 3; 
Ilaj-ti 1; Hawaiian Islands 54; Holland 
1 ; Hungary 23 ; Iceland 1 ; India 850 ; 
Ireland 339; Italy 15; Jamaica, West In- 
dies, 259; Japan 147; Korea 12; Labrador 
1 ; Laos 29 ; Lapland 1 ; Loyalty Islands 
25; Madagascar 93; Madeira Islands 1; 
ilarshall Islands 21; Mauritius 1; Mexico 
133; Newfoundland 2; New Hebrides 1; 
Norway 26; Palestine 5; Panama 5; 
Persia 65 ; Philippine Islands 6 ; Portugal 
4; Porto Rico 7; Russia 49; Samoa 42; 
Scotland 597 ; Siam 2 ; Spain 63 ; Sweden 
374; Switzerland 24; Syria 19; Tokelau 
Islands 3; Trinidad, W^est Indies, 21; 
Turkey 62; United States 46,324; Wales 
460,— total 71,064." 

In 1888, at the Chicago Convention, the 
society adopted the motto : " Not to be 
ministered unto, but to minister;" and 
its badge is a monogram made up of the 
letters " C " and " E." 

A most promising feature of the earlier 
history of the Christian Endeavor Society 
was its attitude toward denominational- 
ism. It is not many years since the de- 
\'Out Methodist, or Baptist, or Congrega- 
tionalist looked upon members of the 
other sects as irretrievably lost unless they 
abandoned their peculiar tenets and 
adopted those of the observer. But the 
Christian Endeavor Society claimed from 
the beginning to be not undenominational 
but i«<e7'denominational. Its theory was 
that each society, under normal condi- 
tions, belongs to some church, and exists 
to strengthen that particular church in 
every way. Moreover similar societies, 
actuated by the same motives, exist in a 
nudtitude of difi'erent churches, and in 
many denominations, to do the same serv- 
ice loyally for each church and each de- 
nomination. The general society unre- 
servedly encouraged in each local society 
the liveliest zeal for the sect to which the 
church in which it existed belonged. Then 
it sought to bring together on terms of 
kindly fraternization and fellowship, in 
general and convention assemblies, those 
strongly differentiated societies. This was 
a most attractive and Christian plan to 



NEW FOKMS OF KELIGIOUS ACTIVITY. 



bring the denominations into more liar- 
monious relations, and to break down 
dividing walls. For several years the 
scheme worked well, and great results 
were being acliieved. As one has said, 
" In the annually increasing conventions 
of the united societies the fervid m.utual 
fellowship of societies attached individ- 
ually to many differing and almost an- 
tagonistic sects was to many generous 
minds an inspiring sight, conveying the 
Ijru))hecy and the earnest of the manifold 
iniity of the church of Christ." But this 
spirit of fraternity was not in harmony 
with the thought of older members of 
some of the denominations, who consid- 
ered sectarian exclusiveness more funda- 
mental and vital than Christian fellow- 
ship. The result was that the Methodist 
and Baptist churches soon counseled the 
union of all their societies within the lines 
of their sectarian bodies. 

In May, 1891, a meeting of representa- 
tives of five different organizations of 
young people within the Methodist Church 
M-as held at Cleveland, Ohio, with the re- 
sult that it was determined to cons(jlidate 
their various societies under a general or- 
ganization to be known as the Epworth 
League, taking its name from the birth- 
place of the founder of Methodism, John 
Wesley. The Christian Endeavor Society 
started with units of the individual 
church societies, which were later drawn 
together by natural development into the 
larger associations. The Epworth League, 
on the contrary, started with a central or- 
ganization under whose direction all in- 
dividual societies should be formed. This 
central organization adopted a constitu- 
tion which was to be the type for all the 
constitutions of subsidiary societies. The 
executive body in the main, society is the 
"Board of Control;" and immediately 
after its organization in 1889 this board 
sent out a ringing call to all young peo- 
ple's societies of the church to unite under 
its banner. The call was, " To Your 
Tents, O Israel ; " and was sent to all 
Christian Endeavor Societies in the Meth- 
odist Episcopal Church, virtually instruct- 



ing them to reconstitute themselves under 
the denominational order. " The Epwortli 
League," the call stated, " has its origin 
in the conviction that the various young- 
people's societies of the church should be 
united in one organization. Its scheme of 
work has been made large enough to com- 
prehend all forms of Christian activity. 
We therefore recommend that all literary, 
social, and religious societies of young 
people now in existence in our church 
merge into the Epwortli League, and that 
every such society continue its special 
work through tliat department of the 
league under which it would properly 
fall." This organization lacks all the demo- 
cratic features that were so attractive 
in the earlier society, and exists within 
hard and fast lines which are determined 
by the controlling society and the general 
church government. The board of control 
is presided over by one of the bishops of 
the church, and is made up of five min- 
isters and nine laymen appointed by the 
bishops and of fourteen other members 
each elected by one of the Conference Dis- 
tricts. The response to the call of the 
board of control was immediate and ef- 
fective, so that in 1897 it could report 
an enrollment of 24,000 chapters, with a 
membership of 1,650,000. The headquar- 
ters of the board of control are in Chi- 
cago, and the official publication is " The 
Epworth Herald." The motto of the 
league is: "Look up: Lift up!" and its 
membership at the present time is approx- 
imately 2,000,000. 

In 1891 representative members of the 
Baptist Church met in conference at Phil- 
adelphia and put forth over their signa- 
tures a document which was sent broad- 
cast among the Baptist churches entitled 
" A General Basis of Organization," 
whose preamble reads as follows : " The 
undersigned, cognizant of the fact that 
there is a widespread desire for a more 
thorough organization of the young peo- 
ple of the Baptist churches for indoc- 
trination in distinctive Baptist principles, 
and instruction in Baptist history; for 
more effective service in the local 



390 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



churches; for a better acquaintanceship 
among our young people; for the better 
pushing of all mission work — domestic, 
home and foreign — suggest the following 
basis of organization." It will be ob- 
served that this plan provides for educa- 
tional features which were not so clearly 
announced in the preliminary statements 
of the earlier general societies. This 
feature was implied in the formal plans of 
the Epworth League, and has since been 
made a more pronounced characteristic of 
its work. Both of these later denomina- 
tional societies had the advantage of sev- 
eral years' experience in the working of 
the principles of the Christian Endeavor 
societies, and so were able to outline or- 
ganizations that seemed more in hannony 
with the individual denominational needs. 
Regular courses of study have been im- 
portant features in the work of the Bap- 
tist societies, and have proved both at- 
tractive and helpful. The result of the 
Philadelphia conference was the organ- 
ization of the "Baptist Young People's 
Union," whose relation to local societies 
is much the same as that of the United 
Society of Christian Endeavor to its in- 
dividual chapters. The headquarters of 
the Baptist Union are also at Chicago. 
and its official organ is " The Baptist 
Union." The watchword of the union is 
"Loyalty to Christ." 

The Episcopal Church has never affil- 
iated with the Evangelical churches, and 
so was without the range of the influence 
of the Christian Endeavor movement. It 
could hardly happen, however, that a 
church which manifests so much interest 
in young men, esi^ecially in the cities, 
should fail to be influenced by the spirit 
of organization that was everywhere in 
the atmosphere. We are not, therefore, 
surprised to find that in October, 1880, the 
representatives of twenty local societies 
that had been formed in as many parishes, 
in different regions, met in Chicago and 
firganized a general " Brotherhood of St. 
Andrew." This brotherhood has de- 
veloped from a loosely tied band of church 



guilds into an order of laymen in the 
Protestant Episcopal Church, divided, for 
local work and administration, into pa- 
rochial chapters. As might be expected, 
this organization is mucli more con- 
servative in its activities than any of 
the other societies that have been de- 
scribed, and rather discourages the es- 
tablishment of new chapters until the 
evident need has become manifest. It has, 
however, had a steady growth, and now 
has a membership of about 20,000. The 
headquarters of the Brotherhood are in 
New York city, where the official organ, 
" The St. Andrew's Cross " is published. 
There are two Brotherhood badges; one, 
a St. Andrew's cross of gold and red 
enamel, and the other a black silk button 
with a red St. Andrew's cross woven on 
its face. 

This brief description of the aims and 
purposes of the leading organizations of 
young people within the churches will give 
a general idea of the magnitude of the 
movement. That it has worked miglitily in 
stimulating an interest in religious work 
can hardly be doubted. Enthusiasm i:i 
contagious, but its heat can only be main- 
tained in a social atmosphere. For many 
years the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciations had centred the interest of the 
young men, at least, outside the churches, 
necessarily weakening their power for 
good. The various organizations de- 
scribed above, however, have all tended to 
revive the love of all the young ix>ople for 
their individual church homes, which has 
served in a marked way to quicken the re- 
ligious activities of such churches and en- 
rich their social life. No imagination can 
picture the possible effects of the more or 
less close union of eight or ten million 
youths inspired with a common purpose 
and a common hope; and though all the 
ideals set up may not be realized, it is a 
happy prophecy for the uplifting of all 
peoples that such a potent influence looks 
toward righteousness and social better- 
ment alone. 



XLI, 

THE FEDERATION OF LABOR — LABOR ORGANIZATIONS 

1881. 



Ideal Relation of Capital and Labor. — Actual Conditions. — Labor of Earliest Historical 
Times. — Origin of Slavery. — Conditions in Greece and Rome. — Change from Slavery to 
Serfdom. — Gradual Acquisition of Riglits of Freemen by Serfs. — Influence of Wyclif and 
His Itinerant Preachers. — Conditions in England in Eighteenth Century. — Unions of 
Laboring ilen Organized. — Early Labor Situation in United States. — First Organizations 
and Their Weakness. — Individual Versus Collective Bargaining. — The Weakness of the 
Labor Unit. — John Mitchell's Description of the Trade Union and Its Purposes. — Flexibility 
of L'nion Organizations. — The Knights of Labor. — '"That is the Host Perfect Government 
in Which Injur}' to One is the Concern of All." — The Federation of Organized Trades and 
Labor Unions of the United States and Canada. — Importance of Federative Principle. — 
General Position of Unions as to Strikes and Boycotts. — Evil Results to All Unions of 
Political Alliances. — Present Status of Federation of Labor; 1,500,000 Paying Members. — 
Organization of Employers' Unions. — "The Citizens' Industrial Association of America." — • 
Statement of Its Principles. — Reactionary Position of Its Leaders. — "Labor Has No 
Rights Capital is Bound to Respect."— The Twentieth Century Spirit Will Not Tolerate 
Reactionary Measures. — The Riglits of All, Labor, Capital, and the Public Must be 
Considered. — " Xo Man Liveth to Himself Alone." — End to be Aimed at is Peace. 



" When labor quarrels with capital, or capital neglects the interests of labor, it is like the hand thinking 
it docs not need the eye, the ear, or the brain." — jAMliS Freeman Clakke. 




N Oriental legend tells of a species of birds of great size 
and strength, whose natural habitat was the clear air of 
the loftiest mountains and the invigorating atmosphere 
of the highest heavens. Yet they were so formed that by 
union alone could they rise. The male bird was equipped 
with a powerful right wing; but in the place of a wing on 
the left side, he had only a hook-like joint. Conversely 
the female bird had a strong wing on the left side, while 
from her right side protruded a joint prepared to fit that 
on the left side of her male companion. United they could 
soar to the loftiest heights, and revel in the most luxurious airs; separated, they 
floundered and groveled in forest and in s\\ amps, — " useless each, without the other." 
It would seem difficult to illustrate better the relations that should exist between 
liibor and capital. Yet from the dawn of history to this year of our Lord, 1909, 
one has refused to recognize the power of friendly union by which the greatest 
good for both could be attained; and yielding willing submission to those birth- 
marks of the bestial nature of the race, — Greed and Avarice, — long and weary 
centuries of injustice, mutual hostility, and angry defiance have been endured, until 



392 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



to-ilay, as all through the ages, these 
giant forces that, working in harmony, 
should make for civilization and right- 
eousness, are drawn up in antagonistic 
lines, under hostile banners, moving to- 
ward the most deplorable crises, unless 
mutual concession and wise legislation 
shall lead them to see the power for their 
own good and for that of all mankind 
that lies in their cordial union. 

Students of the life of primitive men 
agree that as far back as our evidence 
goes the individual was an independent 
unit in all his relations. He supported 
himself and female associate and their off- 
spring by hunting and fishing, while the 
woman in a crude way reared the children, 
prepared their food, and fastened together 
the skins for clothing. Later, as individ- 
iials allied themselves together in families, 
or village communities, or tribes, the 
stronger unions began to prey upon the 
weaker, and war became common. The 
family or tribe that conquered its neigh- 
bors at first merely seized upon their 
cattle or war implements, and killed ofi' all 
the members of the conquered tribe. But 
as the wealth of those stronger tribes or 
fanulies increased they began to realize 
that it would be a much better business 
proposition to make prisoners of their con- 
quered foes, and let the captives do all 
their work while they enjoyed the spoils 
of .victory. And thus slavery arose, the 
natural and immediate result of war, and 
its ethical principle that " Might makes 
Right." But it is essential to note that 
whatever had been their previous rela- 
tions, as the custom grew up of enslaving 
the conquered instead of killing them off, 
the conquerors came to place the captive 
in exactly the same category as the herds, 
or the spears and shields, which they had 
formerly brought home as the spoils of 
war, — simply as so much property. The 
captive ceased to be a man, a worthy foe 
or useful ally; he became a thing, a useful 
tool, and was classed with the other 
chattels. As wars became more com- 
mon, and certain tribes developed into 
powerful nations, the number of slaves 
rapidly increased. With this increase 



grew up the idea that it was ignoble 
for one of the conquering tribe or 
nation to perform any kind of labor, even 
of the most i>ersoual or trivial character; 
that was left to the slaves. So that in 
the days of the glory of Greece and of 
Rome we are hardly surprised to find tliat 
all the philosophy of their learned men 
and the theories of their statesmen are 
based upon the absolute inequality of the 
few and the many. With Plato, Aristotle, 
Cicero, Cato, the slave is such by nature; 
slavery is a political necessity, — since no 
one who labors in any way could be fit for 
citizenship. In order to have free citi- 
zens to rule the State, there must be slaves 
to support them in idleness. How often 
have our pulses throbbed more quickly and 
our enthusiasm been fired as poets and 
orators have sung and declaimed of the 
glorious liberties of Athens, and the high 
character of Athenian political life dur- 
ing the golden days of the city's history! 
But we are seldom reminded of the fact 
that these statesmen and philosophers, 
these men who " spent their time in noth- 
ing else but either to tell or to hear some 
new thing," were a most inconsiderable 
part of the total population of the city, 
probably not at any time over thirty thou- 
sand men, while an aggregate of from one 
hundred to one hundred and fifty thou- 
sand slaves supported them in this idle- 
ness. What slavery was in Rome after 
the great conquests, and what its influence 
was upon the people has been repeatedly 
told us by historians. But the significant 
fact for our present purpose is that all 
through these ages there were just two dis- 
tinctly antagonistic classes, — the idle, who 
could own or hire slaves to do their work, 
and the slaves or laborers who maintained 
their masters in idleness. While Rome 
was tottering toward her fall a new and 
life-giving element was injected into the 
situation, and that was the simple teach- 
ings of Christianity. The distinguished 
German historian and theologian, Har- 
nack, has sununed up the whole revelation 
of Jesus under two heads: (1) The 
Fatherhood of God, and its corollary, the 
brotherhood of man ; and (2) the infinite 



THE FEDEEATION OF LABOK — LABOR OEGANIZATIONS — 1881. 



value of the human soul. And the history 
of the last eighteen centuries has fully 
demonstrated that whenever the full im- 
port of this revelation has been grasped 
by any people, slavery and every form of 
tyranny has been doomed. As a result of 
the Christian Spirit and of the Teutonic 
invasions and conquests the rigors of 
slavery were greatly mitigated throughout 
Europe, and the status of the laborer was 
materially raised. EverjTvhere serfdom 
succeeded to slavery. Under its laws the 
master has no right of ownership in, nor 
of life and death over, his subject man, 
but the latter has become attached to the 
soil. He has gained a larger measure of 
personal freedom, but still is far from be- 
ing a free man. " The owner of the land," 
as a historian has said, " could not sell 
them (the serfs) nor drive them from 
their homes, nor could they, on the other 
hand, run away : if they did, the master 
could bring' them back. Generally they 
were required to pay him a i^ortion, fixed 
by law, of the product of the land which 
had been assigned to'them ; and they owed 
to him also a certain yearly amount of 
labor upon the land which he kept for his 
own purposes. The rent dues and the 
labor dues could not be increased by the 
master. Adscripfi Glehae, these laborers 
were called; they were tenants registered 
by the state, and fastened forever to the 
same spot of earth; for them there was 
no freedom of movement and )io choice 
of occupation. The serf could not marry 
a wife who belonged on another estate; 
his children were tethered to the same soil. 
The title of the property might pass from 
owner to owner, but the serf remained. 
Lords might come and lords might go. but 
he stayed on forever." This description, 
of course, applies directly to agricultural 
communities; but similar relations ex- 
isted in the cities, ilost laborers were in 
some way attached to a Master, as menials 
or retainers. This status of serfdom ob- 
tained in Europe from the fourth or fifth 
century of our era down to vai-ying periods 
in different countries from the fifteenth 
to the nineteenth centuries. For most of 
the countries it was undermined or swept 



away by the French Revolution; in Russia 
it was abolished by imperial edict in 
1S61. In England, however, its decline 
dated from the preaching of Wyclif's 
itinerant priests, in the latter part of the 
fourteenth century, who circulated his 
little tracts consisting of translations from 
the Latin Bible into the new English 
tongaie of the great truths of the brother- 
hood of men. " Wyclif's poor priests," 
says Thorold Rogers, in his ' Six Cen- 
turies of Work and Wages,' "had honey- 
t-ombed the minds of the upland folk with 
what may be called religious socialism. 
By Wyclif's labors the Bible men had been 
introduced to the New World of the Old 
Testament, to the history of the human 
race, to the primeval garden and the 
young world, where the first parents of 
all mankind lived by simple toil, and were 
the ancestors of the proud noble and 
knight, as well as the down-trodden serf 
and despised burgher. They read of the 
Ijrave time when there was no King in 
I srael, when every man did what was right 
in his own eyes, and sat under his own 
vine and fig tree, none daring to make him 
afraid." And Wyclif's disciple, John 
Ball, the " mad priest of Kent," as he was 
called, preached: "Good people, things 
will never go well in England so long as 
goods be not in common, and so long as 
there be villeins (serfs) and gentlemen. 
By what right are they whom we call 
Lords greater folk than we? On what 
grounds have they deserved it? Why do 
they hold us in serfdom? If we all came 
of the same father and mother, of Adam 
and Eve, how can they say that they are 
better than we, if it be not that they make 
us gain for them by our toil what they 
spend on their pride i They are clothed 
in velvet and warm in their furs and er- 
mines, while we are covered with rags. 
They have wine, and spices, and fair 
bread, and we eat oat-cake and straw, anrl 
water to drink. They have leisure and 
fine houses, we have pain and labor, the 
rain and the wind, in the fields. And 
yet it is of us and of our toil that these 
men hold their state." A troublesome 



394 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



leaven this to have working in the dough 
of Feudalism ! 

Of course, too, the religious reforma- 
tion of the sixteenth centui-y did much to 
elevate the status of the serf, and the slov? 
but sure abolition of the restraints of 
serfdom upon the rights of tlie mas-es of 
the people was a natural result. Freedom 
of action, freedom of contract, and the 
rights to secure and hold property were 
gradually acquired. Thus in the slow 
grinding of the " Mills of God " centuries 
of slavery gave place to other centuries 
of serfdom, — a distinct step upward, and 
bearing the seed of a better harvest; and 
after centuries of serfdom, the labor ques- 
tions of the nineteenth and twentieth cen- 
turies all unfolded, but with the parties 
to them each recognized as men. with 
equal rights before the law to life, liberty, 
and the pursuit of happiness. Such, in 
brief, has been the evolution of the Labor 
problem. From slavery to complete legal 
independence is a far reach; and though 
the higher status has been attained only 
after and through the unspeakable suffer- 
ing, misery, and wretchedness of untold 
millions of men, women, and children, 
yet the orderly development promises that 
even present conditions are but transitory, 
and that brighter days and more equal 
privileges are before all God's cliihh'cn. 
as surely as the brightness of dawn fol- 
lows the darkest hours of the night. 

Our space does not admit of any de- 
tailed reference to the mediseval guilds, 
which played no unimportant pait in the 
abolition of serfdom and the determina- 
tion of the rights of man, as man. Their 
influence was, however, powerful chiefly 
on the Continent, and affected the develop- 
ment of labor questions in England and 
the United States only indirectly. But 
as we review the whole period, covering 
more than four thousand years of recorded 
histoi-j-, the .sad .si:)ectacle is everywhere 
presented of mankind ranged in two hos- 
tile lines, the few ever exploiting the 
many; and one cannot fail to observe that 
all through the ages no point or advan- 
tage has ever voluntarily been yielded to 
the weak by the strong, but that every 



advance has been gained in the teeth of 
the bitterest opposition, through force or 
fear. The great capitalist of to-day is a 
more interesting and pleasing person to 
contemplate than the gluttonous, drunken, 
bestial owner of thousands of slaves in 
the days of Nero ; but the same contempt- 
uous indifference to the conditions and 
privileges of the many has characterized 
the policy of both. Greed, avarice, lust 
of possession are jealous masters, and 
quickly strangle any better sentiments in 
those who have once submitted themselves 
to their brutalizing rule. 

Modern labor organizations, that is, dis- 
tinctly labor organizations, are the out- 
growth of the great industrial revolution 
which began about the middle of the 
eighteenth century, and whose end no man 
can foresee. Then came in rapid succes- 
sion the great discoveries and inventions 
that revolutionized every phase of produc- 
tion and distribution. Great factories 
sprang up in certain centers, which drew 
the working people from rural communi- 
ties and massed them in towns. The 
change was attended with the most acute 
misery, and " man's inhumanity to man " 
was never more forcibly illustrated. It 
would be well for every critic of labor or- 
ganizations to read the detailed statement 
of the conditions that resulted from the 
unrestrained action of so-called economic 
laws, as they are recorded in the writings 
of students of this period. And it was not 
until the wholesale mortality among fac- 
tory and mining operatives and the threat- 
ened extinction of a large class of English 
laborers forced upon Parliament a con- 
sideration of the existing conditions, that 
the country at large awoke to the horrors 
of the situation. Nowhere in the history 
of the treatment of slaves is there such a 
record of brutal, selfish greed coining 
money out of the very life-blood of human 
beings. It was a terrible experience, but 
it demonstrated one fact beyond question, 
and that was, that through combinations 
of laborers alone could any relief be ob- 
tained; and it was under such conditions 
that labor organizations first came into 



THE FEDEEATION OF LABOR — LABOE ORGANIZATIONS — 1881. 395 



existence in Great Britain, during the lat- 
ter part of the eighteenth century. 

As the factory system developed in the 
United States, too, and mines were 
opened, similar forces began at once to 
operate. Happily here the vast area of un- 
developed country, and the many openings 
for labor, tended to mitigate the evils that 
bore so heavily upon laborers in Great 
Britain ; but the same tendencies and 
principles were operative here as there, 
and the laboring men early realized that 
through union alone could they secure any 
just and adequate return for their work. 
It was not, however, until toward the mid- 
dle of the nineteenth century that ten- 
dencies toward the union of independent 
and local organizations began to manifest 
themselves. The first quarter of that cen- 
tury hae been called the "germinal 
period," during which mention of labor 
organizations becomes more and more fre- 
quent, though there is no well-defined 
movement. The quarter of a century 
from 1825 to 1850 was a period of intel- 
lectual and political ferment all over Eu- 
rope, as well as in the United States. 
Then flourished the Transcendental Move- 
ment and the attempts at the practical ap- 
plication of the new theories of Commun- 
ism and Socialism. Reform was in the 
air. The determined opposition to the ad- 
vance of the slave power in the South was 
constantly growing, and the equal rights 
of all men were being heralded. This 
widespread phase of thought and action 
could not fail to have its effect upon the 
laboring men ; and the immediate result 
was the formation of a large number of 
loosely organized, semi-political societies, 
to whose membership unskilled laborers, 
women, farmers, and many employers were 
admitted. The most tyjiical of these organ- 
izations were perhajis the New England 
Workingmen's Association, the New Eng- 
land Protective Union, and the Industrial 
Congress of the United States. These 
Associations, which were closely allied in 
their form and laurposes, were organized 
between 1840 and 1850, died early deaths, 
and achieved little of value to anyone. 
Their mistakes, however, showed clearly 



to later organizations what must be 
avoided. These pioneer, indiscriminately 
mixed, associations dissipated all their en- 
ergies in championing women's rights, the 
nationalization of land, and the abolition 
of slavery; and with their failure ended 
the attempts to establish organizations 
upon enthusiasm, altruism, and general 
social discontent. Practical men saw the 
necessity of careful, systematic organiza- 
tion upon business principles, with clearly 
defined purposes in view, the achievement 
of which should be the sole aim of the 
society. The first of the distinctively 
national labor organizations was the In- 
ternational Typographical Union, which 
\vas organized in 1850. The next fifteen 
years was a period of nationalization ; and 
by 1866 from thirty to forty national and 
international Trade Unions were in exist- 
once, some of them numbering their mem- 
bership by tens of thousands. 

As popular notions as to Trade Unions 
are somewhat vague it would be well at 
once to get a clear idea of what such an 
organization is and what are its aims. It 
will, we think, bo generally conceded that 
no one is better fitted than John Mitchell 
to state the Union's case, and we shall 
quote from his work entitled " Organized 
Labor." " In its fundamental principle 
trade unionism is plain and clear and 
simple. Trade Unionism starts from the 
recognition of the fact that under normal 
conditions the individual, unorganized 
workman cannot bargain advantageously 
with the employer for the sale of his labor. 
Since the workingman has no money in 
reserve and must sell his labor immedi- 
ately; since, moreover, he has no knowl- 
edge of the market and no skill in 
bargaining; since, finally, he has only his 
own labor to sell, while the employer en- 
gages hundreds or thousands of men and 
can easily do without the services of any 
particular individual, the workingman, if 
bargaining on his own account and for 
himself alone, is at an enormous disad- 
vantage. Trade Unionism recognizes the 
fact that under such conditions labor be- 
comes more and more degenerate, because 
the labor which the workman sells is, un- 



39(5 



FKOM COLOXY TO WOELD POWEE. 



like other commodities, a thing wliich is 
of his very life and soul and being-. In 
the inilividual eontraet between a rirh 
employer and a poor workman, the laborer 




Copyiiijht 1'.I03 by J. E. Piirdu. Boston. 
JOHN MITCHELL. 

will seeure the worst of it ; he is jirogress- 
ivcly debased, because of wages insuffi- 
cient to buy nourishing food, because of 
hours of labor toO' long to permit sufficient 
rest, because of conditions of work de- 
structive of moral, mental, and physical 
liealth. and degrading and annihilating 
to the laboring classes of the present and 
the future; and, finally, because of danger 
from accident and disease, which kill off 
the workingnian or prematurely age him. 
The ' individual bargain,' or ' individual 
contract.' between employers and men 
means that the condition of the worst 
and lowest nnm in tile industry will be 
that which the best man must accept. 
From first to last, from beginning to end. 
always and everywhere, trade unionism 
stands unalterably opposed to the indi- 
vidual contract. Then' ran. hf tin conrrs- 
sion or yielding upon tliis point. There 



can he no permanent prosperity to the 
working classes, no real and lasting prog- 
ress, no consecutive improvement in 
conditions, iintil the ;;)"i»ctp?e is firmlij 
and fully estahUsJied, that in industrial 
life, especially in enterprises on a large 
scale, the settlement of wages, hoiirs of 
lahor, and all conditions of ivork, must he 
made helween employers and worJcingmen 
eoUeclively, and not heliueen the employ- 
ers and worlcingmen individually." 

American Unions are either local, dis- 
trict, national, or international. Local 
Tnions ordinarily represent members of 
single trades who live and work in the 
same city or small community. The 
National Union, as its name implies, 
covers the various states and localities 
where the members work at a particular 
trade; and the District Organization is a 
subdivision of a National Union, exercis- 
ing supervision over the locals in a par- 
ticular state; it is chartered by and sub- 
ordinate to the National. International 
Societies are so called because they include 
Canadian or Mexican Unions; not because 
of aifiliation of American National Or- 
ganizations with those of Europe or 
other parts of tlie world. Historically it 
is unquestionably true that the local 
union is the father of the National Union ; 
yet it is equall.v true that b,v far the 
greater majority of the local unions have 
been formed by the National Organiza- 
tion. Naturally these local bodies are ex- 
tremely democratic in their forms of gov- 
ernment, and are usually composed of 
men working at the same trade, of about 
equal wages and position in the com- 
munity, and so connected closely by ties 
of personal acquaintance. The govern- 
ment of a trade union is a government of 
workingmen, for workingmen, by working- 
men, and the framers of its constitution 
have been workingmen. Though the 
supreme law of the Union has not been 
formulated by highly paid constitutional 
lawyers, yet it represents in a clear and 
definite manner the ideals, purposes, and 
aims of the great majority of the members 
of the organization ; and the faithfulness 
with which trade union constitutions rep- 



THE FEDEilATlON OF LABOE — LABOK ORGANIZATIOXS — 1881. 397 



resent trade union sentiment is due to 
the elasticity of those constitutions. The 
government of trade unions is loose and 
fle.xible. The object of the leaders, as of 
the rank and file of trade unionists, has 
been to preserve the largest possible elas- 
ticity and freedom of movement to the 
ruling- majority of the organization. The 
formal written constitution of a Trade 
Union is rather a statement of principles 
and a formulation of the present policy 
of the Union than a hard and fast deter- 
mination of its future laws. 

As has been emphatically stated, the 
first, last, and all-important principle of 
all union organizations is that of collec- 
tive bargaining', which undertakes to se- 
cure adequate or reasonable wages, hours 
of labor, etc. There are many other 
thing's of only less importance that are 
distinctive features of all labor organiza- 
tions, such as insurance, — old age and 
death; sick benefit funds; out-of-work pro- 
visions, etc. ; all of which are recog- 
nized and provided for in the make 
up of the total annual payment of each 
member of the Union; and Unions 
have often been severely criticised liy 
their alleged friends for the occasional 
use of pension or insurance funds 
to maintain an important strike. But 
with the explicit statement made by 
all Unions that the charitable features 
must always be held in a secondary 
position to its one imperative purpose 
to maintain wages, secure better hours of 
labor, etc., it is difficult to see with what 
justice such criticism is advanced. It is 
certainly puerile, and would never be set 
up in opposition to any similar act on the 
liart of capital. Every advantage that the 
Unions have gained, either in the way 
of increased wages, better hours of labor, 
improved conditions under which the 
work shall be done, increased responsi- 
bility of the emi^loyer in case of accident, 
— all of these gains have been made 
tin-ough absolute adherence to one prin- 
ciple, and they never could have been 
gained otherwise. Altruism in com- 
mercialism is an absolutely idle dream ; 
and, as we have said before, the saddest 



position one is forced to take in studying 
the whole subject of the rise of the laborer 
from slave to Union man is that never by 
grace of the consideration or courtesy of 
employers has a point been gained. Every 
step has been won in weakness, suffering, 
under ridicule and stringent penal laws, 
by persistent, self-forgetful, determined, 
aggressive action. And it would indeed 
seem strange if, after generations of ex- 
perience the laboring men had evolved one 
principle of absolutely basic character in 
their movements, — a veritable " big stick " 
potent to secure " square deals," — they 
should hesitate to use it to its utmost 
power because of any puling sentiment as 
to the ethics of their insurance or pen- 
sion funds. 

Previous to the civil war in the United 
States there were no successful attempts 
made to form alliances among national 
trade unions. Labor federations, when 
they existed, were local in cliaracter. 
Thus the General Trades Union of the 
City of New York, organized in 18:J3, was 
a federation of the Unions of that City. 
On January 8, 1834, The General Trades 
Union of Boston was organized on the 
same general lines, and shortly after 
similar organizations appeared in Phila- 
delphia and Baltimore. In 18GG repre- 
sentatives of organized labor assembled at 
Baltimore and formed the National Labor 
Union, the chief declared aim of which 
was to secure the establishment of the 
eight-hour working day. This organiza- 
tion held national conventions in 1867 
and 1808, and seemed to possess elements 
of vitality. But too active participation 
in the political campaigns of 1868 and 
1872 created internal dissensions that 
proved fatal to its continued existence. 
The general industrial depression of the 
early "seventies" forced very many 
Unions to disband. They had been or- 
ganized on the basis of low dues and light 
benefits, and hard times found them with- 
out any resources for the emergency. But 
with the later industrial revival, the labor 
world again looked toward organization 
along broader and stronger lines than be- 
fore. The experiences of the Unions dur- 



398 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD ^O^YEE. 



ing the depression had shown the need of 
strong intcr-trade alliances, supplement- 
ary to the local and national trade Unions 
then existing. 

This need the Knights of Labor under- 
took to supply. This, the first successful 
National t^nion of Laborers in the United 
States, had its origin in a local union or 
assembly of Garment Cutters, formed in 
Philadelphia in 1869. With increase in 
the number of local assemblies, demand 
arose for a body which should represent 
all the local unions in a certain district. 
This was the origin of the " District As- 
sembly No. 1," others being formed as fast 
as the number of local assemblies in a 
new field warranted union in a District 
Assembly. On August 2, 1877, a circular 
from " District Assembly No. 1 " was sent 
to all officers and members of Knights of 
Labor, notifying them of a convention to 
be held in Reading, Pa., on January 1, 
1S78, for the purpose of forming a " Gen- 
eral Assembly," and establishing a general 
assistance fund, a bureau of statistics, and 




I'HIAH S. STEPHENS, 

Founder of the Knights of Labor. 

a system of revenue to aid in the work of 
organization. This resulted in the " Gen- 
eral Assembly of the Knights of Labor of 
North America." Full and final juris- 



diction in all matters pertaining to local 
and district assemblies " was given to the 
General Assembly, while each District 
Assembly was given power to decide all 
appeals and settle all controversies within 
or between local assemblies." Many prin- 
ciples of this Order, as enunciated in its 
constitution, were of the most advanced 
and ennobling character. Though it was 
during its supremacy in the labor world 
that the earliest and fiercest of the great 
national strikes occurred, yet, as a body, 
it officially discouraged strikes and boy- 
cotts, urging that the main reliance of the 
Order should be placed on political action, 
co-operation, and education. Back of its 
educational policy was the theory that me- 
chanical inventions were making the 
skilled trades increasingly dependent upon 
the lower grades of unskilled labor, and 
that, consequently, the laboring classes 
must be elevated en masse or not at all, 
— taking for its official motto the senti- 
ment. " Tliat is the most perfect govern- 
ment in which an injury to one is the 
concern of all." The year 1880 was the 
banner year of the Knights, when they 
reported at their Convention upwards of 
CiOO.OOO members of the different local and 
district assemblies. But the mistake was 
again made of engaging too actively in 
national polities: and the autocratic form 
of government of the supreme body was 
not in harmony with the best ideas of 
the time. Consequently when, in 1881, 
" The Federation of Organized Trades 
and Labor L^nions of the Unitecl States 
and Canada " was formed, the Knights 
could not long resist the influence of the 
federative idea, which has proved the most 
potent principle in the history of labor 
organizations. In organization The Fed- 
eration is the very antithesis of that of 
the Knights of Labor. In structure it is 
a confederation, dealing with Unions or 
local federations whenever possible, care- 
fully refraining from the slightest infrac- 
tion of the autonomy of the constituent 
tmions. and confining itself to those ob- 
jects which are of vital importance to all 
liilior organizations in common, — such as 
tl'e maintenance of a labor press, the pas- 



THE FEDERATION OF LABOE — LABOR ORGANIZATIONS — 1881. 399 



sage of favorable labor legislation, the 
amicable settlement of disputes between 
unions, the more extended use of the 
union label and the " unfair" list, and, 
most important of all, the complete 
organization along trade lines of the en- 
tire body of wage earners. Perhaps the 
greatest element of its strength, however, 
may be found in its basic principle, per- 
sistently and consistently adhered to, that 
Ijartisan politics shall in every way, and 
on all occasions, be absolutely eschewed. 

The Federation of Labor has recently 
taken important part in many questions 
of national importance, and is constantly 
gaining in strength, having now a mem- 
bership of close to one and a half million 
men actually paying dues. As John 
^litchell has said: "The American Fed- 
eration is the sovereign organization in 
the trade union world, and represents the 
apex of a pyramid, the foundation of 
which consists of one hundred and twelve 
national unions, and many thousands of 
local organizations. The steady, and, at 
times rapid, growth of the Federation has 
resulted from its adojation of a wise, con- 
servative policy, and from its adherence 
to the interests and purposes for which it 
was instituted. The object of the Fed- 
eration has been, and still is, to foster and 
encourage the formation of local and na- 
tional organizations, to secure the institu- 
tion of local and state central bodies, to 
establish friendly feelings between the 
various national and international organi- 
zations though without destroying their 
autonomy and self-government, and to 
encourage and promote the labor press of 
the country, as well as the use of union 
label goods." 

Naturally a great number of Employers' 
Associations and Unions have also been 
formed to present a united front to the 
demands and movements of the laboring 
men. These have assumed a gTeat variety 
of forms and characters, some embracing 
all the employers of labor in the same 
line in the same state, or a union of em- 
ployers of allied interests, — as of all con- 
nected with the building interests, etc. 
The most formidable organization of this 



kind, however, both because of its strength 
and its confessedly reactionary character, 
is the "Citizens' Industrial Association of 
America." This Association was organ- 




Copyright 1903 by J. E. Purdv, Boston. 
SAMUEL GOMPERS, 

President American Federation of Labor. 
ized at a convention of representatives 
from all employers' associations which met 
at Chicago, October 29, 1903, to which 
more than one hundred and fifty organiza- 
tions, — local, state, and natioiuil, sent dele- 
gates. At a meeting of the Executive 
Committee on December 3, 1903, the fol- 
lowing were adopted as the principles of 
the Federation : "(1) No dealings with 
walking delegates; (2) The open shop; 
(3) No sympathetic strikes; (4) No re- 
striction in the number of apprentices; 
(5) No restriction of output; (6) The full 
enforcement of the law." While these 
principles are not, perhaps, more hostile 
to labor unions than one would expect, it 
is the commentary on them, as exjiressed 
in the addresses of leading officers of the 
organizations at their various conventions, 
that manifests the real animus of the 
members of the Association. On these 



400 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



occasions the fiercest expression has been 
given to the most hostile feelings toward 
any such modem ideas as the " rights of 
labor." In the eye of the Citizens' Indus- 
trial Association labor neither has nor can 
have any rights which capital is bound to 
respect. As one of the most conservative 
students of the movement has said : 
" Nothing less than the entire destruction 
of the power of the Unions, whether the 
exercise of that power be legitimate or 
not, can fulfill the purpose of these mili- 
tant associations. They refuse to recog- 
nize the generally conceded right of 
Unions to exist in the present industrial 
regime, and deny that Unions have a 
legitimate function." The great wealth 
that this organization has at its command 
and the resultant ability to influence legis- 
lation all through the country and to 
practically control the press, will tend to 
make more difficult the long desired con- 
summation of industrial peace. But that 
is all ! Too great advances in that direc- 
tion have already been made for such sel- 
fish opposition to be of permanent influ- 
ence. Already the " small cloud " has ap- 
peared on the horizon which is yet 
destined to determine industrial develop- 
ment. " No man liveth to himself alone " 
is as true in commercial affairs as in 
social or moral; and it is in the establish- 
ment of this principle that relief will yet 
come. Nothing that anyone possesses, 
whether it is wealth, interest, strength, — 
is his to do with as he pleases; but every 
possession or accomplishment is to be held 
and used with due regard to the rights — 
legal and moral — of all other men. Al- 
ready this truth has been feebly voiced in 
important crises, as in the assertion of 
the rights of third parties in the case of 
great strikes, like that of the Anthracite 
Coal Miners; and it is bound to be heard 
more and more frequently and impera- 
tively in the years to come. 

We feel that we cannot better close this 
brief review of the industrial situation 
and the labor movements, than by quot- 
ing the words with which the Rev. Wash- 
ington Gladden closed a lecture on a like 



subject. " The labor question of to-day," 
he said, " when we get at the heart of 
it, is simply this: What can be done to 
bring Employer and Employed together 
upon a basis of genuine good will; to make 
them friends, comrades, helpers of one 
another? This is the labor question of 
tlie twentieth century, and it is the ques- 
tion which the twentieth century must 
answer. I am not sure that the answer 
can be put into the terms of the wage- 
system ; I rather doubt it. I think that 
some kind of co-operation will have to 
be found by which the interests of the 
men who direct the work and the men 
who do the work will be more perfectly 
and more consciously identified. But the 
answer tnitst he found and it tnust he an 
answer of peace. We are not going to 
solve the labor question by gathering men 
into mighty armies and setting them to 
fighting one another; that is simply mad- 
ness. All war is madness; it is the climax 
of unreason. Brutes and savages know no 
better than to fight ; for men, for the men 
of the twentieth century after Christ, it 
is not only wicked, it is absurd. The 
time is near when these industrial wars 
will appear to be as senseless, as mon- 
strous, as the ' wager of battle ' and ' the 
ordeal ' by which disputes were settled in 
the Dark Ages. The answer must he peace. 
Among men of good will there can be no 
other answer. And there is no perma- 
nent place upon this planet for any other 
kind of men. Men of ill will are not 
wanted here. They do not fit into the 
nature of things; they do not make sense; 
they make confusion, discord, chaos; they 
must go. O bells of the New Year, of 
the New Century, ring them out ! ring 
them out! Ring out the churl, the 
egoist, the sect-man, the party man, the 
class-man! Ring them out from church; 
and school, and council chamber, and 
capitol, from office and counting room and 
shop and factory ! 

" ' Ring in the valiant man and free, 
The larger heart, the kindlier hand; 
Ring out the darkness of the land. 
Ring in the Christ that is to be.' " 



XLII. 
THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE— 1885. 



Tlie Bible of the Apostles. — The Jewish Scriptures. — A Librarj' of Law, Prophecy, Philosophy, 
ami Poetry. — Rise and Importance of the Synagogues. — ilanner in Which the Scriptures 
Were Kept. — -The K0II3. — Papyrus and Methods of Writing. — The Septuagint. — Libraries 
of the Early Christian Churches. — Three Great Sources of Our Bible. — Remarkable Work 
of Dr. Tischendorf . — The Old Latin Bible. — St. Jerome's Revision. — The Accepted Vulgate. 

— Caedmon's Paraphrases and Bede's Translations. — King Alfred's Dooms — Translation 
from Saxon to Modern English. — Efl'ects of the Norman Invasion of England. — Influence 
of Bible on the Rise of Intellectual and Civil Liberty. — The Black Death. — Wyclif's 
Translation of the Bible. — Purvey's Revision. — The Invention of Printing. — First Printed 
Book, the Mazarin Bible. — Luther and His Translation of the Bible. — Intellectua.1 and Re- 
ligious Conditions in the Church at Close of Fifteentli Century. — Tyndale and His Trans- 
lation of Bible. — First Division into Chapters. — Final Revision in 1534. — Coverdale's, 
Matthew's, and Ta\eruer's Bibles. — Tlie "Great Bible." — Influence of Bible upon English 
People and Language. — Green's Estimate. — The Geneva, or "Breeches," Bible. — First Di- 
vision of Chapters into Verses, and F"'irst Use of Modern Type. — The Bishop's Bible. — Ac- 
cession of King James and His Ciiaracter. — The King .James, or Authorized, Version of 
ICll. — The Geneva a Strong Competitor. — Reasons for another Revision. — Wonderful 
Increase of Texts and Documents Unknown to Revisers of 1611. — Character of Revision 
Committee and Methods of Work. — Three Million Copies Revised New Testament Sold in 
One Year. — Work of American Revision Committee. — The American Revised Bible of 1901. 

— Many Notable Opinions Regarding the Bible. — "In this Book is Contained All th^' 
Wisdom of the World." 



'■ Here he expn-ssed a wish that I should read to him. and when asked from what book, he said ' Need 
jou asU? There is but one.' " — I.ockhart's I.ife of Scott, 



O long have English-speaking peoples been accustomed to a 
Bible in a single volume, and to regard it as one book, mad^' 
up of a series of more or less closel.v connected parts, fol- 
lowing each other in an established order, that compara- 
tively few persons realize that our Scriptures have ever 
existed in any other forms, or that our so-called Authorized 
Version is itself the result of a great number of previous 
revisions. In his recent work, the " Canon and Text of 
the New Testament," Professor Caspar Eene Gregory, of 
the University of Leipzig, says: "As a general rule the 
mass of people take things as they arc. They are also 
lilvely to think, or at least to go on the supposition, that things have always been 
as they are now. They can buy a New Testament, a nicely bound one, for a mere 
trifle. It rarely occurs to them that six centuries ago that would not have been 
possible. Perhaps there are men who would be surprised to learn that Paul, and 




402 



FliOM COLOKY TO WOELD POWER 



even Peter and John and James, did not 
each carry a little New Testament in his 
girdle." And Bishop Wordsworth tells of 
the curate who, while public feeling was 
deeply stirred over a proposed revision, 
that of 1880, declared that " if the autlior- 
ized version was good enough for St. Paul, 
it was good enough for him." But Jesus 
and his immediate followers knew no 
Bible literature save the Hebrew writings 
which constitute our Old Testament and 
the Apocrypha ; and when the blaster 
bade the Jews " Search the Scriptures," 
it was to those writings alone that he re- 
ferred them. It is equally true, of course, 
that neither Paul nor Peter ever saw or 
heard of one of our gospels ; and their own 
letters, with the Epistle of James, were 
the only books of our New Testament that 
had been written up to the time of their 
martyrdom. It was not until the fourth 
century after Christ that the books consti- 
tuting our Old and New Testaments were 
brought together in one volume; and it 
was a thousand years later before such a 
combination of the Hebrew and Christian 
sacred books became common,^each of 
the individual books still circulating and 
being read, cojiied, and revised, inde- 
pendently of any of the others. The Old 
Testament was the " library " of the Jews, 
as it, with the writings of the Apostles, 
became the " library " of the early church 
and Christians, — a library consisting of 
separate books, or rolls, of history, law, 
prophecy, philosophy, and letters. 

We are prone to forget that Jesus and 
his disciples were Jews and remained to 
the end of their lives regular attendants 
upon the services of the Jewish syna- 
gogues. Without exception, too, Paul on 
his missionary joumeyings undertook first 
to preach his new Gospel of a Risen Christ 
to the Jews and in the Jewish s.\niagogues 
of every place he visited ; and it was only 
when he and his teachings were rejected 
by the Jews in their synagogues, that 
he established his separate Gentile ami 
Christian churches. It is, then, to the 
Jewish synagogues that we naturally turn 
to learn of the form and character of the 
earliest books, upon which a large part 



of our Bible has been built up. The syna- 
gogue, as an important factor in Jewish 
life, only goes back to the destruction of 
the Temple, and the captivity in Babylon, 
in the sixth century before Christ. From 
that time on the Jews became more dis- 
persed over the civilized w-orld, and at the 
time of Christ there was hardly a city or 
town of any size or importance where a 
synagogue would not be found. Sepa- 
rated as the people were from the foun- 
tain of their national life, and from their 
Temple worship, the local synagogue stood 
in the place of both, and was the center 
uf all the religious, educational, and social 
life and activity of each exiled com- 
munity. In those little Jerusalems the 
Jew was ever reminded of the greater city 
of his God ; and here all the great events 
of the Hebrew national life were re- 
hearsed, the law studied and taught, and 
the prophets searched for the signs of His 
coming who should restore to the nation 
its former glory, and redeem its people. 
In those worshiping groups, far from 
tiieir home-land, perhaps, and possibly few 
in numbers, we may almost hear the oft- 
repeated lament of their fathers in exile, 
— " By the rivers of Babylon, there we 
sat down, yea we wept when we remem- 
bered Zion;" while the pious vow was 
oft repeated : " If I forget thee, Jeru- 
salem, let my right hand forget her cun- 
ning; if I do not remember thee, let the 
tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; 
if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief 
joy." 

Each synagogue had a ruler who di- 
rected the general affairs of the religious 
body, and an attendant, or Chazzam, who 
looked after the church property and 
building, and had charge of its sacred 
books. Those were kept in a " press," or 
chest, usually in a separate corner of the 
audience room, and the chest was gen- 
erally hidden from public view by a cur- 
tain. It corresponded to the Ark of the 
Covenant, which contained the law in the 
great Temple at Jerusalem. When the 
service was opened, it was the duty of 
the " Chazzam " to hand to the reader the 
roll containing the lessons of the day from 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 18S5 



40;] 



tlie law and from tiie propnets; and after 
the reading of each, the leader handed 
back each roll to the " Chazzam," who, 
after rolling it up behind the curtain, re- 
turned it to its proper division in the 
chest library. In Luke iv:lC), and follow- 
ing verses, we read that Jesus " came to 
Xazareth, where ho had been brought up. 
and, as his custom was, he went to tlie 



have found that it was separated into 
three main compartments, — one each fnv 
the law, for the historical books (among 
which were included some of the propli- 
ets), and for the "writings," as they 
were generally called, or Hagior/raplia. 
covering the poetical works, the wisdom 
books, and the remainder of the prophets. 
Examining any one of the rolls, we 




SCHIPTIRE ROLLS. 



sjTiagogue on the Sabbath day, mid stood 
up for to read. And there was delivered 
unto him (from the chest) the book of the 
prophet Esaias . . . and he closed the 
book and gave it again to the minister." 
Had we followed the minister as he went 
behind the curtain to return the roll to 
its proper place, and with his permission, 
perhaps, examined the chest, we should 



sh'iuld have found it mounted at the end 
upon a wooden roller, or if the congrega- 
tion was an important and wealthy one, 
upon two rollers, made probably of more 
costly material and, perhaps, with con- 
siderable ornamentation. Opening one of 
the rolls to examine it, we should see that 
the matter was written by hand upon a 
rather stiff and somewhat brittle material 



404 



FROM COLOXY TO WOliLD POWER. 



known as " papyrus." Printing and 
paper were yet centuries away. This ma- 
terial was made from the pith of the stem 
of the papynas plant, which grew along 
the banks of the Nile in Egypt, although 
it was found in small quantities in some 
other places. Of course the strips that 
could be secured by cutting through the 
pith would necessarily be narrow; but a 
sufficient number of these strips were laid 
edge to edge horizontally until the desired 
width of a roll was reached. Then a thin 
paste was spread over this surface and a 
like number of vertical strips were laid 
over the others. The whole sheet was then 
pressed and dried, after which the sur- 
faces were smoothed with pumice stone. 
Several of these sheets were pasted to- 
gether to make a roll long enough to con- 
tain the matter one wished to write out. 
The longest roll known is Egyptian, and 
measures one hundred and forty-four 
feet ; but the usual extreme length of 
Greek rolls was about thirty feet. The 
height, or width, varied from five to fif- 
teen inches. Of course this material was 
costly, and various economies, such as 
running words and sentences together and 
the contraction of words, were exercised 
in its use; and sometimes, though not 
often, the scribe would write upon the re- 
verse side as well as on the front, if his 
sheet was not long enough, — as is men- 
tioned in Ezekiel xi :10, where a " roll of a 
book" was spread before the prophet 
" icritlen without and iritliin." Having 
]}repared his papyrus of the right dimen- 
sions the scribe would commence to write 
his matter on the extreme left of his long 
sheet, — unless it was Hebrew. — arranging 
it on the pap.vrus in columns of from 
two to three and a half inches in width, 
which was considered the best literary 
form, though of course if the matter was 
poetry the length of the line dftermined 
the width of the column. Reed pens 
v.-cre used, and ink, for the making of 
which there were several well-known for- 
mulae. Having carefully written out the 
entire matter which he was copying, as for 
example, the roll of the prophet Isaiah, 
the scribe would attach the end section 



or right edge of his sheet to a roller, over 
which the whole manuscript would be 
wound. So that when Jesus, as referred 
to above, was handed the " roll of the 
prophet Esaias," he commenced unrolling 
from right to left until he came to the 
passage he wished to speak upon, or the 
lesson for the day. As the papyrus was 
easily broken, however, and Lecame more 
brittle with age, the double roll became 
the more common; and in using it, the 
reader simply unrolled from the right 
roller on to the left as he went along. On 
the back of the roll a thin strip of papyrus 
was pasted which bore the title of the 
work. 

The older and original manuscripts 
of the Jewish sacred books were writ- 
ten in Hebrew; but in the greater 
number of the churches of the dis- 
persion, that is, of the exiled Jews, 
the Septuagint translation of these books 
was used. This is one of the great 
basic versions for all later revisions, 
it being a complete translation of all 
the Jewish Scriptures into Greek, and 
derives its name from the fact that 
the translation was attributed to seventy 
of the most learned Jewish Rabbis. One 
of the most familiar legends regarding 
this translation is that Ptolemy Phidadel- 
phus sent to the Jews of Jerusalem for a 
Greek version of their Scriptures for his 
great library at Alexandria. Accordingly, 
seventy elders skilled in the Scriptures and 
in languages were sent to him, whom ho 
separated in seventy different cells while 
they were prosecuting their work. When 
all had completed their translations and 
appeared before the King, " God was 
glorified," as the legend recites, " for they 
all agreed exactly, word for word." The 
generally accepted theory is that the work 
was done by learned Alexandrian Jews at 
ditferent periods during the third and 
second centuries before Christ. This Sep- 
tuagint version is of especial interest to 
us because it was the form of the Jewish 
Scriptures with which Jesus and the early 
Christians were familiar; and the slight 
difference between their quotations from 
those Scriptures and the form with whi<'h 



THE EEVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



4or. 



we are familiar in the authorized version 
is accounted for by the fact that the Old 
Testament of that version was another 
translation from the original Hebrew, and 
not from the Septuagint, which Jesus and 
his followers used. 

Within one hundred years after the As- 
cension of Christ the Christians through- 
out Western Asia and Southern Europe 
had separated themselves from the syna- 
gogue connection, and had organized 
their churches and erected their church 
buildings. If we could have visited one 
of their more influential churches, say 
that of Rome, or of Ephesus, or Alex- 
andria, we should still have found, as one 
of the most important of the church fur- 
nishings, the " chest " for the sacred 
books ; and upon looking into it we should 
have discovered the same rolls which we 
have described as constituting the library 
of the synagogues. But in addition to 
those works we should also have found 
rolls of nearly all, perhaps all, of the 
books which now make up our New Testa- 
ment, — some originals, others copies from 
originals. — all of which hail been written 
within the century that had passed since 
the Crucifixion. Not every church for an- 
other hundred years yet would have all 
these new rolls; but one would have one 
or two gospels, another a different one; 
nearly all would probably have Paul's four 
great Epistles, — to the Galatians, Romans, 
and Corinthians, — as well as the Acts ; 
while some congregations cherished as 
priceless ti-casures the Apostle's ijersonal 
letters to them individually. Buf' Ihe liii- 
poriant fact is that a search through the 
chests of all the churches at about this 
period would have revealed to us in the 
Christian libraries original manuscripts 
of all the bool's of our Bible; ami that 
those early manuscripts constitute the 
only sources from which we hare obtained 
that Bible. These later manuscripts were 
all written out by hand in the same man- 
ner, and upon the same material, as those 
which made up the library of the S^-na- 
gogues. already described. If anyone of 
these collections had been preserved intact 
to modern times the work of revisers 



would be simple and easy; but, unfortu- 
luitely, the libraries of the early churches 
— the Christian writings, — were more 
recklessly destroyed than were the Chris- 
tians themselves during the persecutions 
of the first three centuries, with the result 
that not a single manuscript of any book 
of the Bible belonging to that period has 
been preserved. The question, therefore, 
how we get our Bible, and upon what 
basis the revisers and translators of dif- 
ferent ages have worked, becomes an ex- 
ceedingly important one. 

Taking the position of the learned Re- 
visers of 1880, we should have before us 
three classes of material to work upon, a 
very large proportion of which was un- 
known to the Revisers who produce.] our 
lYuthorized Version, in IGll. This matter 
has been discovered from time to time, 
chiefly during the last five hundred years, 
often in the rubbish heaps of the old 
monasteries of Europe and Asia, and is 
now scattered among the great libraries 
of Rurope. — those of the Vatican, of the 
British Museum, of St. Petersburg, and 
of Paris, especially, possessing documents 
of inestimable value. Of this material, 
the first class consists of Manuscripts, by 
fl'hich is technically meant copies in the 
original language of the different Scrip- 
tures. The second class is made up of a 
great number of ancient Versions, a ver- 
sion technically meaning a franslafioji of 
the Bible, or any of its books, into the 
languages of early Christendo7n. Some of 
these, like the Syriac, Egyptian, Latin, and 
Gothic Versions, are very ancient and of 
supreme importance. The third class con- 
sists of the writings of the Early Chu3'ch 
Fathers, which make an extensive librai-y. 
These men were generally earnest con- 
troversialists, and quoted Serii)ture so 
freely that it has been said if all other 
sources of our Bible were lost, we could 
recover the greater part of it from their 
writings alone. 

The most important of these three 
sources is, of course, the Manuscriprs. the 
copies of the Scriptures in the original 
tongue. Of these there are now a great 
number in existence, some of them having 



406 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD TOWER. 



originally been translations of the whole 
Christian library, that is, of the entire 
Bible, others of single books or groups, as 
the Psalter, the Gospels, the Epistles, etc. 
The manuscripts vary greatly in age and 
so in value, as it is evident that the 
nearer in point of time a manuscript be- 
longs to the original text, the nearer will 
be its approach to a perfect copy. It must 
be remembered that all copies were made 
by hand from other copies; and when one 
considers how difficult it is even to tran- 
scribe a page of printed matter exactly, it 
is easy to see that errors must have crept 
into the successive copies as made, even 
though the most loving and conscientious 
effort was made to avoid any mistakes. 
Irenfeus, Bishop of Lyons in the second 
century, wrote as follows on a copy he had 
made of one of the sacred books : " Who- 
soever thou art who shalt transcribe this 
book, I charge thee with an oath by our 
Lord Jesus Christ, and by His glorious 
appearing, in which He cometh to judge 
the (luick and the dead, that thou care- 
fully compare what thou hast transei-ibed, 
and correct it according to this copy when 
thou hast transcribed it; and thou tran- 
scribe this oath in like manner and j^lace 
it in thy copy." 

Three of these manuscripts, which are 
nearly complete copies of the whole Bible, 
go back to the fourth and fifth centuries, 
and so are the most ancient of the sacred 
documents, as well as the most priceless 
treasures of the Christian church. Curi- 
ously one of them belongs to each branch 
of the church, — the Greek, Roman, and 
Reformed. All of them were before the 
revisers of 1880, though none of them were 
known to those of the Authorized Ver- 
sion. The most ancient of these is the 
" Vatican Manuscript," which has lain in 
the Vatican library for several hundred 
years, but has been of no use to scholars, 
as access to it was forbidden until the 
latter part of the nineteenth century, when 
Pope Pius IX. allowed excellent fac- 
similes of it to be made, which can now be 
studied in all the larger libraries of the 
world. This manuscript is written on vel- 
lum, which began to take the place 



of papyrus for sacred writings about the 
end of the third century, and is in book 
form instead of on rollers, a change that 
was made about the same time, and par- 
tially because of the use of a different 
writing material. This " Codex Vat- 
icanus " as it is known among scholars 
(" codex " meaning simply the book 
form in distinction from the roll) has 
about seven hundred leaves of the finest 
vellum, is about a foot square, and bound. 
It lacks the first forty-six chapters of 
Genesis, Psalms 105 to 138, and all of the 
New Testament after the fourteenth verse 
of the ninth chapter of Hebrews. Each 
page has three columns, the writing is all 
in capital letters, and there is no spacing 
between the words nor any punctuation or 
division into sentences, all of which makes 
it very difficult to read. This form of 
writing vras one of the economies prac- 
ticed when writing material was very ex- 
pensive. It is also one of the best proofs 
of the age of a manuscript, as a few 
centuries later modern forms of writing 
were adopted in copying. These old, capi- 
tal-letter manuscripts are known as 
"Uncials," in distinction from those writ- 
ten in the modern or running form, which 
are called " Cursives." The value of a 
manuscript depends chiefly, as a general 
liroposition, upon its age, which places 
the L^ncials far above the Cursives in 
that regard. Yet it is quite possible that 
a Cursive of the fifteenth century should 
have been copied directly from an early 
L^ncial, like the Codex Vaticanus of 
the fourth century, and so have a greater 
value than an Uncial of the eighth 
century, and several of such Cursives 
have been found which are highly 
esteemed. 

Foremost among the distinguished 
group of scholars of the last centur.y who 
di'voted their time, energy, and study to 
tlie manuscripts and texts of the Bible 
books, was Dr. Constantin Tischendorf, 
Professor of Theology at the University 
of Leipzig from 1845 until the time of his 
death in 1874. For many years he made 
frequent visits to old Greek monasteries in 
southeastern Europe and western Asia, 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1S85. 



407 



eagerly searching for new material. In 
18-1:4, when only twenty-nine years of age, 
he arrived at the ancient convent of St. 
Catherine, on the range of Mt. Sinai. 
While quietly conducting his investiga- 
tions he came upon a large basket filled 
with worn and damaged manuscrix)ts, 
v.hieh had been set aside to be burned, as 
two similar baskets-full had already been. 
Here he found a considerable number of 
vellum leaves of a Greek manuscript, 
which his practiced eye at once recognized 
as one of the oldest in existence. He ob- 
tained possession of forty-three sheets, 



of fruitless search through the library and 
among all the papers of the convent, he 
was about to take his departure. While 
walking with the steward the evening be- 
fore be had planned to leave, their con- 
versation turned upon the text of the 
Old Testament; and returning at twilight 
to the convent, he was invited by the 
steward to partake of a luncheon with him 
in his cell. While they were eating the 
host said that he had there a copy of that 
Septuagint, at the same time bringing 
from the corner of the room a large manu- 
script wrapped in a red cloth. Glancing at 



//- ' 



i\ 



.„ .i" ri- 
i*A "I n ) e 



W' f] '^^ 




1 a; js ^-fr-''"'-'™^> /f 







MT. SIN'AI CONVENT. 



about one-third of the number he had 
rescued, but was not permitted to take the 
remainder. Unfortunately his enthusiasm 
had betrayed the value of the treasures in 
the basket to the unconscious monks. For 
fifteen years he made repeated but un- 
successful attempts to get possession of 
the remaining sheets, working through 
various influential channels. In 1859 he 
determined again to visit the convent him- 
self, and was happily able to go armed 
with a strong personal letter from the 
head of the Eastern Church, the Emperor 
Alexander II. of Russia. After five days 



the pile of vellum, Tischendorf quickly 
recognized it as belonging to the same 
codex of which he had rescued some 
leaves from the waste basket fifteen years 
before. Concealing his emotion, he ob- 
tained the privilege of taking the manu- 
script to his chamber, where, to his un- 
speakable joy, he found it contained the 
New Testament entire. Then began the 
long and weary efforts to get possession of 
the entire manuscript, or proper con- 
veniences for copying it; and, though 
these were eventually granted, the work 
could not be done under such circum- 



408 



EEOil COLONY TO WOKLD TOWEE. 



stances as to guarantee the perfect ac- 
curacy which alone would satisfy Tiseh- 
eaidorf. As a last resort he raade the 
happy proposal tliat the moid?s should 
make a gift of the entire material to the 
great defender of their church, the 
Emperor Alexander; with the result that 
about eight months after reaching the 
convent, the precious treasure was placed 
in his hands to bear to the emperor at St. 
Petersburg. This codex is written iipon 
vellum of extnnne fineness and beauty, 
and has 346 leaves, of which 199 contain 
twenty-two books of the Old Testament, 
while the remaining 147 have the whole of 
the New Testament, the "Epistle of 
Barnabas," and part of the " Sliepherd of 
Hernias." The whole work has J'^.any 
points of similarity with thi' Vatican 
Codex, though the latter has three col- 
unms on a page, while the former has 
four. This is known as the " Cmlrx 
Sinaiticiis," and it is believed tliat it goc-. 
back to before 3.50 A. D. The early 
church historian, Eusebius, who was also 
secretaiy to the Emperor Constantiiie 
after his conversion, states that the 
Emperor ordered him to have fifty of the 
most perfect and beautiful copies of the 
Bible made and delivered to liini; and 
many learned scholars, including Tisch- 
endorf, are confident that the Siinxitie 
manuscript is one of those fifty copies. 
Facsimiles of this codex have also been 
made, and in this form it is accessible 
to all scholars. 

The third in antiquity of the great 
Uncial manuscripts of the Bible in the 
Greek language is the " Codex Alrj- 
andrinus." This codex was presented to 
Charles I. of England, in 1628, only seven- 
teen years after the revisers had com- 
pleted their work on our Antliorized Ver- 
sion, by Cyril Luear, Patriarch of Alex- 
an<lria, from whence he had brought the 
manuscript, which is named after the 
city of its origin. It is in quarto form, 
about thirteen inches high and ten wide, 
each page being divided into two columns 
of fifty lines each. Like the others it is 
written on thin, fine, and very beautiful 
vclhnn, with an elwrant thondi simole 



L'ncial, and without spacing the words. 
Ten leaves are missing from the Psalms, 
and tlie first twenty-four chapters of 
^Matthew, the seventh and eighth chapters 
of St. John, and eight chapters of First 
Corinthians. But there is added to this 
the one genuine letter of Clement of Rome 
to the Corinthians. The trustees of the 
British Museum have published a beauti- 
ful photographic facsimile of this, one of 
the greatest treasures of their lilirary. 

Another curious and valuable manu- 
script is in the National Library of France, 
and is known as the " Codex Ephraemi." 
It was brought from the East by Andrew 
Lascar, a learned Greek patronized b.v 
Lorenzo de' ilediei, and was carried to 
Paris by Catherine de' Medici when she 
became Queen of Henry II. of France. 
This codex illustrates a custom anion:; tlu^ 
monks of the Middle Ages which is doubt- 
less responsible for the loss of many 
valuable manuscripts. As vellum was 
very expensive, if a monk wished to tran- 
scribe any new matter he would often take 
an old book and clean its pages as far as 
]Hissible of its written matter by rubliing 
tliem with pumice stone. As tliis could 
never be perfectly done, the old matter 
always appeared indistinctly under the 
ML'W writing. Such manuscripts are called 
■■ Palimpsests," and the Codex Ephraemi 
was one of them. During the seventeenth 
century a scholar discovered the impor- 
tance of the first writing, and for two hun- 
ih'ed years various attempts were made to 
remove the later matter. But it remained 
for Tischendorf, after nearly a year's hard 
labor, to succeed in the work, and in 1840 
to disclose a very rare and ancient I^ncial 
which unquestionably belongs to the fifth 
century, and is esteemed b.v many critics 
as only second in imjiortance to the Vati- 
can and Sinaitie manuscripts. These four 
codices are the chief manuscripts which 
I'.ave preserved the Greek text for nearly 
the whole Bible: but there are scattered 
through the libraries of Europe manu- 
scripts of groups of books, or single books, 
or parts of each, which are usually classed 
as "Fragments;" and of these there are 
now known aliont ino Fncials. while in 



THE REVISION OF THE ElBLE — 1885. 



409 



1890 Dr. Gregory counted up 3,553 Cur- 
sives, — all of which, as has been said, are 
ir.ore or less Complete parts of the Bible 
in the original Greek language. 

Of the Hebrew manuscripts of the Old 
Testament it is only necessary to saj- that 
none are in existence dating earlier than 
llie tenth century. The lack of old manu- 
scripts here, however, is of little impor- 
tance; for about a thousand years ago all 
the old ones were collected and compared 
for the purpose of a grand revision, so 
that at that early date the Hebrew of the 
Old Testament was made as nearly per- 
fect as the best scholars of the Je^^•ish 
academies could make it. After that the 
older manuscripts gradually disapjpeared. 
The work of revision was done with the 
most scrupulous care, and every mechani- 
cal device was used in addition to clerical 
skill to prevent errors from creeping in. 
And the reason that in the latest English 
revision there are so few changes in the 
Old Testament compared with those in 
the New is that there was less need, as 
well as fewer means, of making any cor- 
rections. 

Before taking up the second class of 
sources of our Bilile, the Versions, a few 
words may be said in reference to the 
change from the use of the roll to the 
book. Vellum had been in use in the 
ancient world since about 180 B. C, when 
King Ptolemy of Egypt, jealous of the 
great library that the King of Pergamus 
was building up, undertook to cripple him 
in his work by forbidding the export of 
papyrus. The King of Pergamus, there- 
fore, was forced to find another material 
for writing, and hit upon skins; and the 
other name for vellum — " parchment " — 
is simply a derivative from " Pergamine." 
For this purpose the skins of sheep, calves, 
and of asses were chiefly used, the hair be- 
ing carefully scraped from one side and the 
flesh from the other. The skin was then 
stretched and dried, and, before using, 
the surfaces were carefully smoothed and 
polished with pumice stone. At a later 
date a very fine quality of vellum was 
made from antelope skins. Strictly speak- 
ing vellum denotes material made from 



calves' and antelopes' skins, while parch- 
ment was applied to skins of sheep, asses, 
and even swine; but practically no dis- 
tinction was made, and the term vellum 
came to be applied to all kinds of dressed 
skins used for purposes of writing. In 
the first and second centuries it was used 
uidy for note books, rough drafts, and 
inferior classes of literary work. But its 
use for note books, shaped according to 
the form of the wax tablets, the kind of 
note books previously existing, naturally 
led to the evolution of the codex, or 
modern book form, and together they 
gradually disijlaced papyrus and the roll 
for literary productions, during the early 
part of the fourth century. One demand 
which greatly stimulated this movement 
was that for complete collections of the 
Scriptures in a usable form both for read- 
ing and reference. It was not until 
towards the close of the second century 
that anything like an accepted canon of 
the New Testament writings was recog- 
nized ; but as soon as tradition and usage 
had determined what books should be ac- 
cepted and read by all Christians as the 
Scriptures, a more convenient form than 
the old rolls was imperatively demanded. 
And as it was recognized that some twenty 
or thirty rolls were needed for the New 
Testament alone, while the whole could be 
gathered into one codex of not immoder- 
ate size, the latter quickly came into gen- 
eral use. 

The second class of material for Bible 
revision, next in importance to the manu- 
scripts, consists of " Version.?," that is, of 
translations from the original language 
of the Scriptures into the languages of 
the various peoples who from time to time 
became converted to Christianity. Of 
these versions a great number are in ex- 
istence, some of which bear evidence of 
great care in translation, others more 
carelessly done and from corrupt originals. 
Many versions are very, ancient, the early 
Christians in their missionary work among 
the Egyptians, Armenians, Syrians, and 
Latin peoples of North Africa and South- 
ern Europe, from the first endeavoring to 
.•'.ive those peoples at least the princijial 



410 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



books of the New Testament and the 
Psalms ill their own tongues, the com- 
plete Bibles following in due course. As 
some of these translations go back to the 
early part of the second century, they 
become of the greatest value as aids in 
verifying and correcting the texts of the 
t-arly New Testament ScriiJtures. 

The church at Rome of the first centui'y 
was iriore Greek in its character than 
linniau; and not only did Paul wi'ite his 
I'lpistle to its members in Greek, about (iO 
A. D., but its earlier bishops all appear to 
have been Greeks, one of whom, t'lement, 
at the end of the century, wrote an im- 
liiirtant letter to the Corinthian church in 
(ireek which, as we have seen, was bound 
n]i with the New Testament books in the 

Cofle.r Ale.i-aiitJriniis." There was not, 
tlii'reforc, the same necessity for a Latin 
ti'anslation of the Scriptures for the 
Italian churches as for those of the Ko- 
man province of North Africa, where many 
important churches were early established, 
and from whence came many of the most 
noted of the church fathers, including the 
great St. Augustine; and it was chiefly 
for these outlying churches that the first 
Latin Jjible was made. This is known as 
the Old Latin Version, to distinguish it 
from the later work of Jerome. This Old 
Latin l^.ible has great value for the New 
'i'l'stament. as it was ])robably the first 
translation made from the original Greek 
te.xts, but the Old Testament was only a 
translation of a translation, that is, of the 
Septuagint. As the Church spread, this 
ISible would necessarily have to lie made 
in large nmnbers, and owing to the fragile 
character of the papyrus, earlier copies 
would have to be replaced by newly made 
ones. It naturally resulted, therefore, that 
in the process of these many translations 
the original text soon became very much 
corrupted, so that by the middle of the 
foui'th century, as one has said, " the Latin 
sjieaking churches were in danger of los- 
ing the pure Scripture of the Apostolic 
days." Fortunately, just at this period 
the great Eusebius Plieronymus. better 
known as St. Jerome, returned to Rome 
after several years of travel, study, and 



ascetic life in the East. Reputed to be the 
best liible scholar in the church, and 
nearly the only one who was thoroughly 
familiar with Hebrew, Damasus, Bishop 
of Rome, in 382 urged him to undertake a 
revision of the Latin Scriptures. This 
work Jerome at once began, and in 385 
had finished the New Testament. lie 
then began work upon the Old Testament, 
making first two or three separate trans- 
lations of the Psalter frozn the Septuagint. 
But being dissatisfied with this, he turned 
to the original Hebrew text and made an 
entirely new translation, which was com- 
pleted in 404. This final translation of 
Jerome has become one of the most im- 
portant factors in all later Biblical re- 
vision. It is known as the " Vulgate," 
which means simply the " commonly re- 
ceived translation." This became the 
officially accepted Bible of the Western 
churches, and holds that position in the 
Roman Catholic church to-day, as it did 
in England until the Reformation; and 
the Septuagint and Vulgate are the two 
great versions in the immense library of 
Biblical literature. 

Human nature, however, changes but 
little through the ages, and Jerome's great 
work met with the same determined oppo- 
sition, as well as bitter criticism and 
abuse, that later greeted the work of the 
revisers of 1880. All over the world, that 
is the Western world. Christians had be- 
come familiar with and loved the Old 
Latin version; and as, owing to the cor- 
ruptions of the latter, Jerome's changes 
\\ ere many and marked, a storm of hostile 
criticism broke over him. This he fought 
vigorously and with considerable temper, 
insisting that no amount of sentiment 
could be a plea for a faulty Bible, and 
that the mosc venerated translation must 
give way, if found to disagree with the 
original texts. In a letter to one of the 
church fathers, Jerome mentions " certain 
poor creatures " who studiously calumni- 
ate him " for correcting words in the 
Gospels;" and says: "T could afford to 
despise them, if I stood upon my rights; 
for a lyre is played in vain to an ass. If 
they do not like the water from tiie pure 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



411 



fountain head, let them drink oi the 
iiuiddy streams;" and ag'ain returning- to 
the subject closes his letter with a refer- 
ence to those " two-legged donkeys." 
Nevertheless the Old Latin held a con- 
spicuous place, and was highly esteemed 
by the churchmen for centuries, both 
versions being used and existing side by 
side, much as the Revised Version and the 
King James Version exist in our own 
religious life to-ila^', until the Council of 
Trent gave to the Vulgate the official 
recognition of the Roman church. 

It was not until late in the seventh 
centuiy that any attempt was made to 
give our English ancestors any portion of 
the Bible in their own tongue: and even 
then, so low was the mental state of the 
people, anything like a written Gospel 
would have been of little use. As hardly 
any, either of the nobility or the peas- 
antry, could read their own tongue, there 
was little demand for a translation of the 
Scriptures. These were truly the " Dark 
Ages." Religious interest could only be 
aroused with any measure of success by 
appeals to the senses, and it v.'as by the 
ininistrj' of art and song that the sacred 
story first touched the popular heart, or 
caught the popular ear. Like all primitive 
peoples, the Saxons were most susceptible 
to the emotional songs of their bards, and 
no festivities were complete without the 
minstrel's lays in which they delighted. 
One of the foremost centres of religious 
life and light at this period was the 
famous Abbey of Whitby. High up on 
the cliils in the north of England, look- 
ing out over the North Sea, the Princess 
Hild had established her religious houses; 
and about her were gathered a goodly 
number of monks, and many lay helpers. 
Among the latter was Caedmon, the 
earliest of English singers, with whom 
English literature and the English Bible 
alike have their beginning, and to the 
" music of whose native harp," as one has 
said, " the Bible stoi-y, in the form of 
poetic paraphrase, begins to pass out of 
its old Latin into its new English dress, 
out of the dim seclusion of cell and 
school to the open sunlight of the country- 



side, and from the narrow limits of the 
parchment-scroU to the wandering min- 
strelsy of the vernacular poetry." Caed- 
mon was already an old man when, as the 
Venerable Bede, the Father of EngJish 
history tells us, " being at the feast where 
all agreed for glee sake to sing in turn, 
he no sooner saw the harp come toward 
him than he rose from the board and went 
out." As it was his day to look after the 
cattle, he went to the stables, where he 
so(ni after lay down and fell asleep. 
Presently a beautiful form, clothed in 
light, stood before liim, and said: 

" Sing, Caedmon ; sing some song to 
me." 

" I cannot sing," was Caedmon's sorrow- 
ful reply; "for this cause I left the hall 
and came hither." 

" Yet," said He who stood before him, 
" Yet, shalt thou sing to me." 

" What shall I sing ? " asked Caedmon. 

" The beginning of created things," re- 
plied his visitor. 

" Whereupon," continues Bede, '" he 
presently began to sing verses to the praise 
of God, which he had never heard. Awak- 
ening from sleep, he remembered all that 
I he had sung in his dream, and soon addwl 
nmch more to the same effect in verse 
worthy of the Deity. By his verses the 
minds of many were often excited to de- 
spise the world, and to aspire to heaven. 
Others after him attempted, in the Eng- 
lish nation, to compose religious poems, 
but none could ever compare with him, for 
he did not learn the art of poetry from 
man, but from God; for which reason he 
could never compose any trivial or vain 
poems, but only those which relate to re- 
ligion suited his religious tongue." But 
this minstrelsy was not confined to mo- 
nastic circles; its songs were sung befoi'e 
kings and warriors, and among the peas- 
antry in the villages and in their homes. 
Through these channels the Scriptui'e 
narratives circulated for generations, and 
the common people acquired in a forn\ 
which fixed itself in their memories a 
rudimentary Bible knowledge to which, 
otherwise, they must long have remained 
strangers; just as, fifteen centuries earliT 



412 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



I lie aueieiit Greeks lirst learned the 
.sturics of gods and men which hiter made 
the Greek Bible, — the Iliad, — through the 
songs of their minstrels in royal halls and 
at imblie festivals. 

])ut the sacred songs of Caedmon were 
not translations into the Saxon tongue, but 
merely free paraphrases of the Scripture 
narrative, and so may be regarded as a 
prologue of the long drama of the evolu- 
tion of the English Bible, whose first act 
calls us to the renowned monastery and 
school at Jarrow, near the mouth of the 
Wear. Here one of the world's great 
scholars had built up one of the most 
famous schools of the age. Beda, or as he 
is more familiarly known, the " Venerable 
Bede," was born close to the monastic 
halls at Jarrow in the year 673; and he 
never left the cloister's shades until he 
sweetly breathed out his life in prayer on 
Ascension Eve in the year 735. His en- 
tire life was devoted to study, teaching, 
and writing; and little by little he made 
himself nuistor of the whole range of the 
knowledge of his day, so that he became, 
as Burke justly styled him, " the father of 
English learning." Si.x hundred monks, 
besides strangers, gathered at Yarrow to 
enjoy Bede's instructions; and in treatises 
prepared as text-books for his scholars he 
brought together all the knowledge that 
the world had then accumulated in astron- 
omy, physics, iJiilosophy, rhetoric, gram- 
mar, music, arithmetic, and medicine. 
The best known of all these works was his 
" Ecclesiastical History of the English 
Nation," from which all that is really 
known of the century and a half follow- 
ing the landing of Augustine must be 
learned. As the historian Green has said, 
" Beda was at once the founder of 
mediaeval history and the first English 
historian." But notwithstanding his com- 
numding position and great learning, he 
remained to the last the simple, unaf- 
fected, loving and beloved master, whoso 
personal influence upon his students 
worked greater results even than his secu- 
lar and religious teachings; and there is 
liardly in all literature more tender and 
loving tribute to the memory of a great 



teacher than the letter in which Cuthbert, 
one of his disciples, writes to his fellow 
student, C'uthwiu, of the passing of the 
master. " He w-as much troubled," writes 
Cuthbert, " with shortness of breath, yet 
without pain, before the day of our Lord's 
resurrection, that is about a fortnight. 
During these days he labored to compose 
two works well worthy to be remembered, 
viz : he translated the Gospel of St. John 
as far as the words, ' But what are these 
among so many ' (John vi. 9) into our 
own tongue, and some collections out of 
the Book of Notes of Bishop Isodorus, 
saying, ' I will not have my pupils read a 
falsehood, nor labor therein without profit 
after my death.' When the Tuesday be- 
fore the Ascension of our Lord came, he 
began to suffer still more in his breath; 
but he passed all that day and dictated 
cheerfully, and now and then, among 
other things, he said ' Go on quickly, I 
kn(.iw not how long I shall hold out, and 
whether my Maker will not soon take me 
away.' By turns we read, and by turns 
we wept, nay, we wept always whilst we 
read." As the last day dawned, again the 
master called his scholars about him and 
bade them write. " There is still a chapter 
wanting," said the scribe as the morning 
wore on, " and it is hard for thee to ques- 
tion thyself anj' longer." " It is easily 
done," replied Bede ; " take thy pen and 
write quickly." And so, amid work and 
tears and farewells eventide approached. 
" There is yet one sentence unwritten, 
dear master," said the boy. " Write 
it quickly," bade the dying saint. And 
when after a little time the youth 
said, "See, dear master, it is finished 
now," the teacher replied, " You speak the 
truth; all is finished now. Receive my 
head into your hands, for it is a great sat- 
isfaction to me to sit facing my holy 
place, where I was wont to pray, that I 
may also sitting call upon my Father.'' 
" And thus," says Cuthbert, " on the pave- 
ment of his little cell, singing Glory be to 
the Father, and to the Son, and to the 
Holy Ghost, when he had named the Holy 
Ghost he breathed his last, and so de- 
jiarted to the Heavenly kingdom." 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



413 



Of the character of this translation, the 
dying gift of the great teacher to his 
spiritual children, nothing can now be 
known, as no copy of the work has come 
down to our day. Still, the Venerable 
Eede stands as the first link in the chain 
of translators which, through Wyclif, 
Tyndale, Coverdalc, and their successors 
in the continuous work of revision, binds 
the eighth to the nineteenth century in 
the history of the English Bible. 

From the middle of the eighth to the 
close of the thirteenth century was a bar- 
ren period in Saxon intellectual and re- 
ligious life. For more than two hundred 
yeai's the country was repeatedly laid 
waste by Danish invaders, only to be fol- 
lowed, before peace had brought any last- 
ing results, by the more complete con- 
quests by the Xormans in the eleventh 
ccntin-y. That anything Saxon survived 
the liarbarous destruction of life and 
liroperty that paralyzed all endeavor and 
Idighted all national hopes of this period, 
is strong evidence of the enduring vitality 
of the love of independence, of justice, 
and of wisdom, which were the basic prin- 
ciples of the better Saxon character, and 
which have become the rich heritage of 
the later English nation. The success of 
the Norman invasion resulted in a more 
complete subjugation than had attended 
the inroads of the Danes; and a strange 
language and a religion that seemed 
hardly less strange to them were forced 
upon the people. The Saxon clergy were 
turned out of their churches and livings 
and were replaced by priests from Nor- 
mandy, who despise<l both the native lan- 
guage and the people who spoke it ; and as 
the whole spirit of the Church on the con- 
tinent was adverse to any translations of 
the Scriptures into vulgar tongues, not 
only was nothing done to enlighten the 
people, but even the few versions that ex- 
isted in the Saxon tongue were con- 
temptuously cast aside and destroyed. 
During the intervals of peace previous to 
the Norman conquest, sporadic attempts 
at translation of parts of the Bible, es- 
pecially of the Gospels and the Psalter, had 
been made; but the whole life of the peo- 



ple had become that of the camp and not 
of the home, and so afforded no congenial 
soil for the propagation of the graces of 
literature and religion. The great, shin- 
ing figure of the entire period was that of 
the most noble and Christian king, Alfred. 




ALFRED THE GREAT. 

who accomplished marvelous things con- 
sidering the conditions ijnder which he 
labored. One of the great monuments of 
his reign was his collection into one body 
of all the laws of the Saxon realm, which 
he entitled " Alfred's Dooms." His intro- 
duction to this code, which began with 
these words, "The Dooms which the Al- 
mighty himself spake to Moses, and gave 
to him to keep, and after our Saviour 
Christ came to earth He said, ' He came 
not to break or forbid, but to keep them,' " 
was followed by the king's own transla- 
tion of the Ten Commandments into the 
native tongue, which thus became the first 
part of the most ancient law of England. 
Although the thoroughness of Williaii 
the Conqueror's plan contemplated the 
complete obliteration of the native lan- 
guage, as well as the supplanting of all 
national customs by the more refined 
modes of Norman French life, yet the 
sturdy patriotism of the conquered race 



414 



IROM COLONY TO WOELJJ POWEE. 



frustrated his purposes. The Saxon 
priests, driven from their eliurehcs. be- 
came wandering friars, and, going from 
liamlet to hamlet, kept alive the fires of 
nationalism and became the iuspirers of 
new hopes in the subjugated, but not sub- 
clued people. So that, though Norman 
Frcneh was the only language of the 
eourt, the church, the school, and for the 
transaction of all public afPairs, yet the 
native tongue was cherished with all the 
sentiment of nationality and fellowship 
that its use inspired, in the halls of the 
old Saxon nobles, and in the rude homos 
of the people. What this double life of 
the people meant is most interestingly 
portrayed in Scott's great novel, " Ivan- 
hoe." But the result of the friction be- 
tween the two languages was the gradual 
formation of a new one which was to be- 
come the medium of expression for all the 
thought and action of the great English- 




JliHX WYCLIF- 

speaking nations. Just when the change 
occurred cannot be marked, any more 
fhnn one can say when a child becomes 
a youth, or the youth a man. But the 
important point is that when the pent-np 
forces of national and i-eligious life and 



thought broke through the barriers that 
had so long restrained them, the imnicrtal 
verse of Chaucer, as well as the noble and 
dignified prose of Wyclif, found a lan- 
guage rich enough in its vocabulary, and 
flexible enough in its fonn, to give full 
expression to the glowing fancy of the 
poet, and to the exalted protests and pas- 
sionate denunciations of the great re- 
former. There have been certain great 
periods in the evolution of the Divine 
plans as manifested in the world's history, 
which no expression seems so well to de- 
scribe as Paul's pregnant one, — " the full- 
ness of time ; " and the era of the thir- 
teenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries 
appeared most forcefully to mark such a 
" fullness of time." It was the breaking 
of the morning light of a new and more 
glorious day for all mankind. In its 
earlier years a spirit of unrest and dis- 
content had become well-nigh universal 
that boded ill for all the forces of tyranny 
and despotism that enslaved the minds, 
as well as the bodies, of the mass of the 
people: and there is no more interesting 
study than to trace the influence of the 
English Bible in arousing, stimulating, 
and directing the course of these uplifting 
nidvements. 

The most notable of all the heralds of 
the new day, the most intelligent and de- 
termined of all " Reformers before the 
Reformation," was John Wyclif. The 
date of his birth is uncertain, but was 
previous to 1320; and the period of his 
life covers a time of grievous distress 
throughout Europe. The most terrible 
plague the world has ever known, the so- 
called " Black Death," advancing from 
the East, devastated all Europe, and in 
1348 invaded England; and of the popula- 
tion, then estimated at between three and 
four millions, more than one half suc- 
cumbed to its dread power. No words can 
describe the effects of its ravages upon the 
social life of the kingdom. All industry 
was paralyzed, and famine stalked in the 
steps of the pestilence. The land was un- 
filled, and even where crops came to ma- 
turity, no one could be found to harvest 
them and they rotted in the fields. Down 



THE EEVISION OF THE BIBLE — IShS. 



415 



to the thirteenth century, the great mass 
of the people was made up of peasants 
attached to the soil, mere serfs, — a little 
higher in the scale of life than the cattle, 
but not much. As a result of the great 
scarcity of laborers, those whom the 
plague had passed by recognized the op- 
portunity that was placed in their hands 
and made bold and determined strikes for 
fi'ccdom. The line of demarcation be- 
tween the rich and the poor was painfully 
distinct, with the result that the same 
social and industrial questions that agitate 
the life of to-day sprang fully developed 
into existence in Wyclif's time. 

Moreover the state of religion only ag- 
gravated the conditions of social life. 
The church had only the husks of re- 
ligious forms to ofPer suffering humanity. 
The monasteries and church institutions 
had become enormously rich, while dire 
poverty and ignorance oppressed the 
people. The clergy as a class were 
ignorant and corrupt. Their chief in- 
terest in the people was to extort by 
masses and pardons the last farthing 
from them, " as if," as an old writer ex- 
pressed it. " God hail given His sheep not 
to be pastured but to be 'shaven and 
shorn." And, as though their cup of 
misery was not full. Christians through- 
out Europe were, for fifty years, scandal- 
ized by the quarrels of rival Popes at 
Rome and at Avignon, each anathematiz- 
ing and hurling damnation at the other, 
while marshaling their armies and 
slaughtering men, women, and children 
for their own aggrandizement. Truly, the 
" fullness of time " had arrived. Space 
forbids any reference in detail to the 
events hy which Wyclif was led, step by 
step, to his final break with the church; 
but when it came, it was decisive, and 
marked the birth of new forces, and doc- 
trines that were to result later in the re- 
ligious reformation of the sixteenth cen- 
tury, and in the establishment of political 
and civil liberty in the seventeenth. For- 
tunately, the situation between Edward 
III. and the Papacy was strained, so that 
Wyclif could rely upon political protec- 
tion in his agitation, without which he 



would have been quickly silenced. With 
unflinching courage he declared : " If 
there were a hundred Popes, and if all 
friars were cardinals, one ought not to 
trust them in matters of faith except 
as they agree with Holy Scripture." In 
works of great force of learning and argu- 
ment he assailed one after another the 
various positions of the Papacy, striking 
at the very heart of its teachings when 
ho denied the doctrine of transubstantia- 
tion. But the great reformer saw that he 
must get the life-giving truths of the Gos- 
pel into the hands and the hearts of the 
people, and so determined to make his 
translation of the Bible into the English 
language. But even with that made, he 
recognized that its circulation must be 
very limited, and confined to the class that 
he was least desirous of reaching. The 
mere writing out of the words of the en- 
tire Bible was the work of months, and it 
is estimated that a copy could not cost less 
than two hundred doHars. Wyclif. there- 
fore, conceived the plan of organizing 
bodies of lay preachers who should go 
among the people; and for their use little 
tracts were prepared, made up of quota- 
tions from the Gospels and the Psalter, 
which they carried into the hovels of the 
poor throughout the hind, explaining, as 
they went, the full purport of the texts 
left with them. Wyclif's cardinal doc- 
trine was the Fatherhood of God, and the 
direct relation of each child to the Father, 
involving the infinite value of each in- 
dividual human soul, and the brotherhood 
of all men as children of the one Father. 
In this creed there was no place for a 
hierarchy of priests, nor for the saving 
power of sacraments; each child was in 
direct communication with, and was the 
heir to, all tlie love and bounty of an In- 
finite Father. This was new doctrine, and 
to the hungry bodies and souls of the suf- 
fering people it was most palatable and 
promised peace and plenty. 

Just when Wyclif began his transla- 
tion of the Bible into English canmit 
be determined, though the entire work 
was completed in 1.382. It is certain 
that a part of the Old Testament was 



416 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



translated by Nicholas of Hereford, 
one of Wyclif's Balliol scholars. The 
translation was made from the Latin 
Vulgate, ■which had already become very 
corrupt as the result of constant copying, 
without reference to Hebrew or Greek 
manuscripts; and so has the many defects 
of a translation from a translation. But 




wyclif's pulpit. 

the great truths of the Gospels and of the 
New Testament Wyclif wrote out not for 
scholars or nobles, but for the common 
people, and he suited his style to those for 
whom he wrote. Plain, vigorous, and 
homely were his expressions, yet of such 
dignity and solemn grace as to fix the at- 
tention of all readers. The master was 
not blind to the faults of the work, how- 
ever, and was preparing for a new re- 
vision, when on the last Sunday of the 
year 13.S4, while serving at the altar of his 
church at Lutterworth, in the very act of 
elevating the Sacrament, he was suddenly 
stricken with palsy, and passed away on 
the last day of the year without having 
spoken once. It is needless to say that his 
death brought gTcat rejoicing into the fold 
of the Church, while its manner was 
Imiilly advertised by the monks, and de- 
clared to be the direct judgment of God 
upon Ills heresies. One of their writers 



thus refers to the subject : " The devil's 
instrument, church's enemy, people's con- 
fusion, heretic's idol, hj-pocrite's mirror, 
schism's broacher, hatred's sewer, store- 
house of lies, flatterer's sink, was stricken 
by the horrible judgment of God, breathed 
forth his soul to the dark mansion of the 
black devil." And the more dignified, but 
no more friendy, Knighton says: "This 
-John Wyclif translated into the Anglic, 
not angelic, tongue, the Gospels. Whence 
it is mad? vulgar by him, and more open 
to the reading of the lay men and women 
than it usually is to the knowledge of let- 
tered men and intelligent clergy, and thus 
the pearl is cast abroad and trodden under 
feet of swine. The jewel of the church is 
turned into the common sport of the peo- 
ple." Very diiferent has been the estimate 
of posterity. An eminent German bi- 
ographer (Buddenseig: Wyclif) has well 
summed up the present-day opinion of the 
great refonner and his work : "As a bold 
and powerful critic of papal abuses, and 
as a mighty champion of the principle 
that the authority of the Bible is higher 
than the authority of the Church, — a prin- 
ciple which had been buried since the very 
earliest Christian times, — it can be said 
of Wyclif that he has profoundly affected 
the entire spirit of the Western world. 
His blow struck a spark from the flint, 
Hus applied the spark to the coals, and 
Luther, having lighted the torch of the 
Reformation at these coals, bore it aloft 
until all Europe saw its light and felt its 
heat." 

The unfinished work of revision was 
taken up b.v Wyclif's friend and curate at 
Lutterworth. Richard Purvey, and was 
completed in 1388. Purvey's Preface to 
his great work is hardly less interesting 
than the work itself, manifesting as it does 
the spirit and purpose that had animated 
him in his labors. He says: "A simpel 
creature hath translated the scrijiturc out 
of Latin into Englische. First, this sim- 
pel creature had much travayle (labor) 
with divers fellows and helpers to gather 
many old Bibles and other doctors and 
glosses to make one Latin Bihle some deal 
true and then shiJii if anew, the texte and 



THE REVISION OE THE BIBLE — 1SS5. 



417 



any otlier help he might get, especially 
Lyra on the Old Testament, which helped 
him much with his work. The third time 
to counsel with the olde grammarians and 
old divines of hard words and hard sen- 
tences, how they might best be under- 
stood and translated, the fourth time to 
translate as clearly as he could to the 
sense, and to have many good fellows and 
cunnynge at the correcting of the transla- 
cion. ... A translator hath great 
uede to studie well the sense both before 
and after, a7id then also he hath nede to 
live a dene life and he full devout in 
preiers, and have not his wit occupied 
about the worldi things, that the Holy 
Spyrit, author of all wisdom and cun- 
nynge and truihe, dresse him for Iiis work, 
and suffer him not to err." 

These two versions are generally classed 
together as the Wyclif Bible and rightly 
so, if one understands their history. Pur- 
vey's work was done in no spirit critical 
or envious of his master's, but in the most 
loving sympathy, and all that gave 
to Wyclifs translation its distinctive 
strength and charm was retained. Not- 
withstanding the great expense of this 
work, its circulation must have been verj' 
extensive, as, in spite of all the penal acts 
of the few years following whose purpose 
was to utterly destroy every vestige or line 
of the books, there are now in existence 
one hundred and seventy copies of the 
Wyclif Bible. The hunger of the people 
for the Word becomes strikingl.y manifest 
when we realize that, as an old writer has 
stated, " the readers of the book were 
burned with the cojjies around their 
nocks; that men and women were ex- 
ecuted for teaching their children the 
Lord's ijrayer and the commandments in 
English ; that husbands were made to wit- 
ness against their wives, and children 
forced to light the death fires of their 
parents; and possessors of the banned 
Wyclif Bible were hunted down as if they 
were wild beasts." " Certes," says old John 
Fox, " the zeal of those Christian days 
seems superior to this of our careless 
times." 

That " God moves in a mysterious way 
J.1 



Ilis wonders to perform " is recognized as 
a truism; nor is it less marvelous how Ho 
uses the most untoward and unrelated 
events, apparently, to further His vast de- 
signs. About twenty-five years after 
Wyclif had fallen asleep, little Johann 
Gooseflesh was having a dull morning in 
his German home. Left to amuse himself 
he began to cut the letters of his name out 
of bark, and to put them together in their 
proper order. Accidentally dropping the 
last one into a pot of purple dye that 
stood beside the stove, he thoughtlessly 
thrust his hand into the boiling liquid 
and pulled the letter out, only to drop it 
again as quickly. But this time it fell 
upon a white dressed skin that was lying 
close at hand, and lo! he had a beautiful 



■ 




MB 


H 


W 


■^9^' ^rW. 1 


^■j 




'^i^^M^^KMM 


H 


m\ 


B M *^ ''^^B. 'M 


1 


Mm 


^Qh| 


Bl 




m 


II 


V -^■■" 


^^1 



JOHANN GUTENBERG. 

purple " h " printed on a rich yellowish 
ground of vellum. It was a trifling mat- 
ter, but evidently impressed itself upon 
little Johann's mind; for about forty 
years later Johann Gutenberg — he has 
dropped his father's name and taken his 
mother's more euphonious one — is turning 
out the first book ever printed from niov- 



418 



FllOll COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



able type, in li.jO. And what could be 
more fitting- than that it should be a 
copy of the Latin Vulgate Bible, which is 
now known as the " Mazarin Bible," and 
has become one of the rarest and most 
costly books in the world — the last copy 
Sold a few years ago. from the library of 
Lord Ashburnham. having brought f-t.OtM), 
or $20,000. 

A few years before the invention of 
printing and the publication of the first 
printed book, the detestalile Turk had. be- 
gun to close in upon Constantinople with 
his armies. Happily there had been liv- 
ing in that city many very learned Greek 
scholars, whose worldly goods consisted 
chiefly of old manuscripts of the works of 
Homer, and of Plato and Aristotle, of 
Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides; and 
far more interesting for our purposes were 
the many copies they had of very old 
manuscripts of the Bible in Greek. Fear- 
ing the excesses of the Turks they began 
to migrate into western Europe, bearing 
their sacred treasures with them. They 
found friendly shelter at the courts of 
some of the patrons of learning, like the 
Medici in Florence, and at the great uni- 
versities. And for the first time all the 
glories of Greek literature and philosoph.y 
illuminated the intellectual world of 
western Europe. Hungry Bible students 
became possessed of ancient texts of the 
Bible books in their original language and 
so became familiar with readings by 
which it was possible to correct the cor- 
rupt texts of the V.ulgate. The effect of all 
this was electrical, and the light of the 
new learning soon banished the shadows 
of the Dark Ages, stirring enthusiasm and 
arousing such a larger thirst for knowl- 
edge as never had been known before. So 
little Johann Gooseflesh and the unspeak- 
able Turk became the moving forces in 
events the most beneficent for all man- 
kind that have occurred since the Saviour 
walked the earth. 

With this broadening of the intellectual 
vision came the impulse to test every- 
thing; and all existing institutions. — 
political, religious, social, — all were put 
on trial. This awakenniir was one 



phase of the great change called the 
Renaissance which came over the Western 
world, starting at an undefined jieriod 
towards the close of the ^Middle Ages, and 
whose influence is still potent among all 
civilized peoples. As has been well said : 
" Expressed in terms of literature, we call 
it the revival of letters. Expressed in 
terms of religion, we call it the Reforma- 
tion. Contrasted with medisevalism the 
Renaissance is like a bright fresh morning 
after a i-lose and sultry night. It repre- 
sents the change in men's views of life 
from asceticism to freedom and human- 
ism; from the monastery to the college; 
from a civilization based on Feudalism 
and educated by the Latin Church to a 
civilization educated by science and bused, 
within the restrictions of nationality, in 
a spiritual intcr-comnumity of ideas anil 
interests." An interesting fact regarding 
this great movement on its religious side 
is that it has been confined, almost with- 
out exception, to races (if Teutonic de- 
s;cnt; while all tlie Latin races, and those 
that have come under their conquering in- 
fluence, have clung to the old Cluirch. 
.Viiiong these Teutonic races the Bible has 
hi'en the teacher and guide in their con- 
tinued advance toward civil and religious 
liberty. Luthi'r posted his faniiiu~ 
" Thesc»s " on the door of the church at 
Wittenberg in l.'ilT, which was the first 
definite step in the great religious refor- 
nuition; and the smoke of the initial battle 
had hardly cleared away before he was at 
work upon his translation of the Bible 
into the popular German tongue; he, like 
all the great reformers, being convinced 
that neither civil nor ecclesiastical ab- 
solutism could long hold in their fetters 
peoples familiar with the great, essential 
truths of the Bible, all of which make for 
freedom. Luther's translation of the Xew 
Testament, with pertinent commentary, 
was published in 1522; and his comideted 
Bible in l.')3-l. The New Testament, with 
many of Luther's tracts, soon found their 
wa.v into England, and were somewhat im- 
portant factors in the early reform move- 
ment there; while, with the first printed 
edition of the Greek Testament, edited by 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



41!) 



1;lie foremost Greek scholar of the age, 
Erasmus, they spurred on the impulse 
which was constantly becoming more im- 
perative for an English Bible, translated 
directly from the new-old manuscripts 
which had only recently come to the 
knowledge of Western scholars. 

In 1484, the year after the birth uf 
Luther, and one hundred years after the 
death of Wyclif, William Tyndale was 
born, the most important personality con- 
nected with the whole history of our Eng- 
lish Bible. Distinguished at a very early 
age for his remarkable scholarship, he was 
entered at Oxford, where he took high 
rank. Changing to Cambridge University 
later he fell in with Erasmus, who had 
recently completed his Greek Testament. 
Tyndale quickly made himself familiar 
with this, and his spirit was stirred to its 
depths by ttiis wonderful revelation of 
Divine love. It had all the force of a 
new revelation, and aroused a spirit of 
earnest study and discussion among the 
priests at the universities; and on one oc- 
casion, in the heat of controversy, when 
the opponent of Tyndale had affirmed, 
" We had better be without God's laws 
than the Pope's," Tyndale indignantly de- 
clared, " I defy the Pope, and all his laws; 
and if God spare me, I will one day make 
the boy that drives the plow in England 
to know more of Scripture than the Pope 
docs." 

As has been said, the first printed book 
was the Mazarin Bible, published in' 1456; 
and the impulse given to the new learning 
came largely as the result of the capture 
of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453. 
England, however, was more backward in 
appropriating the benefits resulting from 
those epochal events than were the nations 
on the Continent. Before the end of the 
fifteenth century about eighty editions of 
the Latin Bible had been published in dif- 
ferent parts of Europe, and national ver- 
sions of the entire Bible were circulating 
in the German, Italian, French, Dutch, 
Danish, and Spanish languages. In his 
most Cuxcellent work on the " Evolution of 
the English Bible," Mr. H. W. Hoare has 
collected some data showing how limited 



had been the facilities for the. study of 
the original texts of the Scriptures, even 
if the scholars had possessed them. The 
public teaching of Greek was not intro- 
duced into the University of Paris until 
1458, and its earliest teacher at O.xford 
was Grocyn, who went to the University 
in 1492. The first Greek grammar was pub- 
lished in 1476, the first Greek lexicon in 
1480; while the earliest Hebrew grammar 




DESnJERIUS EH.4SJnTS. 

\vas printed in 150.3, which was followed 
b.v the first Hebrew lexicon three vears 
later. The first printed Hebrew Bible ap- 
peared in 1486 ; and the first printed New 
Testament in Greek, by Erasmus, was 
published in 1516. Printing was first in- 
troduced into England by Caxton, in 1470. 
So that, even if the clergy had been ani- 
mated by a desire to study any subjects 
other than those connected with ecclesias- 
tic Latin and the scholastic theology, the 
" tools " at their command could have af- 
forded them but little aid in their work. 
But as a matter of fact there was an utter 
paralysis of moral and intellectual pur- 
pose among the clergy, which means, of 
course, among nearly all the so-called 
learned men of Europe, as the Church, as 
a general proposition, embraced within its 



420 



FEOM COLOXV TO WOKLD roWKH. 



fold all the sc-liolars, as well as all the 
learning of the age. But this fact did not 
exalt the scholarship of the clergy to a 
high plane. Writing about the end of the 
fifteenth century the distinguished Car- 
dinal Bellarniine, no unfriendly critic, 
said : " Some years before the rise of the 
Lutlieran heresy there was almost an en- 
tire abandonment of equity in the ecclesi- 
astical judgments; in morals, no disci- 
])line; in sacred literature, no erudition; 
in divine things, no reverence. ReUgion 
was almost exlincf." And a few years later, 
in the preface to his work entitled " The 
Obedience of a Christian ]\Ian." Tyndale 
wrote : " Alas ! the curates themselves, for 
the most part, wot no more what the New 
(jr Old Testament meaneth than do the 
Turks, neither care they but to mumble 
so much every day as the pie and poppin- 




WH.LIAM TVN'UALi;. 

jay speak, they wot not what, to fill their 
bellies withal. If they will not let the 
layman have the word of God in his 
mother's tongue, yet let the priests have it, 
which for the greater part of them dri 
understand no Latin at all, but sing and 
patten all day with the lips only, that 
which the heart understandeth not." Still 
a little later. Hooper, Bishop of Glouces- 
ter, made a visitation in his diocese, and 



examined three hundred and eleven clergy. 
Of these, he reported, one hundred and 
sixty-eight ive're iinahte to repeat the Ten 
Commandments; thirty-one were ignorant 
from whence the Decalogue came; forty 
could not repeat the Lord's prayer, and 
iihout the same number did not even know 
to whom it should be ascribed. If such 
were the shepherds, what of the sheep! 
And yet these unpriestly priests were con- 
tent to live in their fat livings, and had 
complete power of life and death in all 
(juestions of theology; and as all criticism 
of their habits and mode of life was as 
heretical as the denial of doctrines of the 
( hurch, the path of the reformer was 
thickly strewn with dangers, and promised 
only suffering and death in return for the 
most unselfish labors. All this Tyndale 
knew full well when he defied the Pope, 
and proclaimed his purpose to make the 
boy at the plough more conversant with 
the Scriptures than was the great head of 
the church, the Vicar of Christ. 

Before leaving the university Tyndale 
had already begun his work of transla- 
tion ; and having heard that Tunstall, the 
Bishop of London, was a patron of the 
new learning, he asked for permission to 
carry on the work in the episcopal palace 
under the bishop's patronage. But it was 
in the study of classical authors only that 
Tunstall was interested, and Tyndale's 
proposal received a very cold reception. 
Through the generosity of a wealthy mer- 
chant who had heard him preach, however, 
and who had become interested in him. 
Tyndale was able to continue his study 
and his work of translation during the 
greater part of the year 1523 under his 
patron's roof, and with his generous sup- 
port. But what he saw of the life of the 
clergy in London during the year proved 
to him that no mercy would be shown to 
one who shoid<l inidertake to give to the 
people the Bible in their own tongue. Al- 
I'cady many of Luther's writings were 
finding their way into England, and he 
saw men led to prison and even to execu- 
tion for possessing and reading such 
works. " Wherefore," as he sadly said. 
" I perceived that not only in my Lord 



THE EEVISIOX OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



421 



of London's palace but in all England 
tlicre was no room for attempting a trans- 
lation of the Scriptures." So in 1524 he 
sorrowfully left his native land never to 
see it again ; and at Hamburg-, in poverty 
and in distress and in constant danger, 
he most diligently prosecuted the worlv of 
translation, with the result that in 1525 
he was able to go to Cologne, the most 
famous center of printing at that time, 
and place the copy of the translation in 
the printer's hands. It was arranged that 
three thousand copies should be issued in 
a small quarto edition, with a prologue, 
references, marginal notes, and with divi- 
sions into chapters, — the division of chap- 
ters into verses came much later. But the 
spies of the Inquisition were everywhere 
through Europe; and one of its agent-, 
( 'ochlaeus, known among his Catholic con- 
temporaries as the " Scourge of Luther," 
was then in Cologne looking after the 
publication of a book of his own. Chanc- 
ing to be near a little group of composi- 
tors who were indulging rather freely in 
native wines, he overheard their boast 
that before long all England would become 
, Lutheran. Joining the party and gen- 
erously supplying all they would drink, 
he gradually learned the facts regarding 
Tyndale's translation. Cochlaeus at once 
applied to the magistrates, demanding that 
the sheets be seized and the work stopped ; 
and also dispatched a messenger to the 
English bishops warning them of their 
unexpected danger. But, happily, Tyn- 
dale was informed at his lodgings^of what 
had happened: and w'ith a friend rushed 
to the printer's, seized all the sheets that 
were printed, and hurriedly fled to Worms, 
where the enthusiasm for Luther and the 
Reformation was then at its height. 
There he at length succeeded in his noble 
purpose, producing for the first iiiar in 
modern English a complete Xew Testa- 
ment. Knowing that as a result of the 
disclosures of Cochlaeus the greatest 
vigilance would he exercised to prevent 
the entry of the books into England, they 
were dispatched secretly, packed in all 
kinds of merchandise, in barrels, in bales 
of cloth, in sacks of flour, and in every 



covert ■\\'ay that could be devised. Thou- 
sands of copies were, however, seized and 
burned with solemn ceremony at the old 
cross of St. Paul's " as a burnt ofEering 
most pleasing to Almighty God;" but 
other thousands supplied their place. The 
Church had not now to contend with the 
slow methods of production that attended 
the distribution of Wyclif's Xew Testa- 
ment ; the printing press could defy the 




ST. PATTL S CROSS. 

utmost diligence of the opponents of the 
work. " In burning the book," wrote 
Tyndale, " they did none other thing than 
I looked for ; no more shall they do if they 
burn me also, if it be God's will that it 
should be so." 

Seeing that they could not keep the 
books out of the country, Bishop Tunstall 
conceived the brilliant scheme of buying 
up the whole edition in Germany. He ac- 
cordingb' sought out a merchant hav- 
ing extended connections with German 
business houses, Augustine Pakington. 
" Deeming," as the old chronicle has it, 
" that he hadde God by the toe, whanne 
in truthe he hadde, as after he thought, 
the devyl by the fiste." the bishop urged 
Pakington to use all diligence and get 
the books for him, and he would gladly 
give him whatever they might cost; as 
he intended " Surely to destroy them all 
and to burn them at Paul's Cross." A 
short time after, Pakington, who was 
friendly toward Tyndale and knew that 



422 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



his funds ivcre low, sought him out and 
said : 

" Master Tyndalo, I have found you a 
good purchaser for your books." 

" "Who is he '." asked Tyndale. 

" My Lord of London." 

" But if the Bisliop of London wants 
the books it must hi' only to burn them." 

" Well, what of that ? The Bishop will 
burn them anyway, and it is best that 
you should have the money to enable you 
to imjirint others instead." 

" S(i," as the ehrcmiele continues, "the 
Bishop had the books, Pakington had tlie 
thanks, and Tyndale had the money." 
"I am the gladder," (juoth Tyndale, " for 
these two benefits that shall come thereof. 
I shall get money to bring myself out of 
debt, and the whole world will cry out 
against the burning of God's word; and 
the overplus of the money that shall re- 
main with me shall make me more 
studious to correct the said New Testa- 
ment, ar.d so to imprint tlie same once 
again, and I trust the second will be much 
better than ever was the first." 

Finding that burning T.vndale's books 
could not prevent their distribution, a 
vigorous denunciation of them was made 
from all the pulpits of the land, wliich was 
more efPective, as only one side of the 
question was presented. In 1.529, how- 
ever, one of tile most powerful preachers 
of the time, Hugh Latimer, who fortu- 
natel.v enjoyed tlie favor of the King, 
preached at Cambridge his celebrated 
" Sermons on the Card," in whicli he fear- 
lessly championed the translation and uni- 
versal reading of the Holy Scriptures. 
The rage of the friars knew no bounds, 
and it was especiall.v quickened by tlio 
realization of the fact that his reasoning 
was so unanswerable. After many con- 
ferences, however, they decided that an 
opposition s-.'rmon must be preached. 
Friar Buckingham was chosen as their 
champion, and a Sunday was selected on 
whicli he sliould answer Latimer. On the 
Sunday named, a great audience assem- 
bled; and to illustrate the character of the 
arguments of the opponents of biblical 
translation, we quote a few sentences from 



the sermon. " Thus," asked the preacher 
triumphantly, "where Scripture saith, no 
man that layeth his hand to the plough 
and looking back is fit for the Kingdom 
of God, will not the ploughman -when he 
readeth these words be apt to forthwith 
cease from his plough, and then where will 
be the sowing and the harvest? Likewise, 
also, whereas the baker readeth, 'A little 
leaven leavenetli the whole lump,' will he 
not forthwith be too sparing in the use of 
leaven to the great injury of our health? 
And so, also, when the simple man reads 
the words, ' If thine eye offend thee, pluck 
it out, and cast it from thee,' incontinent 
hi' will i)luck out his eyes and so the whole 
realm will be full of blind men, to the 
great decay of the nation and the manifest 
loss of the King's grace. And thus, by 
reading of the Holy Scripture, will the 
whole realm come into confusion." It 
would, indeed, be surjjrising- if any such 
puerile arguments could have influenced 
anyone ; and it was becoming more evi- 
dent every da.v that no persecution, no 
burning of books, no preaching against 
them availed to abate the constantly in- 
creasing thirst the people had for the _ 
Scriptures. In spite of all opposition 
Tyndale's books were ever>'where bought, 
talked about, and read. " It passeth my 
power," wrote one bishop to the primate, 
" or that of any spiritual man, to hinder 
it now; and if this continue much longer 
it will undo Its all.'' 

But Tyndale had not rested after the 
completion of his earlier work. He soon 
began the great task of translating the 
Old Testament from the original Hebrew 
into English; and as the first fruit of this 
labor appeared his translation of the Pen- 
tateuch in 1,530. In 1531 he pulilislied his 
translation of the book of Jonah, with a 
lengthy prologue, reviewing the condition 
of ecclesiastical affairs in England. After 
this for some time he seems to have devoted 
himself to revision, as he expressed his 
purpose of doing when Pakington's deal 
with the Bishop of London was eonsuni- 
mated; «'(7/( the result that in 1.534 lie 
pnlilishcd a thorough revision of his New 
Testament of 1525. Tliis revision lias al- 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



423 



ways been regarded as Ihe crowning glory 
uf the great scholar's work. He had carried 
into it the same pious enthusiasm which 
had characterized his labors in translation. 
The first edition had api^eared anony- 
mously for several reasons; but the revi- 
sion of 1534 had Tyndale's name on the 
title page, and the preface is headed, 
" William Tindale yet once more to the 
Christen reader." Prefaces were also 
written for each book excepting Acts and 
Revelation, and the original marginal 
notes were all rewritten. 

But Tyndale's enemies were many and 
powerful in England, and they were not 
inactive. For years the weary, hunted, 
hungry, poverty-stricken exile in Genuan 
towns had eluded emissaries, though all 
the subtle craft of the state as well as of 
the Church had been exercised to get him 
into their power. But he " was simple, 
and inexpert in the wily subtleties of the 
world;" and through the influence of Sir 
Thomas More a villainous clergyman, of 
the most plausible appearance and char- 
acter however, was sent to Antwerp, where 
Tyndale was then working, to gain the 
friendship and confidence of the lonely 
exile. The scheme worked only too well. 
Tyndale became deeply attached to this 
man Phillips, and confided in him, even 
loaning him money from his ill-lined 
purse, and caring for him in sickness. 
His friend Poyntz. with whom Tyndale 
was lodging in Antwerp, was suspicious of 
Phillips and warned his lodger to be on 
his guard. Unfortunatelj, however, Phil- 
lips one day succeeded in leading him 
some distance from his lodgings, when 
confederates attacked them, and Tyndale 
was carried off to the Castle of Vilvorde. 
near Brussels, where he was cast into a 
dungeon, which he was never to leave 
again. 

If the value of civil liberty and spii'itual 
enlightenment could be measured, it 
would doubtless be found that all Eng- 
lish-speaking peoples owe as much to 
Tyndale as to any other one man on the 
long roll of their benefactors; and it is 
pitiful to read the appeals to the governor 
of the castle of this helpless sufferer who 



was wearing out his life in cold and misery 
that his countrymen might gain a per- 
sonal knowledge of the true God. He 
writes, " I beg your lordship, and that by 
the Lord Jesus, that if I am to remain 
here during the winter you will request 
the Procurcur to be kind enough to send 
me from my goods which he has in his 
possession a warmer cap, for I suffer ex- 
tremely from a perpetual catarrh, which 
is much increased by this cell. A warmer 
coat also, for that which I have is very 
thin; also a piece of cloth to patch my 
leggins; my shirts, too, are all worn out." 
And again, " I wish permission to have 
a candle in the evening, for it is a weary 
work to sit alone in the darl-. But above 
all things, I entreat and beseech your 
clemency to be urgent with the Procureur 
that he may kindly suffer me to have my 
Hebrew Bible, grammar, and dictionary 
that I may spend my time with that 
study." After a confinement of about 
eighteen months, of which but few partic- 
ulars are obtainable, on the 6th of Octo- 
ber. 1536, the great, good man was stran- 
gled at the stake, and then his body 
burned to ashes, — his last words heing, 
"Lord, open the King of England's eyes." 
All previous English Versions of the 




VILVORDE CASTLE. 

T'ible, or parts of it, were simply transla- 
tions of translations, being taken from 
some edition of the Vulgate, or older 
Latin Versions. Tyndale's translation is 
distinguished not only by the fact that he 
went back for the first time to the orig- 



424 



FEOM COLOA^Y TO WOKLU POWEE. 



iual Hebrew and Greek texts, seeking the 
true meaning of Scriptures in the orig- 
inal lansuiiiie, but also because of the won- 
derful character of the translation itself. 
He fixed for all subsequent time tlie mold 
in which the Scripture translations should 




MYLES COVERDALE. 

run, and all later versions, in(dudinf;' our 
so-called Authorized Version, are in 
reality little more than revisions of 
Tyndale's work; and all the sim- 
plicity, the lioauty, the majesty of lan- 
guage and style that have nnule our Bible 
the crowning- glory of the English lan- 
guage, — all belong to Tyndale. As 
Frouile has well said: "The peculiar 
genius which breathes through the English 
Bible, the mingled tenderness and maj- 
esty, the Saxon simplicity, the grandeur. 
unci|ualed, unapproached in the attempted 
improvement of modern scholars, all are 
111 re, and bear the impress of the mind 
of one man, and that man, William 
Tyndale." 

Following Tyndale's death the change 
in the official English sentiment was rapid 
and complete; and could the noble martyr 
rd' 1536 have lived but four years longer 
he would have seen the answer to his 
in-ayer. for the eyes of the King of Eng- 
land were opened, though one may hardly 



admire the causes that led to that desired 
consummation. After Tyndale, the name 
most frequently and most closely con- 
nected with Bible revision was that of 
ilyles Coverdale. Born in 1488, he was 
as a young man attached to the monastery 
of the Augustine friars at Cambridge; 
and later was a member of the " Club of 
Lutherans" in the University. Though 
little is known of his early life, he seems 
to have been an occasional visitor at the 
house of Sir Thomas More, and to 
have become intimately acquainted with 
Cromwell, who was rapidly rising in 
power and was to succeed his master, 
Wolsey, in his influence with Henry 
YIII. About the year 152C Cover- 
dale became a secular priest, and in 
1528 worked in tlie county of Suffolk, 
preaching against the Mass, compulsory 
confession, and the worslup of images. It 
is supposed that this course led to his en- 
forced retirement to the Continent, where 
in 1529 he is said to have met Tyndale at 
Hamburg, and to have worked with him 
on his translation of the Pentateuch. 
Though there is no reliable account of 
Coverdale's movements between 1529 and 
15;;5, it has been surmised that Cromwell, 
who had become Secretary of State, see- 
ing the course affairs were taking, deter- 
mined to be ready with a new Bible to 
introduce at the opportune moment. 
Knowing Henry's hatred of Tyndale and 
the consequent impossibility of using his 
translation, the supposition is that the 
Secretary communicated with his old 
friend Coverdale, encouraging him to be 
ready with a version of his own. How- 
ever this may be, it is certain that in 
15;iG, while Tyndale still languished in the 
Vilvorde dungeon, a new Bible appeared 
in England, printed in black letter, and of 
small folio size, containing an elaborate 
and obsequious dedication to King Henry, 
which was signed by his " humble subjecto 
and dayle oratour, Myles Coverdale." 
This Bible makes no pretense to being a 
new and original translation ; it is, as its 
title page states, " translated out of 
Douche and Lat.vn into Englishe, with 
the help of five sundry interpreters," that 



THE KEVISION OE THE lilELE — ISbi 



425 



is, translators ; and the chief of these was 
evidently Tyndale. whom he practically 
copies in the New Testament. 

This Coverdale Bible is sometimes 
called " The Treacle Bible," because of 
its rendering- of Jeremiah viii. 22 : " Is 
there no treacle in Gilead '. " The exigen- 
cies of the obsequious editors are well il- 
lustrated by the reference to the King's 
" dearest, juste wyfe, and most virtuous 
princesse," who is named in the first 
edition as Ane. Dr. Smythe tells us that 
the copy now in the British Museum has 
the same inscription, but Am has been 
changed to Jane, — thus, JAne. Other 
copies have some Ane and some Jane, 
while some leave the space blank, the 
editors apparentlj- being unable to keep 
pace with Henry's rapid matrimonial ven- 
tures. 

The version known as " Matthew's 
Bible " appeared in 1537. This was really 
the work of John Itogers, one of the noted 
early reformers and the literary executor 
of Tyndale, who suffered martyrdom dur- 
ing Mary's reign. The suppression of his 
name is easily accounted for by his well- 
known close connection with Tyndale, as 
well as on account of his liberal opinions. 
This version was Tyndale's work pure and 
simple, excepting the latter half of the 
Old Testament, which the latter did not 
live to complete; that matter was taken 
chiefly from Coverdale's Bible. The pe- 
culiar thing about the reception of 
]\iatthew's Bible was the fact that Tyn- 
dale's work was not recognized at the time, 
though all his anti-papal marginal notes 
were reproduced exactly as in the original 
edition. Archbishop Cranmer, one of 
Tyndale's bitterest opponents, declared the 
Jfatthew's " better . than any translation 
heretofore made." nnd he would " rather 
see it licensed by the King than receive 
£1,000." Moreover he thought "if they 
waited till the bishops should set forth a 
better translation they would wait till the 
day after doomsday." 

In 15.39 what is known as " Taverner's 
Bible " appeared ; but this was little more 
than a revision of " Matthew's Bible," by 
a private seholai'. 



But there were several reasons, mostly 
political, why none of these versions were 
entirely satisfactory. Cromwell and 
others high in authority were determined 
to have the Scriptures in a form that 
should really be worthy to stand as a Na- 
tional Bible. Again Coverdale was ap- 
pealed to and he took charge of the work. 
Apparejitly thinking that there was virtue 
in bigness, it was arranged that this 
should be the largest liible ever made, and 
that it should be produced in the most 
perfect form mechanically. Accordingly, 
it was arranged that the printing should 
be done by Eegnault of Paris, one of the 
most famous bookmakers of the period; 
and Coverdale went to Paris in 153S to 
suiJervise the work. Although Regnault 
had a special license from the King of 
Eranec to prosecute this work, they 
labored in constant fear of the inter- 
ference of the Inquisitor General oi the 
Inquisition ; and before the work was com- 
pleted in December, an order for confisca- 
tion was issued, and Eegnault was cited. 
By some jjeculiar business transaction, 
however, in which bribery was understood 
to be an important factor, a large pro- 
portion of the sheets were soon recovered; 
and then Regnault's entire outfit for this 
work was moved to London, — compositors, 
type, presses, and all, — where the work 
was completed. This " Great Bible " as 
it has always been called, was first pub- 
lish.ed in April, 1539, and "was autlior- 
ized to be read and frequented in every 
Church in the Kingdom." It was a very 
large folio, in black letter, and was re- 
garded, as the finest, sijecimen of the 
printer's art extant. One of its distinc- 
tive features was a marvelous allegorical 
frontispiece said to have been designed by 
Hans Holbein. In anticipation of the ap- 
pearance of this work Cromwell had pre- 
pared an injunction, issued in September, 
1 538, by which all the clergj- were ordered 
to provide before a specified date "one 
hol-e of the whole hihle, in the largef^f 
volume, in Englyshe, sett up in summe 
conrenijent place ivithin the church that 
lie have cure of, %'liereat your parishoners 
may most commodiously resort to the 



426 



FROM. COLOxN'Y TO WOKLU POWEK. 



same and read yt." This iujunction had 
the full authority of a royal command; 
and thus within thirteen years of the 
hurning of Tyndale's New Testament at 
St. Paul's cross, the battle for the free 
use of the English Bible had been fought 
and won. First, forbidden; then, silently 
tolerated; and next licensed, it was now 
commanded by the King's highness to be 
set up for the benefit of each one of the 
many thousand parishes of the land. 
This meant that in every church at least 
one of these " Great Bibles " should be 
placed on a stand, or attached to the 
pillars or wall of the church in such a 
way that any person who was so inclined 
could have free access to it at any time. 
Bishop Bonner had six of the Bibles set 
up in St. Paul's; and we are tohl that 
" numy well disposed people used nuich to 
resort to the hearing thereof, especially 
when they could get any that ha<l an 
audible voice to read to them." And the 




A CHAINED lilBLE 

name of one young man, otherwise un- 
known to fame, John Porter, has become 
historic, because he was large of body and 
lusty of voice, " a fresh young man of 
big stature," who delighted many by his 
reading of the Word. As the old chronicle 



has it : " Oue John Porter used sometimes 
to be occupied in that goodly exercise, to 
the edifying of himself as well as others; 
and great multitudes would resort thither 
to hear him, because he could read well 
and had an audible voice." And the old 
annalist, Strype, in his life of Archbishop 
Cranmer, said: "It is wonderful to see 
with what joy this book of God was re- 
ceived, not only among the learned sort, 
but generally, all England over, among 
all the vulgar and common ijeople, and 
with what greediness God's word was 
read. Everybody that could bought the 
book, or busily read it, or got others to 
read it to them." 

But what was this " Great Bible ? " It 
has been variously described as a compil- 
ation from Matthew's and Coverdale's 
Bibles, and as a revision of Matthew's, 
Coverdale acting as editor, with reference 
to some other versions. But the inter- 
esting fact is that it is, like its prede- 
cessors, in reality only another version Oi 
Tyndale's great work; and that the noblt 
martyr " though dead, yet speaketh." A 
second edition, in which parts of the Old 
Testament were revised, appeared in 
April. 1540, which was followed by two 
more editions that year, and three the 
next year, 1541. The edition of Novem- 
ber. 1540, bore on its title page an author- 
ization by Tunstall. Bishop of London, 
who thus gave official sanction to the 
work of Tyndale, which fourteen years 
before he had ijroscribed and burned at 
the cross of St. Paul's. 

But a reaction now set in, which tem- 
porarily checked the continued publica- 
tion of the Scriptures, though it did not 
quench the zeal of the people. Henry was 
no more pleased with the spirit to which 
the teachings of the Bible were giving 
life, than he had been with the over- 
bearing claims of the Papacy; and after 
the execution of Cromwell he became dis- 
tinctly hostile to the principles and 
practices of the Protestant leaders. In 
1543 it was ordered that all translations 
of Scriptures bearing the name of Tyndale 
should be destroyed; that all notes anil 
comments in other Bibles should be ob- 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



4-2'> 



liturated; and the common people were 
forbidden to read any part of the Bible 
either in public or private. In lo-lC 
Coverdale's New Testament was joined in 
the same condemnation as Tyndale's, 
and a great destruction of the earlier 
Testaments took place. So that not only 
was the making of new translations sus- 
pended for several years, but the very ex- 
istence of all that had been made was 
endangered. But the common people had 
already caught clear visions of a realm of 
light and freedom, and no royal command 
could quench their thirst for further 
knowledge. When the Great Bibles wore 
set up in the churches to be read by all 
men, the gates had been opened, and no 
earthly power could close them again. 

It is difficult for us of the twentieth cen- 
tury to appreciate what this change meant. 
Accustomed as the English speaking- 
peoples of to-day are to the issue of a 
score of thousand of new books every 
,\car, on every conceivable subject, and to 
the daily, weekly, and monthly ministra- 
tions of a like number of pajjers and 
periodicals of every character, we can 
with difficulty place ourselves in the posi- 
ti(in of our English ancestors of the early 
ihiys of Elizabeth, when the Bible was 
practically the only literature with which 
they were familiar. As Green has said: 
" The whole moral effect which is pro- 
<luced now-a-days by the religious news- 
papers, the tract, the essay, the mis- 
sionary report, the sermoai, was then pro- 
duced by the Bible alone ; and its effect 
in this way, however dispassionately we 
examine it, was simply amazing-. The 
whole nation became a church." The 
English people have, in a very true sense, 
been the people of one book ; and to form 
any definite and proper estimate of the 
value of that book, which it is somewhat 
the purpose of this chapter to demon- 
strate, one must realize how it has entered 
into, given direction to, and affected the 
trend of all the literary, social, political, 
and religious thought and activities of 
that people from the days of the new 
lilrth, or Renaissance, down to what we 
arc pleased to consider the full-orbed day 



of civil and religious liberty, and of gen- 
eral enlightenment, in which we live. 
That this has been so, is the result of con- 
ditions that attended the first presenta- 
tion of the Bible to the people; and as it 
would be idle for another to try to im- 




J. R. CHEEN. 

prove upon the account of those condi- 
tions which Green has so superbly and 
interestingly elaborated in his " History 
of the English People," we shall quote a 
few sentences from his account to illus- 
trate our position. "All the prose litera- 
ture of England," he says, " save the for- 
gotten tracts of Wycliff, has grown up 
since the translation of the Scriptures by 
Tyndale and Coverdale. So far as the 
nation at large was concerned, no history, 
no romance, hardly any poetry, save the 
little-known verse of Chaucer, existed in 
the English tongue, when the Bible was 
ordered to be set up within the churches. 
Sunday after Sunday, day after day, the 
crowds that gathered round the Bibles in 
the nave of St. Paul's, or the family group 
that hung on its words in the doctrinal 
exercises at home, were leavened with a 
new literature. Legend and annal, war- 
song and i>salm. State-roll and biography, 
the mighty voices of prophets, the par- 



4li8 



riiO.M COLOXY TO WOKLD TOWEE. 



ables of Evan,nelists, stories of mission 
journeys, of perils by sea and among- tlie 
heathen, philosophic arguments, apocalyp- 
tic visions, all were fliins' broadcast over 
minds unoccupied for the most part by 
any rival learning- . . . The power of 
the book over the mass of Englishmen 
showed itself in a thousand superficial 
■ways, and in none more conspicuously 
than in the influence it exerted on ordi- 







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HUGH LATIMER. 

nary speech. It foi'med, we must repeat, 
the whole literature which was practically 
accessible to ordinary Englishmen; and 
when we recall the number of conniion 
phrases which we owe to great authors, 
the bits of Shakespeare, of Milton, of 
Dickens, of Thackeray, whii-h unconsci- 
ously interweave themselves in our ordi- 
nary tallv, -n'e shall better understand the 
strange mosaic of biblical words and 
phrases which colored English talk three 
hundred years ago. The mass of pictur- 
esque allusion and illustration which we 
Iiorrow from a tho-usand bonks our fathers 
were forced to borro;v from one. 
When Spenser poured forth his warmest 
love-notes in the ' Epithalamion,' he 
adopted the very words of the Psalmist, 
as he bade the g-ates open for the 
cntva'.'.ce of his bride. When Crom- 



well saw the mists break over the hills of 
Dunbar, he hailed the sunburst with the 
cry of David, ' Let God arise,- and let his 
enemies be scattered. Like as the smoke 
vanisheth, so shall thou drive them away.' 
Even to common minds this familiarity 
with grand poetic imagery in prophet and 
apocal.vpse gave a loftiness and ardor of 
expression that, with all its tendency to 
exaggeration and bombast, we may prefer 
to the slip-shod vulgarisms of to-day." 

The brief freedom that was accorded 
the people in the use of the Bible by 
Edward YL, who succeeded Henry YIII. 
in 15-t7, was again restricted under Mary, 
who came to the throne in 1553. A 
bigoted Catholic, the wife of Philip of 
Spain, and of a generally sour and 
morose disposition, her accession boded 
ill for all reformers as well as for all use 
of the Scriptures. Although her reigti 
lasted but five years, about three lumdred 
Protestants were burned at the stake, in- 
eluding- Cranmer and John liogers, the 
real author, as we have seen, of Matthew's 
Uible, and the friend of Tyndale. Promi- 
nent among the other prelates who wit- 
nessed to their faith at the stake, were 
Ridley, Bishop of London, and Latimer, 
]3ishop of Worcester, celebrated alike for 
their great learning and virtue. Perish- 
ing- in the same flames, they sustaineil 
each other's constancy by mutual exhor- 
tations, Latimer calling out, " Be of good 
cheer, brother Ridley, we shall this day 
kindle such a torch in England as, I trust 
in God, shall never be extinguished." 

But our immediate interest lies with 
the little band of fugitives from the 
ifarian persecutions which found a safe- 
refuge in Geneva, where Calvin had al- 
ready become firmly established, and 
which was a stronghold of the whole re- 
form movement. Besides Calvin and 
Knox there was then in Geneva Theodore 
Bcza, recognized as the foremost biblical 
scholar of that day. A distinguished body 
of French scholars was also assembled 
there, engaged in making a translation of 
the Bible into their language for the use 
of French Protestants. Into this con- 
genial atmosphere came several of the 



THE EEVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1S85. 



429 



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430 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



Icaiiing English Bible scholars who had 
tied across the channel, including Cover- 
dale ; and they immediately began to work 
upon a revision of the " Great Bible." A 
New Testament was first issued in 1557 
by Whittingham, a fellow of All Saints 
College, Oxford, and a relative of Calvin 
by marriage. But this was very soon 
superseded by a more comprehensive and 
complete revision of the whole Bible, in 
which work Coverdale, Beza, and others 
took part in addition to Whittingham. 
The bases used for revision were the 
"Great Bible" for the Old Testament, 
and Tyndale's revision of 1534 of the 
New Testament. This "Geneva Bihle" 
(IS if ]ias alwatis heen called, puhlished 
In 15(;(), ivas notable in manii respects. It 
lens tlie first Bible printed in. modern 
roman type instead of the old black letter 
wliich had ahvays been used before. It 
iras also tlie first Bible in whicJi the 
modern division of chapters into verses 
occurs. In all previous translations only 
a division into chapters or paragraphs had 
been made, a form to u'hich the Revisers 
of 1880 reverted. In the making of ver- 
sions of the Bible, or New Testament, 
the custom of writing comments in the 
margins had been universal from very 
(>nrly times. Beginning with Wyclif these 
became of a polemical character, not 
merely explanations or illustrations of the 
matter of the text; and Tyndale and 
others followed the Steps of Wyclif, de- 
nouncing in their marginal notes the 
Pope, the Mass, the Confession, and all 
the, leading doctrines of the Roman 
Church. The "Geneva Bible" was not 
only richly supplied with marginal notes 
of this character, but also added a large 
number proclaiming the Calvinistic and 
Protestant teaching against the divine 
right of kings and all forms of absolutism, 
— an innovation which, we shall see later, 
lilayed an imjiortant part in determining 
the form of our Authorized Versi(m. 

The " Geneva " was for a long time 
familiarly known as the "Breeches" 
P)ilile. from its rendering of Gen. iii. 7. 
where Adam and Eve were said to have 
" sewed fig-tree leaves together, and made 



themselves breeches." Though it wa.-; 
never authorized for use in churches, its 
convenient form, a small quarto, its 
legible type, and its intelligent and sen- 
sible commentary immediately gained for 
it the popular approval, so that it became 
the Bible of the home and for all general 
reading; and during the half century that 
intervened between its publication and 
the completion of the King James version 
in 1611, more than one hundred and 
twenty distinct editions came from the 
press. Not the least interesting fact 
about this Geneva Bible, to American 
readers, is that it was the Bible used by 
our Puritan ancestors, and the one which 
the Pilgrims brought with them to 
Plymouth in 1020. 

With the accession of Elizabeth in 
1558, a brighter day dawned for the Eng- 
lish Bilile, as with the death of Maiy 
had closed the final chapter in the history 
of the supremacy of the Catholic Church 
in England and Scotland. The public 
reading of the Bible in the churches was 
at once restored and the clergy were again 
reiiuired to have a copy of the " Great 
Bible " publicly displayed in the churches 
to which all should have free access. The 
publication of the Geneva Bible, how.ever, 
at once weakened the position of its rival, 
even churchmen recognizing the great 
superiority of the former. But the par- 
tisan character of its notes made its ac- 
ceptance for use in the public service of 
the churches out of the question. Conse- 
quently Parker, Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, conceived the idea of a revision of 
the Great Bible to be made by a number 
of scholars working separately. Por- 
tions of the Bible were assigned to each 
of the divines selected for the revision, 
and the whole work then passed through 
the hands of the archbishop as editor. 
This was known as the " Bishop's Bible," 
and was published in 1568. It at once 
superseded the " Great Bible " for use in 
the churches, no eflition of the latter hav- 
ing been printed later than 1569. As a 
whole, however, the work was far from 
satisfactory, and the Geneva Bible still 
easily held its place in popular favor, the 



THE KEVISION OF THE lilBLE — 1885 



431 



Bishop's having practically no sale except 
for use in the churclies. During the last 
third of the sixteenth century, therefore, 
there were tliree different Bibles in more 
or less common use ; the " Geneva," in the 
homes and the familiar use of the people; 
the Bishop's, the translation supported by 
c:clesiastical authority; and the "Great 
Bible," which was still to be found 
chained to the walls or pillars of many 
churches throughout the kingdom. 

Upon the death of Elizabeth the crown 
passed from the Tudors to the Stuarts, 
and James VI. of Scotland became James 
I. of England. One of the most peculiar 
and uninteresting kings that ever sat on 
any throne, it seems passing strange that 
we owe to one of his pronounced xiecu- 
liarities, — his inordinate love of theologi- 
cal disputation, — the most admired of the 
English versions of the Bible. "' His 
big head," says Green, " his slobbering 
tongue, his quilted clothes, his rickety 
legs, stood out in as grotesque a contrast 
with all that men recalled of Henry or 
Elizabeth as his gabble and rhodomon- 
tade, his want of personal dignity, liis 
buffoonery, his coarseness of speech, his 
pedantry, his contemptible cowardice. 
Under this ridiculous exterior, however, 
lay a man of much natural ability, a ripe 
Scholar, with a considerable fund of 
shrewdness, of mother wit, and ready 
repartee. His reading, especially in the- 
ology, was exhaustive; and he was a volu- , 
mi nous author on subjects which ranged 
from predestination to tobacco. But his 
shrewdness and learning only loft him, in 
the phrase of Henry IV. of France, ' the 
wisest fool in Christendom.' " 

Very early in his reign grievances from 
the Puritan wing of the church were 
pressed upon the King, and in 1604 he 
held a conference at Hampton Court to 
consider the subject of toleration, to 
which bishops and Puritan clergy were 
alike invited. In the course of a lengthy 
discussion of religious affairs. Dr. Rey- 
nolds, a Puritan, and the head of Corpus 
Cliristi College, Oxford, urged the need 
of a new revision of the Bible, which 
should be such as could be accepted by all, 



and so become a bond of union between 
rival religious commimities. Coming 
from a Puritan the proposition seemed 
likely to fail of serious consideration, 
Bancroft, Bishop of London, remarking 
" if every man had his humor about new 
versions, there would be no end of trans- 
lating." But the proposal appealed to 
James, and he quickly saw that such a 
work well done would confer great dis- 
tinction on his reign, while having, in a 
sense, the supervision of it would afford 
him many opportunities for the display 
of his theological learning, of which he 
was inordinately proud. Moreover, he 
had had many and irritating controver- 
sies with the Calvinists of Scotland, An- 
drew Melvil, for instance, once having 
snapped his fingers in the King's face, and 
called him " God's silly vassal." He had. 




therefore, conceived a violent hatred of 
the " Geneva Bible," whose whole atmos- 
phere was hostile to the cardinal doctrine 
of the Stuarts, — " the divine right of 
kings." It is not surprising, therefore, 
that James shortly after suggested a 
scheme for the prosecution of the work, 
along the general lines that the revision 
should be executed mainly by the univer- 
sities; that it should be approved by the 



432 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POAVEE. 



liishops and most learned men of the 
whole church, by the privy council, and 
liy the King himself, su that the whole 
church should be concerned in it ; and es- 
pecially important, in view of the results, 
was the absolute prohibition of the usual 
marginal commentaries which might tend 
to make it a Bible of one party only. — 
marginal notes only to be used for the 
purpose of explaining, when deemed 
neeessarj', any Hebrew or Greek words. 
The scheme of revision was drawn up 
in 1604, though the work was not for- 
mally begun until 1607. The body of re- 
visers was a very able one, inchtding the 
professors of Hebrew and Greek at both 
universities, with practically all t!i:- Irad- 
ing scholars of the day. Their numVier 
varied from forty-eight to fifty; and they 
were divided into six groups, of which 
two sat at Westminster, two at Oxford, 
and two at Cambridge. In the first in- 
stance each group worked separately on 
a special part of the Bible assigned to it, 
and when any group had finished the re- 
vision of its allotted portion, the matter 
was sent to all the others for their criti- 
cism or suggestions; while ultimate dif- 
ferences of opinion were to be settled at 
a general meeting of the chief members 
of each company. Two years and nine 
months of arduous labor were consumed 
in the work, the last nine months being 
devoted to the final revision; and in 1611 
the results of their labors were pub- 
lished. Tills. Iiux always been l-nown as 
llifl "King James Version," or as iJir 
" A iiiliorized Version," hy which lillr 
if is most frequently designated and 
cited; yet, strangely, apart from the 
appearance on the title page of the words 
" appointed to be read in the churches." 
Iliere is no record whatever of any 
decree of King, parliament, or convo- 
cation, ordaining its use. As against the 
Bishop's Bible it quickly established its 
superiority; but the struggle between it 
and the Geneva Bible was long and sonie- 
\\lmt heated, and for more than fifty 
years they existed side by side. Just as 
the Authorized Version and the Revised 
have existed since 188.5. But the recog- 



nized superior merit of the King James 
\'ersion. and its freedom from any party 
iir sectarian spirit, eventuall.v won the 
day for it, so that by the middle of the 
seventeenth century it liad tat:eii its un- 
disputed place as ilic Biidc of tlie Englisli 
iiiilion. All learned and serious-minded 
[leople realized that in its preparation the 
translation had passed out of the sphere 
of controversy; that it had been made a 
national undertaking in which no one 
had any interest at heart save that of 
producing the best possible version of the 
Scriptures. But another important ele- 
ment that contributed to the excellence of 
the translation was the constant improve- 
ment of literary exi>ression and taste dur- 
ing the fifty years preceding the revision. 
We have already referred to the absolute 
lack of books and of literary culture when 
the "Great Bible" was published; but in 
the intervening period some of the most 
noted poets and prose writers of English 
literature, — Spenser, Sidney, Hooker, Mar- 
lowe. Shakespeare, to name only a few 
of the greatest, — had combined to estali- 
lish and cultivate a literary style and to 
fix a high standard of literary taste. And 
il iras under sucli influences tliat the re- 
risers wrought out the fi,ne material left 
llirni liy Tt/ndale and his sncce.i.'sors into 
Hint grandest monument of Elizahethan 
prose, the version of 1611. As one ha-^ 
well said: "The English of the Author- 
ized Version is tJie finest specimen of our 
prose literature at a time when English 
prose wore its stateliest and most majes- 
tic form.." 

As the history of the Bible as used in 
the Roman Catholic churches, and the 
measure of its agreement with the one 
used in the Protestant churches is not 
generally understood, it seems desirable 
to describe the origin and development of 
the former, as we have already done of the 
latter. In 190.3 Miss Helen Gould, hav- 
ing had some controversial con-espond- 
ence with Father Early of Hastings-on- 
the-Hudson, offered through Dr. White, 
president of the Bible Teachers' Training 
School, prizes for the three best essays 
upon the accepted Catholic Bible and the 



THE KEVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



433 



Americau revision of 1901. These prizes 
were resjjectively one thousand, tive hun- 
dred, and two hundred and fifty dollars. 
Two hundred and sixty-five essays were 
submitted. A competent and scholarly 
board of seven judges unanimously 
agreed ujxin three of these as must com- 
pletely and learnedly covering the ground 
specified. These have since been pub- 
lished in a volume entitled " Koman 
Catholic and Protestant Bibles Com- 
pared. The Gould Prize Essays." (_Scrib- 
ner's Sons). They give an amount of re- 
liable information upon the subjects dis- 
cussed — all buttressed by an array of 
references to and quotations from Cath- 
olic and Protestant Bible students, de- 
crees of councils, and ecclesiastical au- 
thorities, — such as has never before been 
accessible to the general reader in a single 
volume in the English language. It is 
a work that every Bible student should be 
familiar with; and we gratefull.v ac- 
knowledge an indebtedness to it for many 
facts, and especially for the translations 
of church decrees, and similar documents. 
The Bible in use in the Roman Cath- 
olic Church has for its basic version the 
Vulgate of St. Jerome. An account of 
his preparation of that version has al- 
ready been given above. In 1545 the 
Council of Trent, after a prolonged de- 
bate, decreed : " The same old and Vul- 
gate edition, which has been approved by 
long use for so many ages in the Church 
itself, is to be regarded as authentic ini 
public readings, controversies, discourses, 
and expositions, and nobody may dare or 
presume to reject it on any pretense." 
And it was further declared to be unlaw- 
ful " for anyone to print or cause to he 
printed any books whatsoever on sacred 
matters without the name of the author; 
nor to sell them in future, or even to keep 
them by them, unless they shall have been 
first examined and approved by the ordi- 
nary." But the chief source of confusion in 
the church arose from the fact that there 
were so many and variant editions of the 
Vulgate in existence, scores of them dif- 
fering one from another so that there 
could not be said to be any commonly re- 
28 



ceived text. This point, however, was not 
touched upon by the Council of Trent. 
The oldest extant manuscript of the Vul- 
gate, known as the Codex Amiatinus, as 
it came from the convent of Monte 
Amiata, near Sienna, Italy, is now the 
most valued treasure of the Mediceo- 
Laurentian library at Florence. It was 
originally made in England by order of 
Ceolfrid, and by him presented to Pope 
Gregory II. about 715 A. D. Even when 
this was made the texts must have been 
very corrupt, as copies had been made 
constantly during three hundred years; 
and as we have before shown, early 
scribes rarely hesitated to take liberties 
with the texts they were copying, adding 
or omitting words or phrases if such addi- 
tions or omissions seemed to them to im- 
jjrove the text. As Gigot, the learned 
Professor of Sacred Scriptures at St. 
Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, Md., says in 
his " General Introduction to the Study 
of the Holy Scriptures : " " During the 
course of the two centuries which elapsed 
between the time of St. Jerome and the 
general reception of his work, corruptions 
of a very extensive character crept natur- 
ally into the text of the Latin Vulgate. 
Not only the or<linai'y mistakes of trans- 
cription . . . were made . . . but 
the peculiar relation in which our Vul- 
gate stood to the old Latin Version . . . 
led to a strange mixture of texts. From 
sheer familiarity with the words of the 
older version the transcribers of the Vul- 
gate wrote down its words instead of 
those of St. Jerome. Another fertile 
source of corruption . . . consisted 
in the lack of critical sense in most of 
the transcribers and owners of manu- 
scripts during the Middle Ages ; time and 
again they inserted in their copies of 
Holy Writ glosses drawn from other 
manuscripts, from parallel passages, from 
the sacred liturgy, from the writings of 
St. Jerome, or even of Josephus, and 
thought that they had thereby secured 
what they were pleased to call pleniores 
codices (more complete texts), while they 
had simply added to the corruptions al- 
ready existing." 



4;;-i: 



FKOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



I']vcii when the Council of Trent con- 
vened more than seventy different edi- 
tions of the Vulgate had been published 
t;inee the invention of printing; and gen- 
erally the printer used the most available 
copy without regard to its authenticity or 
accuracy. In view of these facts an ap- 
peal was made to the Pope shortly after 
the close of the Council to determine upon 
a text that should be deemed and recog- 
nized as authoritative. It was some years, 
however, before the subject received seri- 
ous consideration. But toward the end of 
the sixteenth century one of the noted 
scholars of the church became Pope, as 
Sixtus V. In l.js7 he appointed a com- 
mittee of six scholars to revise the Vul- 
gate, reserving for himself the decisive 
voice in the revision. As Pope, he pre- 
faced this revision with a Bull giving it 
the approval of his " apostolic authority 
transmitted from the Lord," and decree- 
ing that it should be used " as true, legit- 
imate, authentic, and undoubted in all 
public and private debates, readings, 
preachings, and explanations ; '" and any- 
one -who ventured to change it without 
Papal authority would " incur the wrath 
of God Almighty and of the blessed Apos- 
tles Peter and Paul." Eeserving a copy- 
right for ten years, he ordered that all 
future editions must conform with it, 
and that all existing copies should be cor- 
rected by it and be officially certified by 
inquisitor or bishop. Sixtus dying in 
1590 his revision was held for further 
scrutiny, as something like two thousand 
of his personal corrections of the com- 
mittee's work had been proved erroneous. 
In 1592 a revision of the revision of Six- 
tus was issued under the authority of 
Clement VIII. This revision was also 
preceded by a Bull of Clement similar in 
terms to that of Sixtus. Corrected edi- 
tions followed in 1592, 1593, and 159S, 
all of which are credited to Sixtus instead 
of Clement. This course seemed neces- 
sary in order to protect the doctrine of 
the infallibility of the Pope. The Clem- 
entine Vulgate in the edition of 1598 be- 
came the authorized text of that version 
for use in the Poman Catholic Church, 



and is to-day the standard for all Catholic 
versions of the Scriptures, from which, 
according to the Bull of Clement, none 
may vary. 

The many translations of the Bible into 
the English tongue during the sixteenth 
century had excited a popular enthusiasm 
which affected Catholics as well as Prot- 
estants ; and the apprehended danger to 
Catholic readers from contact with the 
marginal notes of the Protestant Bibles 
forced the authorities of the Roman 
Church to yield an unwilling assent to a 
translation for their own i>eople. The 
reign of Elizabeth was not a propitious 
one for the Catholic Churcii iu Englaml. 
Many of its priests and scholars, there- 
fore, took refuge on the Continent ; and 
among- them was a distinguished and 
learned graduate of Oxford, William 
Allen. With the approval of the Pope he 
established, in 1568, a seminary at Douay, 
in France, for the training of English 
Catholics. Ten years later the school was 
removed to Rheims, where the translation 
of the Bible was begun. That it was not 
undertaken with good grace the preface 
to the work clearly shows. The trans- 
lators there declare that they have not 
taken the step from an " erroneous 
opinion of necessity that the Holy Scrip- 
tures should always Ik- in the mother 
tongue, or that they ought to be read in- 
differently by all. Not for these causes 
do we translate this sacred book." But 
they consider that some things are " med- 
icineable now that otherwise in the peace 
of the church were neither much reiiui- 
site. nor perchance wholly tolerable." 
^loreover Allen, in a letter, expressed his 
aversion to the work. '' Perhaps indeed 
It would have been more desirable," he 
wrote, " that the Scriptures had never been 
translated into barbarous tongues; never- 
theless at the preseu-t day, when either 
from heresy or other catises, the curiosity 
of men, even of those who are not bad, 
is so great, and there is often also such 
need of reading the Scriptures in order 
to confute our opi>onents, it is better that 
there should be a faithful and Catholic 
translation than that men should use a 



THE KEYISIOX or THE BIBLE — 1885. 



435 



corrupt version to their peril or destruc- 
tion; the more so since the dangers which 
arise from reading certain more difficult 
passages may be obviated by suitable 
notes." 

Associated vs'ith Allen in this undertak- 
ing were Gregory Martin, reputed to be 
one of the most learned Hebrew and 
Greek scholars of his time, Richard Bris- 
tow, and Dr. Worthington, all distin- 
guished Oxford scholars, ilartin trans- 
lating, his co-laborers revised his work, 
with the result that in 1582 the New Tes- 
tament, with notes by Allen and Bristow, 
fl"as published at Eheims. As the stand- 
ard Clementine Vulgate was published in 
1598, a new edition of the Eheims New 
Testament was issued in 1600 at Antwerp. 
In 1609 the Old Testament, with notes 
by Worthington, was published at Douay, 
forming, with the New Testament de- 
scribed above, the Eheims and Douay 
Bible, or, as it is commonly called, the 
" Douay Bible." Though this has since 
been accepted as the authorized version of 
the Holy Scriptures to be used in the 
Catholic Church, it has never received 
Papal indorsement. As Cardinal New- 
man has said: "It has never had any 
episcopal imprimatur, much less has it 
received any formal approbation from the 
Holy See. It comes to us on the author- 
ity of certain divines of the Cathedral 
and College of Eheims and of the Univer- 
sity of Douay, confirmed by the subse- 
quent indirect recognition of English, 
Scotch, and Irish bishops and its general 
reception by the faithful." 

In making their translation Allen and 
his associates worked upon what they con- 
sidered the best texts of the Vulgate. 
" It must be said," declares Professor 
Gigot, " that, since the Douay version was 
made very closely from Latin manu- 
scripts, or editions of the sixteenth cen- 
tury, anterior to the official texts pub- 
lished by the Popes Sixtus V. and Clem- 
ent VIIL, it may and does in several 
cases point to Latin readings no longer 
found in our editions of the Latin Vul- 
gate." The translators also followed 
closely in many places the English trans- 



lations of Wyclif, Tyndale, and Cover- 
dale. In fact it is only when these early 
translations are more or less closely ad- 
hered to that the Douay version is gen- 
erally intelligible to the average English 
reader. A literal translation of Latin 




CARDINAL NEWMAN. 

wurds produced a hard and often incom- 
prehensible literary work. That this fact 
was recognized by the translators is made 
evident by their reference to it in their 
preface. " We have," they say, " kept 
ourselves as near as possible to our text 
and to the very words and phrases made 
venerable . . . though to some pro- 
fane or delicate ears theij may seem more 
hard or barbarous." And it was this 
course, with the results it produced, 
which led the English revisers in pub- 
lishing the King James version to suggest 
in their preface that the Douay trans- 
lators had retained Latin words " of pur- 
pose to darken the sense, that since they 
must needs translate the Bible, yet by the 
language thereof it may be kept from be- 
ing understood." This unintelligible 
character of much of the English of the 
Douay translation and the success of the 
King James version created a demand for 
a revision of the former, with the result 
that such works followed in frequent sue- 



436 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD POWEE. 



cession. The most noted of these was the 
translation of Challouer, Vicar Apostolic 
of London. In 1749 he brought out an 
edition of the Kheims New Testament 
and later of the Douay Bible, " newly re- 
vised and corrected according to the 
Clementine edition of the Scriptures." 
The changes from the language of the 
Douay version were so many that Chal- 
loner's was practically a new translation; 
and in this translation the King James 
Version was evidently his guide. So evi- 
dent is this that Cardinal Newman wrote : 
" Looking at Dr. Challoner's labors on 
the Old Testament as a whole, we may 
pronounce that they issue in little short 
of a new translation. They can as little 
be said to be made on the basis of the 
Douay as on the basis of the Protestant 
Version. Of course, there must be a cer- 
tain resemblance between any two Cath- 
olie Versions whatever; because they are 
both translations of the same Vulgate. 
But, this connection between the Duuay 
and Challouer being allowed for, Chal- 
loner's version is even nearer to the Prot- 
estant than it is to the Douay; nearer, 
that is, not in grammatical structure, but 
in phraseology and diction." And fur- 
ther he says : " After all allowances for 
the accident of selection (of passages for 
comparison) it is difficult to avoid the 
concJusion that at this day the Douay Old 
Testament no longer exists as a received 
version of the Authorized Vulgate." Re- 
ferring to the same author's revision of 
the New Testament, Newman says : " The 
second Challoner edition of 1750 differs 
from the first, according to the collations 
which Dr. Cotton has printed, in about 
one hundred and twenty-four passages ; 
the third, 1752, in more than two thou- 
sand. These alterations. Dr. Cotton tells 
us, are all in the direction of the Protest- 
ant Version." And Cardinal Wiseman 
says : " To call it any longer the Douay 
or Rhemish version is an abuse of terms. 
It has been altered and modified till 
scarcely any verse remains as originally 
published." 

In 17S3 the Rev. Bernard :\ri-Mahon. 
nf Dublin, published another revision of 



the Douay Bible, which is connnonly 
known as the Troy Bible, from the prelate 
who gave his approbation to the transla- 
tion. Though this work claims descent 
from the Challoner version, it differs 
from it materially, there being more than 
five hundred variations in the New Testa- 
ment. These two revisions, however, — ■ 
Challoner's and Troy's — have become the 
accepted authorities in the Church, though 
many other translations have since been 
made. 

In 1870 the Vatican Council restated 
the position of the Church in these woi-ds: 
" The complete books of the Old and New 
Testaments with all their parts, as they 
are received in the decrees of the same 
Council (of Trent) and contained in the 
old Latin Vulgate edition, must be re- 
ceived as sacred and canonical. The 
Church, moreover, holds these booivs as 
sacred and canonical not only because 
collected by man's industry, since they 
have been approved by its authority, nor 
for the reason only that they contain 
revelation without error, but because, by 
the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the 
collections have God as their author, and 
as such the churches have handed them 
down." 

The authority for the use of this ver- 
sion in the United States comes from the 
decrees of the Second Council of Balti- 
more, held in 1866. After charging that 
the clergy should take care that their 
flocks do not " select the pure food of the 
woril of God unless from approved ver- 
sions and) editions." the Council declares 
its position as follows: " We order, there- 
fore, that the Douay Version, which is re- 
ceived in all churches where the faithful 
speak English, and which has been justly 
set forth for the use of the faithful by 
our predecessors, be altogether retained. 
Moreover the bishops wil' take care that 
the most approved copy should be desig- 
nated by them, and all editions, both of 
the Old and New Testaments of the 
Douay Version be most perfectly made, 
with such notes as might be selected from 
the holy Fathers of the Church, or from 
learned Catholics." 



THE REVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



437 



It is evident, therefore, that uo trans- 
lation of the Bible into English has ever 
received the official approval of the Holy 
See. While the translation in general 
use is known as the Douay Bible, it is, 
nevertheless, Challoner's or Troy's re- 
vision of that text, which, as has been 
shown, amounted to practically new 
translations. Any of the many revisions 
that have been n^ade may be used by 
members of the Catholic Church provided 
it has received the approval of a bishop 
or higher prelate. But the only version 
that has received ecumenical or papal 
authorization is the Vulgate itself. The 
position generally maintained by the 
clergy and laity of the Church wa-', un- 
doubtedly clearly expressed by Father 
Early in his letter to Miss Gould. " The 
Catholic Church," he wrote, " has never 
prohibited any of her members reading 
Ihe Scriptures or Bible. In every family 
whose means will permit the buying of a 
copy, there you will find the authentic 
version of God's words as authorized by 
the Church, and which has come down to 
us, unchanged, from the time of Christ 
himself. But the Catholic Church does 
object to the reading of the Protestant 
Version, which goes back only to the days 
of Henry VIII. of England, and was then 
gotten up for obvious reasons." 

How truly this Bible has " come down 
to us unchanged from the time of Christ," 
and how exact is the Father's declaration 
as to the age and purpose of the Protest- 
ant Bible, one may be able to judge some- 
what intelligently, it is hoped, from the 
unbiased account that has been given of 
the different versions and revisions of 
the same early texts by the great ecclesi- 
astical divisions of the Universal Cliarch 
in the western world. 

Ever since the invention of printing 
the vagaries of compositors have bowed 
low the heads of publishers and excited 
the most profane sentiments of authors. 
That frequent errors should have been 
made in the earliest days of printing, and 
that they should have passed inspection 
and survived to enliven the printed page 
is hardly to be wondered at. Composi- 



tion and proof-reading were not then the 
specialized arts they have since become. 
Holy writ and secular literature have 
alike suffered from the lapses of type-set- 
ters, many of which have produced a racy 
humor beyond the conscious wit of man 
to devise. Collectors of rare and curious 
books have long since fi.xed a great value 
upon certain editions of the Bible which, 
upon publication, were found to contain 
gems of the compositor's fancy. These 
have all been given distinctive titles, sug- 
gestive of the character of the blunder 
they have perpetuated. The Breeches 
Bible and the Treacle Bihle have already 
been mentioned ; and a brief description 
of the most valued of the others may not 
be without interest. 

The Printer's Bible is so called because 
where in Psalm cxix. 1(31, the Psalmist 
declares that " Princes have persecuted 
me without a cause," he is made by the 
type-setter to say that, even at that early 
day, " printers," not princes, were the 
source of his troubles. 

The Vinegar Bihls takes its name from 
an edition of the Authorized Version pub- 
lished in 1717, in which the head-line 
over Luke xx. calls attention to the " Par- 
able of the Vinegar," instead of the Vine- 
yard. 

The sixteenth verse of Jude reads: 
" There are murmurers, complainers," 
etc. But the luckless compositor thought 
" murderers " better expressed the author's 
meaning, and so became responsible for 
the Murderer's Bible. 

It would almost seem that the days of 
Elizabeth were more akin to the twentieth 
century than we are apt to appreciate; 
and that political bosses were then the 
sources of patronage as now. The one 
who set up the type for the Sermon on the 
Mount in the Geneva Bible of 15C2 was 
unquestionably an office-seeker, and so 
naturally declared " Blessed are the 
Place-makers" instead of Peacemaker's; 
thus giving birth to the Place Mal-er's 
Bible. 

The evil-minded who would annul the 
Ten Commandments belong to all ages. 
It is not surprising, therefore, to find a 



438 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



compositor of the time of Charles I. im- 
mortalizing himself by producing the 
]yiched Bihle, for which it was only 
necessary to omit the " not " from the 
seventh commandment. All pure-minded 
people, however, will sympathize with the 
risihtcous indignation of Arch-liishop 
Laud, who promptly fined the offender in 
the sum of £300 sterlini;' for his indis- 
cretion. 

If St. Paul was conscious of events of 
the sixteenth century he must have felt 
that he had .iust occasion for the applica- 
ticm of his injunction, "Be ye anijry 
and sin not." For while he had sedulously 
labored to confirm the Corinthian Christ- 
ians in riti'hteousness, in I. Cor. vi. 9, urji- 
inji' " Know ye not that the unrighteous 
shall not inherit tlie Kingdom of God?" 
another absent-minded compositor over- 
looked the negative, and thus knocked out 
one of the corner-stones of the great 
Ai)ostle's theology by declaring that the 
unrighteous should inherit the Kingdom. 
And so we have the U nriiihli'inis Bihle. 

The Bug Bihle is of particular interest 
because of the different use of words at 
different periods rather than from a 
printer's error. This edition of Cover- 
<lale's Bible made Psalm .\ci. 5, read: 
" Thou shalt not node to be affrayed for 
eny hugges by night." To the modern 
ear this has an unpleasant sound. But all 
disagreeable suggestions vanish when one 
remembers that the word " bogy," which 
we still use, was in tln' sixteenth century 
the common term for anything frightful 
or fearful, either in its present form, or 
as " bug." The latter is used in the same 
sense in Purvey's and ^latthew's Biljles, 
thinigh not there in the Psalm quoted. 
Shakespeare, also, in III. Ilenr.v YI. has: 
'■ Warwicke was a hiigge that fear'd 
(affrighted) us all;" and in another place: 
" The hug which you would fright me 
\vith, I seek." Coverdale's translation 
thus becomes more natural, though none 
the less amusing to modern readers. 

Others, though less interesting and 
sought after, are the Goose Bihle, the 
Lrrla Bihle. the JJe and She Bihles, the 
^landing Fislie.^ Flihle, etc. Of course 



but few copies of these Bibles got into 
circulation, as the errors were quickly 
noted by some reader. The further issue 
was then delayed until the objectionaljle 
passages had been corrected. 

F<]r more than two hundred and fifty 
years the grand old version of 1611 
has been the word of God for all Eng- 
lish-speaking Protestant peoples, in all 
parts of the world. And when, during 
the latter part of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, urgent calls for a revision of it 
were made by scholars, the great mass of 
Christian people protested, and the ques- 
tion naturally was asked on all sides, 
'■ AVhy do we need a revision ? " It has 
often been said tliat when Luther, pro- 
testing against an infallible Pope, inaugu- 
rated the reformation movement, he set 
up in the place of the unseated autocrat 
an infallible hook; and there are few who 
were children of Christian families of a 
half a centur.v ago who were not taught 
that every individual word of the Bible 
they used was directly inspired by God, — 
a teaching that has worked more harm in 
the world, and made more skeptics, than 
all heretical teachings combined. The 
whole beauty and purpose of God's won- 
derful revelations of Himself, and His 
purposes, were missed and instead of seek- 
ing above all things to learn the will of 
the Father and then to develop a life in 
harmony with that will, all the energy of 
the great majority of Christians has been 
expended in well-nigh fruitless endeavors 
to minutely observe the mere letter of the 
law, while its spirit was too often entirely 
missed. A spirit of idolatry was almost 
omnipresent, the form of the revelation 
getting the reverence due to its content 
alone ; the setting of the stone being more 
highl.v prized than the precious jewel 
which it encased. We have endeavored to 
show that our English Bible has been 
evolved, and that the form in which we 
know and love it is the result of a long 
series of revisions. Eveiy devout Christ- 
ian believes that God spake to Holy men 
of old, and the essential thing for His 
followers to know is just what He said, 
roganlless of the form in which the mes- 



THE EEVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



439 



sage comes to us. For the New Testament 
we know that the message was written out 
some eighteen centuries ago in the form 
of original manuscripts in the Greek 
language; and for the Old Testament 
very ancient documents existed which 
were the written form of traditions that 
had been accumulating for centuries, — 
traditions handed down from generation 
to generation with an exactness of form 
that could not be made more jierfeet by 
the modern form of the printed book. 
But as we have shown, owing to the perse- 
cution of the early church and Christians 
everyone of such manuscripts had been 
lost before the fourth century ; and for 
fifteen hundred years the only available 
form in which their message existed 
was the Latin Vulgate, itself Jerome's 
revision of the early Latin versions 
which in turn were translated from 
the original Greek Scriptures of the 
first and second centuries. From about 
400 A. D. to 1500 A. D. the only 
standard to which all translations could 
be referred was the Vulgate; and as. 
during that long period, thousands of 
copies of it had been made, and its origi- 
nal was early lost, it hardly needs any 
argument to prove that many and perhaps 
important changes and corruptions must 
have crept in, and errors and omissions, 
or additions, have been made to the 
original text. Consequently ever since 
the awakening of the Christian conscious- 
ness in the fourteenth century, the su- 
preme desire of devout scholars has been 
to find that plumb line of Divine Truth, 
and to straighten their warped and ill- 
shaped forms of it Ijy that standard. For 
the New Testament the imperative need 
was a reliable Greek text, one that could 
be relied upon as an esontially correct 
reproduction of the original form of the 
Gospels, Epistles, and other books. But 
it was not until 1516, when Erasmus pub- 
lished his Greek Testament, that any ap- 
proximately accurate guide was obtained ; 
and the material upon which he had to 
build was of doubtful authority, and un- 
questionably imperfect; yet it was upon 
such uncertain foundations that the 



revisers of 1611 had to build. But during 
the last century the situation has entirely 
changed. Not only have three very 
ancient texts of nearly the whole Bible 
been discovered (the codices described 
above), but thousands of other manu- 
scripts, versions, and documents have 
come to light, which were entirely un- 
known to the makers of the Authorized 
Version. Moreover during the last cen- 
tury a large body of the world's most 
learned men have devoted their entire 
study to the comparison and collating of 
all this material, that is, to textual criti- 
cism, with the result that forty or fifty 
years ago these scholars became assured 
that they were in a position to determine 
with great exactness just what the origi- 
nal texts of the Scriptures were; and men 
like Tischendorf, Tregelles, Westcott, and 
Hort, were able to practically agree upon 
a Greek Text for the New Testament 
which has proved acceptable to all men 
learned in textual criticism. Their re- 
searches had proved beyond question that 
many readings of our King James Ver- 
sion were erroneous; and the question 
became a dominant one whether as Chris- 
tians we should have and teach the word 
as Christ and the Apostles spoke and 
wrote it, or whether we should still be 
content with a superb and grand literary 
production irrespective of the relation of 
its contents to the exact truth. Hapjiily 
the desire to know the truth prevailed ; 
with the result that on the 10th of Feb- 
ruary, 1870, Bishop Wilberforce proposed 
in the upper house of the Southern Con- 
vocation " that a committee of both 
houses be appointed to confer with any 
committee that may be appointed by the 
convocation of the northern province, to 
report on the desirableness of a revision 
of the Authorized Version of the New 
Testament, whether by marginal notes or 
otherwise, in all those passages where 
plain and clear errors, whether in the 
Greek text adopted by the translators, or 
in the translations made from the same, 
shall on due investigation he found in 
exist." 

In our classification of the material 



440 



riiO^M COLOXY TO WOULD TOWER. 



iiixiu which revision must he hased, we 
spoke of manuseriyts, ancient versions, 
and the writings of the early fathers. As 
was then said, the early fathers were 
voluminous writers and pronounced con- 
troversialists, and nearly one half of their 
works are made up of quotations from the 
Scriptures as they existed in their time, 
only a century or two after the Apostolic 
days. Hence these very profuse (juota- 
tions become of supreme value in textual 
criticism, corroborating the texts of the 
manuscripts or versions that were before 
the revisers of 1880, who were the first 
scholars engaged in any such work, prac- 
tically, to whom this great mass of ma- 
terial was available. 

Another consideration that made revi- 
sion seem desirable was the natural 
growth of the English language since the 
days of Elizabeth, an<l the consequent 
change in the meaning and use of many 
words. Many an earnest Christian has 
stumbled over Christ's injunction " Take 
110 thought for your life, what .ve shall 
cat or what ye shall drink; nor yet for 
your body, what ye shall put on," not 
knowing that when the Authorized Ver- 
sion was made the word " thought " was 
used in the sense of worrv. anxious 
thought, fret. — a sense which it has 
now entirely lost. So what the IVIaster 
really said was, " Do not worry, or fret 
yourself about such matters," gently as- 
suring his followers that their Heavenl.v 
Father knew that they had need of all 
these things. In the same sense an early 
chronicler used the word when he wrote 
that "Soto died of thouglif in Florida:" 
and Chaucer wrote, " Which cause is of 
my death for sorrowe and lliouglil." An- 
other illustration is in the use of the 
verb " to let," which in earlier times had 
the meaning " to hinder " and " prevent." 
The Authorized Version makes Paul write 
to the Thessalonians (II. Th. xi. 7), 
" Only he who now letteth will let, until 
he be taken out of the way," which is evi- 
dently the opposite of his meaning. 
Shakespeare used this word in the same 
sense, when he made Hamlet, who would 
follow his father's ghost, say, " By 



Heaven! I'll make a ghost of him that 
lets me;" and in Tennyson's Lancelot 
and Elaine we read : 

" Sir King, mine ancient womid 
is hardly whole 
And lets me from the saddle." 

The work of revision was undertaken 
by a carefully selected committee of fifty- 
four members, who were divided into two 
companies of twenty-seven members each, 
one company to undertake the revision of 
the Old and one the revision of the New 
Testament. These committees were made 
up of the most noted biblical scholars of 
Great Britain, the leading professors of 
the Hebrew and Greek languages in the 
great universities, with many special 
students of textual criticism. Sectarian 
lines were ignored in making up the com- 
mittees, the leading men of the Church of 
England, and the noted scholars of the 
Presbyterian, ilcthodist. and Baptist 
Churches sitting side b.v si<le in the prose- 
cution of their great work. The first meet- 
lug of the revisers was held in June, 1870, 
in the renowned Jerusalem Chamber of 
Westminster Abbey. The work of revis- 
ing the New Testament occupied the at- 
tention of its company for ten years, dur- 
ing which time the average number of 
meetings was fort.y each year; and in 
iMa.v, 1881. the Revised Version of the 
Xew Testament was published, which was 
followed by the Old Testament in July, 
1884:, and a complete Revised Versicju of 
the entire Bible was published in May, 
1885. As a very complete account is given 
in the preface to the Revised Version 
of all the conditions attending its prepa- 
ration, we shall not recite the details here. 
Christian people all over the world had 
followed the repoi-ts of the work of the 
connnittees with deep interest and the re- 
sult was anxiously looked for. More than 
three million copies of the Revised New 
Testament were sold within one year after 
its issue, and the complete Bible received 
a cordial welcome when it appeared later. 
Shortly after the beginning of their work 
the English revisers solicited the co-op- 
eration of American Bible scholars, and 



THE EEVISION OF THE BIBLE — 1885. 



441 



two companies were organized in tlie 
United States similar to the companies in 
England, who worked together harmoni- 
ously during the remainder of the revi- 
sion period. Some of the suggestions of 
the American committees that were not 
accepted by the English revisers were 
added to the completed Bible as an ap- 
jiendix. By the mutual agreement under 
which the work of the two national com- 
mittees was prosecuted, the American 
revisers had bound themselves not to pub- 
lish any American revision for fourteen 
years. During this period, however, they 
had kept up their organization and a great 
ileal of critical study bad been devoted to 
the English version of 1885. And at the 
expiration of the fourteen years' period 
the American revision committee decided 
to publish a standard Revised Version for 
the United States, which came from the 
press of Thomas Nelson & Sons in 1901. 
This embodies all the suggestions of the 
American revisers which were not ac- 
cepted by the English companies, and in 
other ways materially differs from the 
English Revised Version. This American 
revision has become the standard in this 
country and is unquestionably as near a 
true rendering of the Holy Scriptures as 
can be made. 

As we have seen, loud protests have 
been made by those to whom old versions 
have become familiar and dear, whenever 
revisions have been proposed. When 
.Terome made the Vulgate, which super- 
seded the Old Latin Bible; when the King 
James Version came into competition 
with the home Bible of the people, the 
" Geneva ; " and recently again, when 
the Revised Version was offered in pri'f- 
crence to the Authorized Version, the 
same cry has in every instance been 
raised, " They are taking away our Bible." 
But just as the " Geneva " and " King 
James " Versions existed side by side for 
more than half a century, so the later re- 
vision is living harmoniously with the 
beloved Authorized Version; and after 
twenty-five years of such friendly rivalry 
Christian people have come to realize 
that in the work of revision nothing 



rightly tending to subvert the faith of any 
believer has been set up. Many readings 
and expressions which had become as 
familiar to us as household words in the 
Authorized Version, have been changed 
in the revised, and we cannot help feeling 
that something has been lost. But the 
essential fact is that after from ten to iif- 
teen years of the most critical study and 
deliberation of the foremost biblical 
scholars of England and America, dviring 
which time thousands of manuscripts, 
versions, and translations covering a 
period of more than fifteen hundred 
years, have been studied and com- 
pared, it has not been found neces- 
sary to change or materially restate 
any essential truth as set forth in the 
King James Version. So that we have 
not lost our Bible; but we have gained 
the priceless assurance that we have, es- 
sentially correct, the Scriptures as they 
were known to the Christians of the first 
and second centuries. The letter it has 
been deemed wise and helpful to change 
in many cases; but the great truths of the 
Divine revelation, as we have been 
familiar with their statement in the Au- 
thorized Version, remain unchanged and 
inviolate. 

Some time after the appearance of the 
Revised Version, a well-known clergyman 
published a book entitled, " What is left 
of the Bible ? " iluch better might it be 
asked, " What has been lost from our 
Bible ? " and a truthful answer would be 
" Nothing." Not one c "^ the grand truths 
that have placed these sacred books so 
far above all other books of religious or 
philosophical thought has been assailed ; 
and for nearly all, the same exalted state- 
ment remains. The old Bible, dear to 
millions of people both for its simisle ex- 
pression of the thoughts of every human 
heart and for the beauty and majesty of 
its literary form, holds a more exalted 
liosition to-day than ever before. The 
esteem in which any great work has been 
held by the most learned, serious-minded, 
and eminently experienced men of the 
past naturally interests their readers of 
following generations. We cannot, there- 



441! 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD LOWLK. 



fore, better bring tbis story of tbc evolu- 
tion of our English Bible to a close than 
by quoting- the opinions regarding it of 
many of the distinguished statesmen, 
prose-writers "and jxiets of the recent and 
more remote past. Rev. R. Ileber New- 
ton, in his book. " The Riglit and Wrong 
Uses of the Bible," and Professor T. IL 
Pnttison in his " History of the English 
Bible," in particular, have brought to- 
gether a great number of these testimonies 
from a wide range of sources; and we 
gladly acknowledge our indebtednes>s to 
them for several of the sentiments which 
follow. 

Emerson wrote : " Europe has always 
owed to Oriental genius its divine im- 
pulses. What these holy bards said, all 
sane men found agreeable and true. And 
the unique impression of Jesus upon man- 
kind, rvltose name is not so much, ivrit/i'ii 
0.S' ploughed in Id ilic Jiisfori/ of ihe world, 
is proof of the subtle virtue of this infu- 
sion." And in the same manner that the 
name of Jesus has been " ploughed " into 
history, the noble and soul-satisfying 
teachings of the Bible have Ijeen 
"ploughed" into the human conscious- 
ness of English-speaking peoples. What 
a blank would most of our best literature 
be. could the Bible and its influences be 
withdrawn from it ! Poets, orators, 
statesmen, novelists have, one and all. 
drawn from its pages their highest in- 
spiration and a large proportion of their 
most impressive thought, as well as th(> 
standard of form for its expression. " The 
English Bible " says ]\[acaulay ; " a book 
which if everything else in our language 
should perish, would alone suffice to show 
the full extent of its beauty and power." 
Along the same line John Stuart Mill 
wrote: "The Bible and Shakespeare have 
done more than any other books for the 
English language, introducing into the 
soul of it such grand ideas expressed with 
such sublime simplicity." But " Shakes- 
peare," says Emerson, " the first literary 
genius of the world, the highest in whom 
the moral is not the predominating ele- 
ment, leans on the Blhle; his poetry pre- 
supposes it." And Bishop Wordsworth 



has cited five hundrej and forty passages 
from Shakespeare, where the poet uses the 
exact words of the Bible, or uses its image 
or thought with a slightly varied form of 
expression. 

" As a mere literary monument," wrote 
J. R. Green. " the English Bible remains 
the noblest example of the English 
tongue, while its perpetual use made it 
from the instant of its appearance, the 
standard of our language." " People 
imagine," says Emerson, " that the place 
which the Bible holds in the world, it owes 
to miracles; it owes it simply to the fact 
that it came out of a profounder depth of 
thought than any other book." Milton 
and Dante lived, moved, and had their 
intellectual being in the atmosphere of 
the Bible; while Tennyson, Browning, 
Wordsworth, Coleridge, Pope, Dryden, 
Addison, drank at the same fountain of 
exalted wisdom and sublime expressicni, 
and gladly witnessed to their obligation. 
" There can be no songs comparable to the 
songs of Zion." wrote ^Milton ; " no ora- 
tions equal to those of the prophets; and 
no politics like those the Scriptures 
teach." It is said to have been Edmund 
Burke's habit to read a chapter in Isaiah 
before going to speak in the House of 
Commons. " Isaiah." said he, " possessed 
both the blaze of eloquence and the light 
of truth; " and Washington Irving de- 
clared : " I think I have waked a good 
many sleeping fancies by the reading of 
a chapter in Isaiah." Matthew Arnold, 
easil.v the most distinguished literary critic 
of his time, edited Isaiah as a text book 
for the culture of the imagination in Eng- 
lish schools; and in his preface to that 
work exclaims with enthusiasm : " What 
a source of eloquence and poetry is the 
liible in our schools!" In another place 
the same writer says : " Of conduct, which 
is more than three-fourths of life, the 
Bible, whatever people may think or say, 
is the great inspirer." In his conversa- 
tion with Eckermann, Goethe said : " Let 
mental culture go on advancing, let the 
natural sciences go on gaining in depth 
and breadth and the human mind expand 
as it may, it will never go beyond the ele- 



THE EEVIS10:N of the bible — IbSo 



44.S 



vation and moral culture of Christianity, 
as it glistens and shines in the Gospel." 
And Thomas Jefferson wrote : " Of all the 
systems of morality, ancient and modern, 
which have come under my observation, 
none appear to mo so pure as that nf 
Jesus." Daniel Wi'hster was an habitual 
reader of the Bible and attributed his 
wonderful vocabulary of the simplest yet 
most forceful language to the influence of 
the Scriptures, while he held its moral 
standards as far superior to those of any 
other religion. In one of his remarkable 
orations he says : " If we abide by the 
principles taught in the Bible, our 
country will go on prospering and to 
prosper; but if we and our posterity 
neglect its instruction and authority, no 
num can tell how sudilen a catastrophe 
may overwlielm us, and bury all our glory 
in profound obscurity." One of his most 
achnired passages was the reference to the 
besetting force of " duty," which closed 
his argument in the famous White murder 
case. "A sense of duty," he said, " pur- 
sues us ever. It is onniipresent like the 
Deity. If we take to ourselves the wings 
of the morning and dwell in the utter- 
most parts of the sea, duty performed or 
duty violated, is still with us for our hap- 
piness or our misery. If we say surely 
the darkness shall cover us, in the dark- 
ness as in the light our obligations are 
yet with us. We caiuiot escape their 
power, nor fly from their ijresence," — all 
<if which is merely the most literal para- 
phrase of the Psalmist's sense of the omni- 
presence of God, as expressed in the 139th 
Psalm. In his " History of the Jewish 
( 'huKch," Dean Stanley recalls reminis- 
cences of the great historian of Israel, 
Ewald, saying : " It is impossible to for- 
get the noble enthusiasm with vehich this 
dangerous heretic, as he was regarded in 
England, grasped the small Greek Testa- 
ment which he had in his hand as we 
entered, and said 'In this little hool- is 
contained all the wisdom of the world.'" 
Carlyle read his Bible continually, insist- 
ing that it was the greatest work in the 
world ; and the Ijook of Job, which was 
his closest friend, he considered " one of 



the grandest things ever written with 
lieu." Indeed, it is related of him that 
(ince visiting at a country house he was 
asked to conduct the family worship ; and 
starting to read that immortal poem he 
forgot his surroundings, and did not stop 
until he had read all of its forty-two 
chapters. Buskin and Cardinal Newman 
liave generally been considered as masters 
of the purest and choicest English; yet 
both attributed their skill in its use to the 
fact that they were led to commit large 
portions of the Bible to memory, when 
young. From his earlist boyhood, Scott 
was a devout admirer and constant 
>ttidciit of the Bible: and his greatest 
romances are filled with Scriptural refer- 
ences, and many direct quotations occur. 
Tn describing the great man's last illness, 
his son-in-law and biographer, Lockhart, 
says: "Here he expressed a wish that T 
sliould read to him, and when asked from 
what book, he said, 'Need you ash? There 
is hut one.' " 

In reply to a critic Dickens once wrote : 
" I have always striven to express venera- 
tion for the life and lessons of our 
Saviour,- because I feel it." But had he 
left no written testimony of his rever- 
ence for the Gospel, one would not rend 
far in his works without realizing the 
atmosphere of Christ's teachings: and no 
one can read that superb, crowning scene 
in the " Tale of Two Cities,'' without 
realizing that its author had dwelt hiug 
on the meaning of Calvary. Professor 
Pattison has said : " The Castaway Syd- 
ney Carton, by his voluntary death, better 
than any other character in English fic- 
tion, illustrates the Master's words 
' Greater love hath no man than this, 
tliat a man lay down his life for his 
friends.' " Already the guillotine is in 
vii'w and in turn the victims take their 
lilaces in line. Just in front of Carton 
is a poor seamstress, like himself inno- 
cent, and until then a stranger to him. 
At this supreme moment she remembers 
a cousin of hers in the sweet far-away 
country, ignorant of the dreadful doom 
by which she is now to perish : and in her 
simplicity she turns to Sydney for light 



444 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLJJ POWEE. 



on the question that perplexes her. " ' Do 
.you think,' and the uncomplaining eyes in 
which there is so much endurance fill with 
tears, and the lips part a little more and 
trcnihle, ' that it will seem long to mo 
wliile I wait for her in the better land, 
where I trust both you and I will be 
mercifully sheltered?' 

"'It cannot be, my child; there is no 
Time and no trouble there.' 

" ' You comfort me so much ! I am so 
isnorant. Am I to kiss you now ? Is the 
moment come ? ' 

"'Yes.' 

"She kisses his lips; he kisses liers; 
they solenuily bless each other. The 
spare hand does not tremble as he re- 
leases it; nothing worse than a sweet con- 
stancy is in the patient face. She goes 
next before him — is gone. 

"'I am the Resurrection and the Life,' 
saith the Lord; 'he that believeth in me, 
though he were dead, yet shall he live; 
and whosoever liveth and believeth in me 
shall never die.' " 

Nor was Thackeray less indebted to the 
Bible, and no writer treats its sacred 
themes more reverently. Many illustra- 
tions might be given, but the author's 
whole spirit is so manifest in his descrip- 
tion of the last moments of the noblest 
character in the whole range of English 
fi<-tion, — Colonel Newcome, — that we shall 
quote it alone. "At the usual evening 
hour the chapel bell began to toll, and 
Tliomas Neweome's hands outside the bed 
beat time. And just as the last bell struck, 
a peculiar sweet smile shone over his face, 
and he lifted, up his head a little and 
quickly said, 'Adsum.,' and fell back. It 
was the word we used at school when 
names were called; and lo! he whose heart 
was as that of a little child, had answered 
to his name and stood in the presence of 
the ^Master." 

Truly we may say of the Bible, as the 



Psalmist declared of the Glory of the 
Liird, "there is no speech nor language 
where its voice is not heard." 

In an address to young journalists, de- 
livered at Union College in 1893, the late 
Charles A. Dana, one of the most distin- 
guished e<litors this country has produced, 
said: "There are some books that are ab- 
solutely indisi^ensable to the kind of edu- 
cation that we are considering; and of 
these the most indisjTensable, the most 
useful, the one whose language is most 
cffcrtive, is the Bible. There is no book 
f re 1111 which more valuable lessons can be 
learned. I am considering it now, not as 
a religious book, but as a manual of 
utility, of professional preparation and 
professional use for a journalist. There 
is. perhaps, no book whose style is more 
suggestive and more instructive, from 
which you learn more directly that sub- 
lime simplicity which never exaggerates, 
which recounts the greatest event with 
solemnity, of course, but without senti- 
mentality or affectation, — none which you 
can open with such confidence, and lay 
down with such reverence; there is no 
hook lil-e the Bible." 

No ! This glorioxis Bible — the book of 
books — ^has lost none of its glory in re- 
vision. We may. individually or as a peo- 
ple, lose it through neglect ; but to-day, 
as of ohl, no inquirer can come to it with 
open mind without finding in its pages all 
the wisdom, the beauty, the sublimity 
that have endeared it to untold millions. 
"We search the world for Truth; we cull 
The good, the pure, the beautiful 
From graven stone and written scroll. 
From all old flower-fields of the Soul; 
And, weary seekers of the best. 
We come back laden from our quest 
To find that all the Sages said 
Is in the Book our mothers read." 

Whittier — (Miriam.) 



XLIII. 
THE HAYMARKET EIOT - ANAECHY — 1886. 



Political and Social Conditions at Llose of Eighteenth 'Century. — Ktl'ect of Advances Along 
Commercial and Industrial Lines. — Difficulty of Realizing Economical and Social Burdens 
of Eighteenth Century Workingmen. — Accounts of Travelers and Historians aud Novelists. 

— The Origin of Socialism and Anarchy. — St. Simon, Fourier, Proudhon. — Proudhon's 
■■ \\ hat is Property V " " Property is Theft."' — Accounts of the Two Great Anarchist Leaders, 
Bakunin and KrojjutUin. — Rise of Russian Anarcliists. — Repressive Laws Following Murder 
of Alexander IL — The Leaders Driven From Europe to United States. — 'Connection Be- 
tween Assassination of Czar and Haymarket Riot a Close One. — Condition in Chicago. — 
Cireat Strike at McCorniiek Harvester Works. — Interference and Incendiary Utterances of 
Anarchist Agitators. — Calls to Arms. — The Riot at ilcCormick's Works, May 3. — Call for 
Haymarket Meeting. — "Workingmen, Arm Yourselves, and Appear in Full Force." — The 
Throwing of the Bomb. — Whole Company of Police Prostrated. — Eight Mortally Wounded. 

— Intense Excitement All Over Country. — Trial of Accused Anarchists. — .Seven Sentenced 
to Death, One Imprisonment for Life. — Sensational Suicide of Lingg. — Sentences of Fieldcn 
and Schwab Commuted to Life Imprisonment. — .Spies. Parsons, Fisher, and Encel. Hun" 
November U, ISS7. — Change in Public Opinion. — Action of Ctovernor Altgeld. — Judi'e 
Garv's Position. 



' As man seelis justice in equality, so society seeks oriler in anarchy." — PnouimoN. 




IIK last half of the eighteenth and the first half of the iiiuc- 
teciith centuries was pre-eminently a revolutionary era. In 
every line of activity, as vs'ell as in all trends of thought, — 
political, social, philosophical — the tendency was to break 
away from established forms. In the latter part of the 
eighteenth century, emancipation from absolutism of every 
kind was the goal sought; and the "rights of man" set 
<iver against the " divine rights " of kings and institutions, 
and the equally despotic rule of caste and wealth, became 
the battle cry of the people throughout Europe and the 
United States. The French Revolutioii was but the breaking forth in one local- 
ity of the pent-up forces that were working in all localities; but the evidence 
that the leaven, whose working was first manifested in the Reformation of the 
sixteenth century, had already leavened the whole lump, and that the old national. 
Social, and religious orders were doomed, and must give place to newer orders 
v,-hose purpose and result should be the enlightenment and uplifting of all man- 
land. Contemporaneous with this forward movement, and very largely as a result 
of it, came also the unprecedented development along commercial and industrial 
lines, — the wonderful inventions in manufacturing machinery, the discovery and appli- 
cation of the uses of steam, the vastl.y increased knowledge and utilization of the 
forces of nature, which, before the last quarter of the nineteenth century had banded 



446 



PEOM COLOXr TO WOKLD POWEli. 



all nations and peoples of the earth more 
elosely together physieally than the people 
of any single State had been at the Lie- 
ginning of the century, — all these changes 
combined to broaden men's ^iews, to 
"widen their whole outlook upon the phe- 
nomenal and social world, and to burn in 
uiiou the minds of thoughtful men tli<' 
deep truth announced eighteen hun- 
dred years before, but now for the 
tirst time in any sense comprehended, 
that " Ciod hath made of one blood all 
nations of men," and that the neces- 
sary corollary of the Church's divincst 
tenet, " the Fatherhood of God," was 
the "brotherhood of man." It could 
not fail tliat thought, suddenly emanci- 
pated after so many centuries of repres- 
sion, should for a time run riot; that 
llicories containing germs of the most 
sacred truth should be distorted, per- 
verted, and misapplied; but through it all 
we may now discern a purpose which was 
by mistake, by failure, by brutal extremes 
at times, perhaps, ushering in the dawn of 
better ilays. At different jseriods marked 
by the excesses of men drunk with the 
new wine, it seemed as if the "return to 
nature " meant the return to the state of 
bestiality and savagery that character- 
ized the primitive man. But through all 
the sporadic excesses and all the ill-ad- 
vised and sometimes criminal acts we can 
see that new conditions were being 
evolved that have uplifted mankind, mor- 
ally, socially, economically, ami physi- 
cally; and though we are yet suffering the 
pains of the new birth, and ideal conditions 
of political and social life are still far be- 
fore us, yet we cannot thoughtfully re- 
view the advances of the last century 
without sharing the faith so confidently 
cxju'cssed by Tennyson, seventy years ago, 
when he wrote: 
'' Yet T doubt not through the ages one 

increasing purpose runs. 
And the thoughts of men are widened 

with the process of the suns." 

Tt is an easy matter to sit quietly in 
our comfortable and luxurious homes in 
this twentieth centuiw. enjoying social 



conditions that have been made possible, 
in a large degree, by the sufferings of 
those who "counted not life dear unto 
themselves," and criticise the harsh and 
brutal acts of those who have blazed the 
V ay for reform. But it was quite a dif- 
ferent thing for the poor wretches who 
were the sufferers from the oppression of 
the greedy and heartless masters of the 
|)eriod we are considering. Xo just esti- 
mate can ever be made of any man or any 
people, at any time, unless one can, in 
some degree, at least, put one's self in the 
place of such actors. And to judge right- 
eous judgment of many of the labor and 
social agitators of the last century one 
must endeavor to live with them under 
conditions which have been described by 
many historians and novelists. From 
such accounts as may be found in 
Taine's "Ancien Regime," Arthur Young's 
"Travels," and Dickens' "Tale of Two 
Cities," one can learn of the horrible op- 
l rcssion of the many by the few which 
n.ade the French Revolution inevitable ; 
and in Kingsley. Dickens, Besant, Green, 
and poems like Mrs. Browning's " Cry of 
the Children," the seminal causes of the 
origin as well as of the excesses of the 
labor organizations may be learned; while 
if we familiarize ourselves with the social 
and political conditions described b.v 
Turgeneff, Tolstoi, and Sienkiewicz, we 
shall, perhaps, if we have much love for 
justice, cease to wonder at and anathema- 
tize the men who have from time to time, 
impatient of the slow grinding of God's 
mills, struck at the personifications of the 
.-ystems that were oppressing them, — the 
ffficial authorities who enforced the laws 
cf those systems. 

Murder, bomb-throwing, secret assas- 
sinations are, indeed, horrible things and 
can neither be condoned nor tolerated by 
:.ny people. But every page of history 
IS eloquent of the truth that the iidiuman 
;ind degrading conditions which so-called 
i-ivilized and Christian peoples have 
rieated are the soil which must of neces- 
sity produce anarchistic acts. All down 
through the ages the dominant powers in 
Cluirch and State have stood behind the 



THE HAYMAEKET KIOT — ANAECHY — 18S6. 



447 



mental and physical enslavement of all 
liut an insignitic-ant proportion of the 
people; and it has only been the dearly 
bought rights and privileges, secured by 
revolutions of various kinds during the 
last one hundred and fifty years, that 
have made the lives of the great majority 
much better than those of the brute crea- 
tion. So late as 1771, Blaekstone in his 
Commentaries on the Laws of England 
enumerated two hundred offenses punish- 
able by death, nearly all of which bore di- 
rectly upon the poor and in protection of 
unimportant privileges of the rich ; while 
it was not until 1830 that the common peo- 
ple became possessed of any large degree 
of civil rights even in England, which in 
all matters pertaining to the welfare of 
its people, was, generally sneaking, far in 
advance of the other countries of Europe, 
excepting Switzerland. In, this countrj' it 
has been difficult for us to realize such 
conditions, because we started as a people 
on a political and social basis consider- 
ably in advance of that of any people of 
Europe down to 1850. But of those whose 
unpardonable acts have cast such oppro- 
brium on the term " Anarchy " prac- 
tically all were brought up subject to con- 
ditions which existed in central Europe 
iuul Russia and have themselves suffered 
in dungeons, under the lash, and been de- 
prived of every privilege of advancing 
their own and the interests of those dear 
to them, or protecting the same. 

It is hardly surprising, therefore, that 
as the smoke of the battle of the French 
Revolution cleared away theories of every 
kind looking toward the amelioration of 
the condition of the people should find 
expression. Early in the nineteenth cen- 
tury three different philosophers an- 
nounced more or less well-defined systems 
for social betterment. From the jirin- 
ciples expounded by those teachers — St. 
.Simon, Fourier, and Proudhon, — have de- 
veloped the various schools of socialistic 
thought which have prevailed down to the 
present time, though on the foundations 
they laid men like Owen, Lassalle, Marx, 
Rakunin, and others have built differing 
superstructures. Strictly speaking Social- 



ism and Anarchism have little in com- 
mon ; are, in fact, the very antitheses of 
each other. Socialism looks toward com- 
munity of interests, while Anarchy is the 
extreme of individualism. But as all the 
systems would reach their ultimate ends 
through the subversion of the existing 
forms and laws governing the iirinhu-tiuu 
and distribution of wealth, they have 
quite naturally been grouped together in 
the uninformed public mind. 

Proudhon, the founder of Anarchism, 
was born at Besan(;on, in France, in 1800, 
of poor parents, and was himself, as a 
young man. a cattle herder. At sixteen 
he was able to enter college, but was so 
IJoor that he had to borrow the books from 
other students and copy out the lessons at 
night while the others slept ; and it is re- 
ported that he returned home laden with 
prizes only to find that there was nothing 
in the house to eat. When nineteen he be- 
came a proof reader, and while so occupied 
became conversant with Hebrew. Greek, 
and Latin. In 1838 he obtained a scholar- 
ship from the Academy of Besancon, 
which insured him three hundred dollars 
a year for three j'ears, and soon after he 
set out for Paris to continue his studies. 
Here he lived an ascetic and studious life, 
and became deeply interested in the 
social movements which were then agitat- 
ing central Europe. In 1840 he published 
his first and decisive work, entitled 
" What is Property ? '' to which he gave 
the answer that " Property is Theft." The 
greater part of the remainder of his life 
was passed in Paris, and he became a 
deputy from the Seine; though as a re- 
sult of one of the many changes in gov- 
ernment in France, he was forced to flee 
to Belgium, and remained in exile three 
years. He died at Passy in 1865. Per- 
sonally he has been described as one of 
the most remarkable figures of modern 
France. His life was marked by the 
severest simplicity and even puritanisni ; 
he was affectionate in his domestic rela- 
tions, a most lo\-al friend, and strictly 
upright in conduct. He strongly opposed 
the prevailing French Socialism of his 
times because of its utopianism and im- 



448 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



morality; aud bitterly deuouuced the 
teaching that the ideas common to both 
could be realized otherwise than through 
a long and laborious process of social 
transformation. That society could be 
changed oS-hand, by a ready-made and 
complete scheme of reform, he character- 
ized as " the most accursed lie that could 
be offered to mankind." It is evident, 
therefore, that true anarchism, or scien- 
tific anarcliism, as it has been called, 
counseled neither the bomb nor the dag- 
ger; but loolved for tlie realization of its 
ideals through tlie slower processes of 
social evolution. As his doctrine is sum- 
marized in Kirkup's " History of Social- 
ism," Proudhon " contemplated a condi- 
tion of human enlightenment and self- 
control in which the individual shall be a 
law unto himself, aud in which all ex- 
ternal authority shall bo abolished as a 
despotic interference with personal free- 
dom. It is an iilcal to which the highest 
religion and philosophy look forward as 
the goal of man, not as one, however, 
which can be forthvpith reached through 
the wholesale destruction of the present 
framework of society, but through a long- 
process of ethical and social improvement. 
The error of the anarchists consists in 
their impatient insistence on this prin- 
ciple of absolute freedom in the present 
debased condition of the great mass of 
people in every class. They insist upon 
taking the last step in social development 
before they have quite taken the first." 
As Proudhon himself says in " What is 
Property " : " In a given society the au- 
thority of man over man is inversely pro- 
portional to the stage of intellectual de- 
velopment which that society has reached. 
Property and royalty have been crum- 
bling to pieces ever since the world began. 
As man seeks justice in equality, so so- 
ciet'ii seeks order in anarchy," that is, in 
the entire ahsence of laur, because of the 
i<Ieal condition which society has reached 
wlien law is no longer necessary. This 
theory of freedom is a very ancient one, 
and, as has been said, " has no necessary 
connection with a revolutionary pro- 
gramme, and we should not misunder- 



stand it because of the strange company 
in which we here find it." It has been a 
high aud long-cherished ideal of the best 
and greatest minds. St. Paul had the 
same conception in mind when he de- 
clared " Ye shall know the Truth, and the 
Truth shall make you free." The good 
and just man in the social life of to-day 
does his duty not from fear of the police 
or the law, but because it is his duty ; and 
we rightly regard it as the highest evi- 
dence of his goodness that the right is so 
wrought into the very fibre of his con- 
science and intelligence that the doing of 
it becomes as natural as breathing or 
walking. 

But, unfortunately, two of his disciples 
became more actively influential than 
Pri million himself; and as both had been 
witnesses of the worst crimes of Russian 
despotism, and had themselves endured 
the tortures of Russian prisons and suf- 
fered the hardships of exile in Siberia, 
they seized upon the phase of the master's 
teachings which emphasized the abolition 
of all government and determined that, so 
far as they could affect it. it should be 
accomplished now, rather than naturally 
as a result of social development, as 
Proudhon taught. The most earnest of 
these men was Michael Bakunin, who be- 
came the great apostle of destructive 
anarchism. He belonged to the highest 
Russian aristocracy, and was born in 
1814-. In due time he entered the most 
select branch of the army, the artillery. 
While serving in Poland, however, he was 
so oppressed by the barbarities perpe- 
trated under Russian rule that he re- 
signed from the artillery, and began a life 
of study. In 1847 he visited Paris and 
there met Proudhon, who gave the de- 
cisive influence and direction to his opin- 
ions. Engaging in the Revolution of 1848 
and being especially active in the unsuc- 
cessful uprising in Dresden in 1849, he 
fell into the hands of the police, with the 
result that, as he has told us, he was con- 
fined for eight years in various fortresses 
in Saxony, Austria, and Russia, and was 
then exiled to Siberia for life. Fortu- 
nately for him, however, Muravieff, the 



THE HAYMARKET KIOT — ANARCHY — 1886. 



449 



Governor of Siberia, was a relative, and 
allowed him some measure of liberty ; and 
after four years of exile he escaped, 
reaching California after a series of al- 
most unprecedented hardships, from 
whence he went to London. This most 
interesting man is thus described by his 
intimate friend and fellow anarchist, 
Elisee Reclus, the distinguished geog- 
rapher: "Friends and enemies know 
that the man was great by his thinking- 
power, his force of will, and his persistent 
energ-y; they know also what lofty disdain 
he felt for fortune, rank, glory, and all 
the miserable prizes which the majority 
of men are base enough to covet. A Rus- 
sian gentleman belonging to the highest 
nobility of the Empire, he was one of the 
first to enter in that proud association of 
revolt, who know to detach themselves 
from the traditions, the prejudices, the 
interests of race and class, — to contemn 
their own happiness. With them he 
fought the hard battle of life, aggravated 
by prison, by exile, by all the dangers and 
all the bitterness which devoted men have 
to undergo in their troubled existence. 
The originality of his ideas, his pictur- 
esque and fiery eloquence, his untiring 
zeal in propaganda, supported by the 
natural majesty of his appearance and by 
his strong vitality, gained an entrance for 
him in all groups nf revolutionary social- 
ists, and his activity left deep traces even 
among those who, after having welcomed 
it, rejected it because of differences in 
aim or method." 

His principal published work was en- 
titled " God and the State," and in it he 
most frankly and unhesitatingly unfolds 
his destructive theories. Rejecting every 
ideal system, of whatever name or shape, 
from the idea of God downwards, and 
every form of external authority, whether 
emanating from the will of a sovereign, 
or from universal suffrage, he says: " The 
liberty of man consists solely in this, that 
he obey the laws of nature because he has 
himself recognized them as such, and not 
because they have been imposed upon him 
externally by any foreign will whatever, 
human or divine, collective or individual. 
29 



In a word, we object to all legislation, all 
authority, and all influence, privileged, 
patented, official, and legal, even when it 
has proceeded from universal suffrage, 
convinced that it must always turn to the 
profit of a dominating and exploiting 
minority against the interests of the im- 
mense majority of the enslaved." 

The other most interesting figure in 
the recent revolutionary history of Eu- 
rope is Prince Kropotkin. Like Bakunin 
he belonged to one of the noblest families 
of Russia, it being frequently claimed 
that his family had a better right to the 
throne than the present dynasty. A man 
of the widest scientific attainments, a 
member of nearly all the foremost and 
most distinguished societies of learning 
in Europe and the United States, of the 
most kindly and refined nature and 
courteous bearing, it is difficult to con- 
ceive of him as an avowed champion and 
active supporter of the most destructive 
creed of anarchism. In his defense at 
the famous trial of anarchists at Lyons, 
France, in 1883, he stated the leading 
facts of his life, in substance as follows: 
His father was an owner of serfs and 
from childhood he had witnessed scenes 
made familiar to American readers by 
" Uncle Tom's Cabin." The cruelties suf- 
fered by the oppressed classes taught him 
to love them. At sixteen, he entered the 
school of Pages at the Imperial Court, 
and learned at court to detest the great 
as much as he had learned at home to love 
the poor. In the army and the admin- 
istration he saw the hopelessness of ex- 
pecting reforms from the reactionary Rus- 
sian government. For some time after- 
ward he devoted himself to scientific 
study and work. When the Russian social 
movement began, Kropotkin joined it. 
The demands made by the new party for 
more liberty met with a simple response 
from the government ; they were thrown 
into prison, where they were subjected to 
the most horrible treatment. In the 
prison where the Prince was confined 
nine lost their reason, and eleven com- 
mitted suicide. Falling seriously ill he 
was sent to the hospital, from which he 



450 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEli. 



later escaped, and found refuge in 
Switzerland. Here lie witnessed the suf- 
ferings of the pcciple caused by the crisis 
in watch manufactures, — everywhere the 
like niisorics, due to the like social and 
political evils. The recor<l of the great 
trial allu<lcd to (at Lyons in l^.SM) is a 
historical docunicnt nf Ihe greatest inj- 
portance; and, as (me li.i> --aid. "Everyone 
who wishes to understand the causes, mo- 
tives, and aims of the anarchist move- 
ment should study it carefully.'' At the 
trial a declaration of opinion was signed 
by all the accused, from whirh we can 
quote only tlic statement as tn capital and 
distribution. " As no freedom is possible 
in a society where capital is monopolized 
by a diminishing minority, we believe that 
capital. tlif connnon inheritance of 
humanity, since it is the fruit of the co- 
operation of past and present generations, 
ought to be at the disjiosal of all, so that 
no man be excluded from it, ami no man 
seize part of it to the dctriuicnt of the 
rest. In a word, we wish equality, equal- 
ity of fact, as corollary, or rather as 
primordial condition of freedom. From 
each one according to liis faculhes; to 
each one according io his needs." 

There have been three distinct stages in 
the reform movement in. Kussia. 1 he 
first took the form of Nikllism, with 
whose princiijles and workings all readers 
of Turgeneff are familiar. The second 
stage was one of socialistic teaching and 
•jropaganda, — a campaign of education. 
In the early " seventies " hundreds of 
j'oung men and young women from the 
best families of Kussia were studying at 
universities and leading schools of West- 
ern Europe, — a large proportion of them 
at Zurich. As they were here exposed t(j 
all the dangers of socialistic teaching, 
they were all called home by an Imperial 
Ukase, in IbTo, — but not until they had 
imbibed the new spirit of freedom, and 
had consecrated their lives to the holy 
purpose of securing its blessings for their 
fellow countrymen and women. L^pon 
their return, the plan of " going among 
the people " was adopted as a systematic 
principle. The young women went to be 



midwives, or helpers, in the villages; the 
young men learned sinqile trades of the 
Iniiidilcst cliaractcrs, so as to identify 
themselves with the people; others toiled 
fifteen hours a day in the factories, that 
they might quietly talk with fellow labor- 
ers. By the most heroic self-denial they' 
laliin'cd to arouse the n.iinds of the 
peasantry. But they had no organization, 
and paid little attention to secrecy, with 
the result that they were quickly appre- 
hende<l by the government, and before 
ISTG more than two thousand of them had 
bi'Cn transported to Siberia. One can 
hardly wonder, therefore, that the third 
stage of tile revolution became one of per- 
sistent and determined attack upon of- 
ficials regardless of consequences to them- 
selves. A strong and secret organization 
was formc(l, and the bomb, the revolver, 
and the dagger were adopted by the rev- 
olutionists as their arguments, the more 
peaceful ones having proved wholly futile. 
'^I'he first notable act of this period was 
the assassination of General Trepoff, 
Prefect of Police, b,v A'era Sassoulitch, at 
St. Petersburg, in 187S. The occasion of 
the deed was the brutal flogging of a 
Ijolitical iH'isoner, wholly unknown to the 
nnirderer. hy command of Trepoff. At her 
trial she was acquitted by the jury to the 
great surprise of the Imperial Court ; and 
an attempt of tlic police to rearrest her 
as she left the cdurt was frustrated by the 
mob, through whose aid she escaped to 
Switzerland. Then followed in rapid suc- 
cession several assassinations of leading 
otHcials of the government, followed, on 
ilarch lo, JS.sL hy that of the Czar Alex- 
ander II. The determined purpose of the 
revolutionists was well illustrated in the 
latter ease, as tlnve desperate attempts on 
Alexander's life had failed, owing to his 
change of plans, before the fourth and suc- 
cessful attempt was made. This assas- 
sination sent a thrill of horror throughout 
Europe, and the most repressive measures 
were at once instituted in all countries 
against men suspected of secret as:;ocia- 
tion with anarchistic bodies. As a quite 
natural result of these measures hundreds 
I if Russian, German, Scandinavian, and 



THE IIAYMARKET KIOT — AXAKCIIY — ISSG. 



4o1 



Slav anarchists were forced to flee across 
the Atlantic, their hatred of governments 
inflamed to a white heat by their further 
sufferings at the hands of Eurojx'an of- 
ficers. And it was under these conditions 
that New York, Chicago, St. Louis, and 
Milwaukee became centres of destructive 
socialistic and anarchistic teachings and 
propaganda. The forced exodus of the 
disciples of Bakunin as a result of the 
Russian revolution was the almost direct 
cause of the rise of anarchism in the 
United States; and the connection of the 
murder of Alexander II. with the Hay- 
market riot in Chicago and the slaughter 
of the police was a close one. 

As the rise of labor organizations in 
the United States has been fully detailed 
in another chapter of this book, it is only 
necessary here to note that the third quar- 
ter of the last century was the fruitful 
period in the development of such organ- 
izations, and was also the period of their 
great strikes to secure the redress of real 
or imaginary grievances or a recognition 
of their principles. Similar bodies in Eu- 
rope had not been less active ; but, as has 
been shown above, there the acquisitidu 
of the simplest political privileges, which 
the American laborer had not to contend 
for, to a large degree overshadowed the 
labor questions. Consequently, extreme or 
destructive Socialism and Anarchism were 
not much considered by the great labor 
bodies of this country. Immediately upon 
their arrival here, however, the exiled 
anarchists began their ett'orts to proselyte 
among the laboring men, and as ten years 
of more or less incessant and open war- 
fare between capital and labor had then 
been waged, the aroused animosities of the 
members of the labor iniions presented a 
soil especially fitted for the reception of 
teachings which emphasized the antagon- 
ism between employers and employees, and 
openly advocated the use of force to ac- 
complish ends which had been secured 
only in a limited degree by the strike and 
the boycott. 

For months previous to the fateful May 
4, 1886, rabid New Y'ork and Chicago 
anarchists had been uttering through 



their class papers the most impassioned 
c-alls to laboring men to join them in 
llieir crusade against the connnon enemy, 
— the capitalistic class. The sentiment 
among the laboring men in Chicago was 
very bitter, and it is doubtless true that 
some of the more hot-headed among them 
were influenced by the anarchistic appeals 
and threats. Tliat there was any wide- 
spread acceptance of their teachings, huw- 
cvcr, there is no evidence. For nearly a 
year strikes had been maintained at vari- 
<ius places in the endeavor to enforce the 
adoption of the eight-hour law. In the 
spring of 1885 such a strike had occurred 
at the great McCormick Harvester works 
in Chicago; and though work was re- 
sumed later in the season, the company 
had taken the opportunity to install new 
f(n'ms of labor-saving machinery, so that 
the help of many men previously em- 





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.■\LEXA\DER n. OF RUSSIA. 

ployed was not needed. In February of 
1886, the employees of the works waited 
upon the company's officials and asked for 
a uniformity of wages; the re-employ- 
ment, as occasion demanded, of all old 
hands, many of whom liad been out of 



452 



YROM CULOXY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



work since the strike of the previous 
April ; and the discharge of five non- 
union men emi^loyed in the foundry. To 
the first two requests Mr. McCormick 
yielded, but the last he refused to con- 
sider on the usual ground that the request 
was an interference with the company's 
right to emijloy whomsoever it pleasetl. 
As the employees persisted in their de- 
mand and thi-eatened to strike unless it 
was complied with, the company antic- 
ipated their action by ordering the works 
closed on February IGth, to remain closed 
until the strikers saw tit to return to 
work. By this lock-out the employees were 
deprived of three thousand dollars a day 
in wages, that being the amount of the 
daily pay-roll. The situation was a very 
serious one, and the strikers were in a 
bad mood ; and, as is usual in such cases, 
all the disafl'ected men of every character 
in the city began to hang around the har- 
vester works, inciting men to violence and 
destruction of property. It was a golden 
opportunity for the anarchists and they 
did not fail to improve it. Their two 
papers were daily filled with the most ex- 
aggerated statements as to real conditions 
in the labor world, and with the most im- 
jiassioned appeals to the men to arm 
themselves and demand their " rights." 
It seems incredible that a civilized com- 
munity should have allowed men to pub- 
lish for more than a year, day after day, 
nueh wild calls upon maddened men to 
kill and to burn; to arm themselves with 
revolvers, but more particularly with dy- 
namite and bombs, and to use them. Free- 
dom of speech and of the press have never 
been held to mean open and undisguised 
incitements to murder, and the preaching 
of sedition and revolution in a commu- 
nity; and in all fairness and reason a city 
that knowingly permits such incendiary 
appeals ought to be held jointly responsi- 
ble for any evil that may result. 

Within thirt.v days the McCormick 
Company had so arranged their affairs as 
to open the works, and run them without 
the aid of the strikers, and did so on 
March 1st. This, of course, added fuel 
to the flames, and through the two follow- 



ing mouths coniiicts with the non-union 
men and police on one side, and the 
strikers on the other, were of almost daily 
occurrence. At the close of work on May 
3, however, an unusually large force of 
the men had assembled about the works, 
the anarchistic papers having endeavored 
to stir up a "blood and riot" sentiment 
for that occasion. All through the day 
the members of their orders labored with 
tlie workmen, urging them to arm them- 
selves and teach the capitalists the needed 
lessons at that time. As is usual in such 
cases, the matter was a fizzle, only a few 
hoodlums and anarchists committing any 
overt acts, and the whole crowd was 
quickly dispersed by a charge of the 
police. In the excitement four or five of 
the mob were shot by the police, though 
so far as could be learned, no deaths en- 
sued. The anarchists' papers, however, 
innnediately came out with great head- 
lines announcing- that six of the workmen 
had been " murdered by the bloodhounds 
of the capitalists," and called upon the 
workmen to avenge their slain brethren. 
Thousands of circulars were distributed 
among the unemployed, headed in large 
letters "Revexgk! Wohkixgmen' to 
Arms !" These were printed in both Ger- 
man and English. The German, which 
was somewhat more inflammatory than 
the English, ended with this appeal: 
" Laboring men, Hercules, you have ar- 
rived at the cross-way. Which way wiU 
you decide? For slavery and hunger, or 
for freedom and bread ? If you decide for 
the latter, then do not delay a moment; 
then, people, to arms ! Annihilation to 
the beasts in human form who call them- 
selves rulers ! Uncompromising annihila- 
tion to them! This must be your motto. 
Think of the heroes whose blood has fer- 
tilized the road to progress, liberty, and 
humanity, and strive to become worthy of 
them." Private meetings of the an- 
archists, and of as many of the workmen 
as they could influence, — mostly ignorant 
Slavs, unable to understand or to speak 
English, — were held at difi^erent places 
that evening, and a call was issued for a 
grand mass meeting at the " ITavmarket " 



TILE IIAYMAKKET RIOT — AXAKCHY — 18S0. 



45n 



for the next evening to denounce the out- 
rage, and to act. The call for the meeting 
read as follows : 

Attention Workingsien ! 
Great 
Mass Meeting 
To-night at 7:30 
at the 
IIaymauket, Randolph St., between 
Desplaines and Halsted. 
(!(]od speakers will be present to de- 
nounce the latest atrocious act of the 
police, the shooting of our fellow work- 
men yesterday afternoon. 
WoiiKiNGMEN, Arm Yourselves, and Ap- 
pear IN Full Force. 
The Executive Committee." 

During the afternoon the word Riitie 
(German for Peace) appeared without 
comment on the pages of the evening an- 
archist paper. The police afterward laid 
great stress upon this, assuming that it 
was the signal to be uttered when the 
bomb should be thrown. The " Hay- 
market," which was designated as the 
place of meeting, is simply a widening of 
Randolijh street, between Desplaines and 
llalsted streets, a short distance from the 
Chicago river, on the west side. In years 
past it had been used by farmers as a 
place for the sale of hay and produce, 
from which fact it took its name. For 
certain reasons, however, the meeting 
was held on Desplaines street, about one 
hundred feet north of Randolph. This 
locality was surrounded by a low class of 
beer saloons, and the meeting places of 
the different anarchistic bodies were near 
by. The meeting was not opened 
promptly and, as estimated by the police, 
at eight o'clock three thousand people had 
assembled who were getting into bad 
humor. About 8 :40 the anarchist Spies 
delivered a very harmless speech in Eng- 
lish, and following him Parsons spoke in 
a similar strain. Mayor Carter Harrison 
(the elder) was among the crowd, and 
after hearing these two speeches, dropped 
in at the Desplaines street station and ad- 
vised dismissing all the reserves, as the 
meeting was orderly and would call for 



no interference. After the mayor had 
gone, however, Fielden began a most im- 
passioned address, and was arousing the 
crowd to a high pitch of excitement when 
detectives reported at the station house 
that the crowd was getting turbulent, and 
that it was time to interfere. Inspector 
Bonfield, who was in charge, doubting the 
seriousness of the situation, sent the de- 
tective back to investigate further; but 
the latter quickly returned, reporting 
greater excitement, and more incendiaiy 
utterances from Fielden. In order to meet 
any emergency that might arise a reserve 
force of five companies of police had been 
assembled in the Desplaines street station, 
which was about four hundred feet from 
the truck which served as a speaker's 
stand at the meeting. The Inspector im- 
mediately ordered all these reserves out, 
and they were at once placed in available 
positions to cover the mob. Captain 
Ward then advanced to within six feet of 
the truck and said : " I command you, in 
the name of the people of the State of 
Illinois, to immediately and peacefully 
disperse." And turning to the crowd he 
continued, "I command you, and you, and 
you to assist." Fielden had, meanwhile, 
jumped from the truck, and as he reached 
the sidewalk, declared in loud voice " We 
are peaceable." This reply, the State 
claimed on the trial, was the signal for 
the firing of the bomb; but no proof of it 
\\'as ever advanced, except that " we are 
peaceable " suggested " Riihe," which had 
appeared in the evening Arheiter Zeitung. 
But, be that as it may, the order to dis- 
perse had hardly been given, before a 
spark flashed through the air, " looking 
like the remnant of a cigar, but hissing 
like a miniature sky rocket." A terrific ex- 
plosion followed, creating frightful havoc 
and dismay. The police were for the 
moment stunned and terror stricken. 
All the members of the center column, 
near which the bomb exploded, were 
thrown to the ground. But the In- 
spector immediately rallied the uninjured 
men, and ordered a running fire of 
revolvers, as a result of which the street 
was quickly cleared. The wounded offi- 



454 



FKOM COLO:XY TO WOULD POWEii. 



fcrs and men of the crowd were at once 
hurried to the station house, which was 
quickly transformed into a hospital, and 
medical aid was called for from every 
direction. It was then found that eight 
of the officers were dangerously wounded, 
all of whom died as the result of their 



Fi 


^«5iSk 


A 



JOSEPH E. GARY. 

Wounds, while sixty-eight others were 
more or less seriously injured. Officer 
Mathias J. Degan was almost instan- 
taneously killed, and his murder was the 
charge on which the anarchists were sub- 
sequentl.v tried. 

The frightful results of this wicked 
riot filled the people of the whole country 
with a most righteous indignation, and 
the cr.v for vengeance was instant and 
emphatic. As there was no reliable 
knowledge as tn ulin threw the bomb, the 
leading anarchist-^, including the pub- 
lishers and editors of their papers, were 
one after another arrested, and all were 
soon brought to trial. All their rooms, 
offices, and meeting places were searched, 
and must incriminating evidence was 
found, inclu<ling bombs, dynamite, guns, 
etc. After three weeks of the most thor- 
ough investigation of every movement 
jiud act (if these men, the Orand Jury, 
on the 28th of May, returned indictments, 



and on June 21st the trial of the case of 
the State of Illinois vs. August Spies, 
Michael Schwab, Samuel Fielden, Albert 
R. Parsons, Adolph Fischer, George 
Engcl, Louis Lingg, and Oscar W. Neebe, 
charged with the murder of Mathias J. 
Degan on the fourth day of May, 1880, in 
Chicago, was begun before the Hon. 
Joseph E, Gary, as judge. Twenty-one 
days were consumed in selecting the jury, 
and 9S1 men were sworn and examined 
before the jury was secured. The taking- 
of testimony began July 14th and con- 
tinued until August 10th, and the case 
was given to the jury at four o'clock on 
the afternoon of August 19th. A-s Judge 
Gary had ordered that the jury should not 
leave their room until they had reached 
a verdict, when they marched out of the 
court house at 7.30 the same evening to 
go to their hotel, the public knew that a 
verdict had been agreed upon, though it 
could not be ainiouneed until the next 
morning. Of course the most intense ex- 
citement prevailed, and the night passed 
slowly and wearily for many a heavy 
heart. For one thing had been estab- 
lished beyond dispute during the trial, 
and that was the irreproachable private 
character of the leading defendants, sev- 
eral of whom hatl large families to whom 
it had been shown they were tenderly de- 
vdteil, — all of whose members must wait 
in ajixious suspense until the verdict 
shiiuld be announced. At ten o'clock on 
the morning of the 20th, the Court con- 
vened, and soon after the verdict was 
called for. Lender the Statutes of Illinois 
tlie measure of punishment on a verdict 
of guilty of murder, whether it shall be 
death, or imprisonment in the peniten- 
tiary for life, or for some time not less 
than fourteen years, is fixed by the jury. 
In his closing argument the State's at- 
tin'ney had acknowledged that he did not 
think Neebe ought to die: would like 
lenienc.v be shown to the others^ Address- 
ing the jin-y, Judge Gary asked if they 
had agreed upon a verdict? "We have,' 
replied the tVireman, at the same time 
handing two papers to the clerk, from 
which he read: '"We, the Jury, find 



THE HAYMAKKET RIOT — ANAKCHY — 1886. 



455 



the defendants August Spies, Michael 
Schwab, Louis Lingg-, Samuel Fielden, 
Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer, and 
(ieorge Engel, guilty of murder in man- 
ner and form as charged in the indict- 
ment, and fix the penalty at death. We 
find the defendant Oscar W. Neebe 
guilty of murder in manner and form 
as charged in the indictment, and fix the 
penalty at imprisonment in the peniten- 
tiary for fifteen years.'' 

On a Writ of Error the case was car- 
I'ied to the Supreme Court of the United 
States, which sustained the State Court 
in its findings; and, as the date first set 
for the execution of the prisoners had 
passed before the United States Court 
had passed upon the case, November 11, 
^ 1S87, was finally set down as the date 
for the execution. But soon after the 
(•'inclusion of the trial, public opinion 
began to change. When the heat of pas- 
sion had subsided, thinking men and 
women began to realize that the only 
thing that had been established against 
the condemned men was their teachings; 
and it was not long before petitions for 
executive clemency began to pour in upon 
the Governor, and even public meetings 
were held with the same end in view. 
As a result, the sentences of Fielden and 
Schwab were commuted to imprisonment 
for life; and on the very day of the exe- 
cution, Governor Oglesby was seriously 
considering the conunutation of all the 
sentences. But for reasons known only 
to himself he failed to act; and on 
November 11th, Spies, Parsons, Fischer, 
and Engel were hung. Lingg was one of 
the most determined men of the entire 
group and was an expert in the handling 
and preparation of dynamite and bombs. 
On the 6tli of November, five days before 
the date set for the execution, his cell was 
carefully searched. In it was an old box 
that had been passed to him as empty, 
and which appeareil to have only a few 
personal effects in it. It was, however, 
liy accident forcibly overturned, when a 
false bottom was knocked out, and four 
suicide bombs were disclosed. He was 
then again most carefuly searched, and 



put in a new cell where he would be under 
the eye of a keeper all the time. At nine 
o'clock on the 10th of November, a fear- 
ful explosion was heard in the direction 
of his cell. The officer who had him in 
charge had only left him for a moment 
to attend to another prisoner. Ujjon en- 
tering the cell Lingg was discovered lying 
on his side, with face toward the wall, 
and his arm over his head. When he 
was turned, it was found that a bomb 
which he had placed in his mouth and 
exploded had torn nearly the whole front 
of his head out, presenting a most hor- 
rible sight. He was, however, breathing 
regularly, and was at once placed in the 
hands of the surgeons. For more than 
two hours they worked over him, Ik,^ 
calmly watching their every move, and 
bearing all the pain of their operations 
without a quiver. About three in the 
afternoon, however, he passed away, hav- 
ing- cheated the gallows of a victim. 

Few cases have ever been tried in this 
country that aroused such widespread in- 
terest. The cry for vengeance was so loud 
before and during the trial that the pub- 
lic hardly considered the legal rights of 
the accused men at all; nor did they re- 
ceive much more consideration from the 
Court. It was "Anarchy " that was 
really being tried ; and it hardly admits 
of question to-day, nor is it often dis- 
puted by the best lawyers, that the four 
men who were executed on November 
11th, were illegally put to death. Aii- 
arcliy condemned and punished an- 
archists. So strong was this sentiment 
for a few years, that several of the fore- 
most lawyers of the country reviewed the 
trial in the legal journals and magazines, 
practically all arriving at conclusions ad- 
verse to those of the Court. It is un- 
questionably true that under the Common 
Law, and our State laws, one must bo 
held responsible for the result of his 
speech or writings, if hy them another is 
led to commit a criminal act; and if the 
State could have proved that the one who 
threw the bomb was incited to do so by 
the harangues and inflammatory words of 
the accused anarchists, then the case 



456 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



^voulil have been clear, and the Court's 
rulings and instructions would have been 
beyond question. But to this day it is 
not known who threw the bomb, and so 
it cannot possibly be shown that he was 
influenced by the teachings of the men 
who were declared guilty of the murder 
of Degan. The important case against 
Moyer, Haywood, and Pettibone. the of- 
ficials of the Western Federation of 
Miners, tried at Boise, Idaho, in the 
spring of 1907, turned upon this very 
point. And Judge Wood of the United 
States Court held in all the cases, — the 
defendants, or rather two of them, being 
tried separately, — that the Government 
had not made out its case because it had 
failed to show any connection between 
the incendiary talk of the defendants and 
the act of the murderer of ex-Governor 
Steunenberg (also killed by bomb), the 
infamous Harry Orchard. 

In 1893 interest in the case was re- 



vived by the absolute pardon of the three 
anarchists, Fielden, Schwab, and Neebe. 
by the Governor of the State of Illinois: 
and in a small volume entitled, " Why I 
pardoned the Anarchists," Governor Alt- 
geld has reviewed the case fully, an<l 
shown the illegal character of the pro- 
ceedings of 1886. Moreover the criticism 
of hi.s course had been so wide and 
strenuous that Judge Gary felt called 
upon to retry the case in the forum of 
public opinion, and to make what reduced 
itself to a personal defense of his course, 
in the Century Magazine for April, 1903; 
and we think a careful reading of his 
statement will tend to convince an un- 
biased mind that the judge would have 
done well to have remained silent; for 
" Common Sense " is not now, nor has 
it ever been, law in this country; nor does 
" Vengeance " have any place in a State's 
prosecution of a criminal. " Yengeanre 
is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." 



XLIV. 
THE GEEAT BLIZZAED - 1888. 



Supreme Satisfaction of People of New York. — Its Assumed Safet\- from Dangers from 
Storm or Flood. — Apparent Purpose of the Intiuite Power to Show How Insignificant We 
Really Are. — Beginning of Great Storm, Sunday Evening, March 11, 1888. — Origin and 
Progress of Storm From West to Coast. — Conditions Early Monday Morning. — All Systems 
of Transportation Tied Up. — People Rescued From Elevated Trains by Ladders. — Before 
Ten O'clock Broadway a Succession of Hills, Valleys, and Ravines. — -Drifts Across Street 
Six to Ten Feet Deep. — Side Streets Filled With Abandoned Teams About Wliich Snow 
Piled up Fifteen to Twenty Feet. — Cabmen Charge Fifty Dollars for Fare Madison Square 
to Wall Street. — Trade Conditions. — Many " Spring Openings " Advertised for This Monday 
Morning. — At Altman's Through Forenoon One Woman Bought Two Spools of Thread. — 
All Business Suspended at Xoon. — No Steam Trains Able to Enter or Leave City. — Horrors 
of Monday Night. — Storm Increasing, Wind Rising, Mercury Falling. — Total Darkness and 
Blinding Storm Obliterated all Landmarks. — Sufferings of Lady Stenographer; Seven Hours 
Getting Home, a distance of Two Miles. — Terrible Experience of Roscoe Conkling. — ^ Lost 
in Union .Square. — Snow Storm Ceases Tuesday Morning, But Not the Wind. — 12,.jOO,000 
Loads of Snow to Be Removed. — Over Six Hundred Funerals Wednesday. — ■ City Close 
to Starvation. — Humorous Messages of Sympathy from Dakota. — " Keep Of!' the Grass. "^ 
Extent of Storm. — Worst Recorded in History of Country. — Twenty Lives Lost and $15,- 
OOn.Onn to $20,000,000 of Property Destroyed in Manhattan Alone. 



'So all night long the storm roareJ on; 
The morning broke without a sun; 
And when the second morning shone 
We looked upon a world unknown; 
No cloud above, no earth below, — 
A universe of sky and snow." 

— Whittier. 



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JIIE liist fifty yenrs have been characterized by more wonder- 
ful achievements in the domain of physical science than 
have marked any other period of the world's history, — 
perhaps more wonderful, even, than those of all preceding 
centuries combined. We of the twentieth century consider 
with not a little pride the conquests that have been made 
of so many of the forces of nature; and from heights al- 
ready attained, anticipate with confidence the not dis- 
tant day when all the secrets of the earth, sea. and air shall 
be as clear to us as the page of a printed book, and we shall. 
in very fact, be " Lords of all we survey." So accurately have the laws of the 
material universe been fathomed that we bid all its forces serve us, and with 
.such uniformly certain results that it is hardly surprising- that we are prone 
to forget that we are not their masters, and come to look upon ourselves as the 
creators of the energies we are merely given tlie intelligence to direct for the pur- 



458 



FROM COLO^'Y TO WOELD POWEE. 



pose of our own physical and spiritual 
advancement. But to-day, as of old, it 
would seem to be the purpose of tlir In- 
finite Power at times to impress upon us, 
llis creatures, how insignificant we really 
are, and by some great and startling' man- 
ifestation of power, rather than by voice, 
t(i |)riirlaiin "1 am the Lord; that is my 
name; and my glory will I not give to 
another." 

Probably nowhere else in the world 
were the evidences of man's dominion over 
nature so varied and pronounced as in 
New York city. They wore to be seen on 
every hand, — in her great business blocks 
and in her palatial homes; in her rail and 
steamship connections with every part of 
the globe; in her free adoption of all de- 
vices, of every nature, which the }nost 
highly developed inventive genius coukl 
suggest as likely to minister to the com- 
fort or convenience of her peoxsle; in her 
vast commerce; in her widely diversitied 
activities, whose influence was felt 
throughout the world; in her apparently 
perfect and complete system of electrical 
communication, which made the business 
happenings or the political and social 
movements of the most remote jjlaces the 
innnediate subjects for action on her ex- 
changes, or for gossip at her dinner tables 
and clubs; and in the profusion of the 
rari'st products of the factories, the fields, 
the forests, and the seas of every part of 
the globe, which daily appealed to tlu' ap- 
petite and wants of this cosmopolitan 
people. So that not without reason might 
they paraphrase the boast of Babylon's 
great king- and say, " Is not this great 
New York that we have built by the 
nnght of our power, and for the honor of 
our majesty ( " 

Yet, as the sequel shows, nature had 
but to frown for a night and a day, when, 
l(j ! all this vaunted dominance is para- 
lyzed, and the people of this great modern 
Babylon become as impotent as a babe 
in its mother's arms. 

The terrible storm of wind, sleet, and 
snow which prostrated all industries, 
destroyed all means of communication, 
and held ninety-five jser cent of the popu- 



lation of Xew York city in as close con- 
finement as if they had been behin<l 
prison bars, covered the period from Sun- 
<lay evening, March 11th to Wednesday, 
March 14, 1888, and has come to hold 
rank as the most fearful storm ever 
known on the coast, and has acquired the 
distinctive title of " Tlie Blizzard." The 
iifficial report of it made by an officer of 
the Weather Bureau saiil : "The great 
storm off the Atlantic Coast of the United 
States of March ll-14th, will probably go 
down into history as the most severe ex- 
perienced since this country has been 
iidiabiti'd by Europeans. Not only was 
it remarkable for its force and duration, 
but also for the unexpected manner of its 
ai)i)earance and development, and from 
the track it followed from the time it was 
first observed to that of its final disap- 
pearance." Tt orig-inated in the far West 
and traveled leisurely across the Con- 
tinent, an apparently inoffensive and 
somewhat obscure disturbance; and it 
was not until it reached the coast, and 
there found a great anti-cyclonic wave of 
high barometer overlying the ocean from 
Nova Scotia to Hatteras, that it met with 
any opposition. But for this meeting of 
hostile atmospheric forces, each claiming 
the right of way, and trying to pass on 
the same track, the original storm would 
have passed quietly off to sea, and the 
city would have suifered only the trifling- 
inconvenience of the rain of Sunday 
evening. But when two such powerful 
forces cross each other's paths, or meet 
face to face, the results may be exceed- 
ingly unpleasant; and such proved to be 
the ease in New York city, when these 
two storm areas met, — the city apparently 
being- in the very storm center. 

The latter part of the previous week 
had suggested an early spring. The 
weather was mild, — even warm; the sun 
bright and genial, foretelling the near ap- 
proach of the days when all nature breaks 
into renewed life and beauty. On Sun- 
day, however, the scene changed, and dull 
clouils hung- over the city, which became 
darker and heavier as the day advanced. 
Early in the evening- a light rain began 



THE GEEAT BLIZZAED — 1888. 



459 



to fall, the thermometer indicating about 
thirty-five degrees above zero. The force 
of the storm steadily increased until 
before midnight it had driven all pedes- 
trians within doors, the driving, pelting 
rain making umbrellas of little use. 
Shortly after midnight there camr a su<I- 
den change, the wind rising rapidly t(i 
the force of a hurricane, and the mer- 
cury beginning to fall stea<lily. Very 
quickly the rain became a wet, heavy 
snow, which fell with almost unparalleled 
thickness, the average accumulation for 
the hours preceding daybreak being from 
three to four inches. During the early 
morning the fury of the gale was con- 
stantly increasing; and the wind soon ac- 
quired a velocity of sixty to sixty-four 
miles an hour. Very early, long before 
daylight, the street cars had become 
stalled, and on nearly all lines the effort 
to run cars had been abandoned. The 
small army of working men and women 
^^■ho start out between four and seven were 
able to get to their destination with only 
moderate difficulty and without serious 
suffering. But the main army of work- 
ci's, who crowd every means of convey- 
ance and throng the streets between seven 
and nine in the morning, faced another 
l>roblem. The pecidiar physical forma- 
tion of the city, — a long narrow islan<I 
with nearly all nf its offices and whole- 
sale business down at its extreme southern 
end, while the hundreds of thousands who 
nuist get to that business district live 
from two to fifteen miles farther north, 
at the center and toward the northern 
end, — greatly aggravated the difficulties 
piled up by the storm. By eight o'clock 
the street cars had all been taken off, ex- 
cepting those — and there were many of 
them — which were stuck in the snow 
along the various lines. But the elevated 
roads had always, heretofore, made some 
coimection with the downtown districts 
possible; and it was considered that any- 
thing like a complete " tie-up " of the 
transportation system of the city was im- 
possible, as the skeleton-like structures of 
these roads seemed to make any such 
accumulation of snow as should impede 



the movement of trains practically out 
of the question. But this storm had no 
respect for theories ; and before ten o'clock 
it was evident that even these roads had 
met their master. The switches became 
clogged, the tracks icj', and the force of 
the wind was such that the cars swayed 
to and fro until the passengers expected 
every moment to be hurled to the streets 
below, while at times it defied the best 
efforts of the engines to make any head- 
way against it. As a result, this service 
early became totally demoralized and by 
eleven o'clock there was a continuous 
blockade on the Sixth avenue lines from 
Fourth to Twenty-eighth streets. The 
sufferings of the imprisoned passengers 
was intense, quite as much from fear as 
from the inclemency of the weather. 
After a long and weary wait a young man 
on the platform of a car over Twenty- 
second street saw through the blinding- 
snow a burly negro plowing his way down 
that street. 

" Sa-a-ay,"' he shrieked, and the man 
looked up. 

" If you'll get. a ladder and let me down 
into the street I'll give you a dollar." 
There was a look of doubt on the man's 
face, but the idea was too good and the 
opportunity too promising, to allow it to 
miscarry. So another man shouted, " I'll 
give you five, if you get a ladder and get 
me down." 

"A' right, boss," responded the man, 
and away he started to find a ladder ; and 
a shout went up as he was seen shortly 
after coming down Sixth avenue with 
one. But upon placing it against the 
iron pillars it was found it would not 
reach the rail beams. Off the negro went 
again, soon returning with two large and 
strong dry goods boxes and placing the 
butt of the ladder on these, the top rung 
just reached the rail beam. Then the 
man yelled that all the passengers who 
would pay twenty-five cents might use the 
ladder, — an offer which was quickly ac- 
cepted. Wliile that train was being emp- 
tied, passengers from those in front and 
behind were crawling along the icy rail 
beams, getting around the engines by 



460 



FEOM COLO^^Y TO WOKLD POWEIJ. 



holding to their greasy wheels, and in 
turn they descended to the street. As a 
result of his work the colored man took 
iu over one hundred dollars in an hour. 
But neither his scheme nor his apparatus 
was patented. He soon had a dozen com- 
petitors; and before the train service wa.s 
actually discontinued in the afternoon 
there was a colored man with a ladder on 
about every block along the avenue. 
Later a train was blocked at Sixth avenue 
and Ninth street, where the track is 
higher and more exposed. F(jr over four 
hours the passengers were in the greatest 
danger and suffered intensely, until at 
length thirteen policeman forced their 
way through the drifts, bearing a ladder 
that had been hastily constructed at a 
neighboring carpenter's shop ; and by 
means of it all the passengers were 
brought safely to the street. The Ninth 
avenue line suffered even more than the 
Sixth, as it is in many places higher, and 
along its whole route is much more ex- 
posed to the terrible winds that sweep 
down the North river. During the 
middle of the day the best time made by 
a train between Fourteenth and Fiftieth 
streets, where there are some bad grades, 
was four hours, though the schedule time 
was only thirteen minutes. But the 
whole elevated system was tied up before 
night, as the engineers refused to try to 
make the trip again when they had once 
reached the yards. 

But what were the people on the streets 
doing all this time? A very large pro- 
portion of the stores, realizing the serious- 
ness of the situation, had either not been 
opened at all, or had been closed at an 
early hour of the forenoon. But there 
were, of course, many thousands who felt 
that they nuist get down town, and so 
made the journey on foot. Before ten 
o'clock Broadway had, for its entire 
length, become a succession of hills, val- 
leys, and ravines. Enormous drifts, 
reaching entirely across the street and 
from six to ten feet deep, were common. 
The wind was continually adding to these 
and piling up others, while the air was so 
thick with snow that one could hardly 



see fifty feet. Driven by the fierce gale 
the sleet cut faces and hands until the 
lilood came, wdiile the force of the wind 
was so great that many were driven 
bodily into snow banks, and others against 
heavy iron railings or the sides of stone 
walls, breaking arms, legs, and in two or 
three eases fracturing skulls. The entire 
police force was on the alert watching for 
the injured, and helping women and chil- 
dren out of the drifts in which they were 
buried and must soon have perished. 
But all through the forenoon a great 
army in single file marched wearily over 
the snow hills in their effort to reach 
their offices. They presented a grotesque 
and motley appearance, and the greatest 
good nature prevailed. All were brothers 
then, and mutual help and encouragement 
was everywhere manifested. Every con- 
ceivable kind of a dress was to be seen, 
and the procession would have been a 
mirth-provoking one had the situation 
been less tragic. The side streets had 
become practically impassable. Long 
before noon abandoned meat wagons, 
piled high with jirovisions; milk trucks, 
loaded beer wagons, grocers' teams, and 
every kind of a vehicle were to be seen, — 
many of them overturned — and in the 
middle of the streets deserted cars, 
all of which formed natural barri- 
cades about which the fierce winds 
piled the snow from ten to twenty- 
five feet high. During the earlier part 
of the day, and to a limited extent all 
through it, the cabmen forced their poor 
horses through the storm and drifts, mak- 
ing more from a single trip than was 
usually made in a week. With their 
thorough knowledge of all side streets and 
by-ways the drivers were able to get from 
the uptowTi hotels to the downtown office 
district in some way, and at some time. 
A broker at the Hoffman House had a 
very important deal which was to be 
closed that day, which meant a small 
fortune to him. Meeting a " cabby," a 
dialogue something like the following is 
reported to have taken place : 

" I must get down," pleaded the broker. 



THE GREAT BLIZZARD — 1888. 



4G1 



" Oi, very loikely," responded the cab- 
man. 

" What will you take for your whole 
establishment ? " 

" It arn't moine.' 

'■ I'll buy the horse and cart, and I'll buy 
you too, if you're for salfe; come, what's 
your price ? " 

" The 'orse arn't moine, I tell ye." 

"Your rig's worth $150. Come, I'll 
give you $500." 

" No, but I'll take you down for $50." 

The broker quickly paid it, and the 
start was made. Every fare was paid in 
advance that day. 

Before noon a large proportion of the 
cabmen had made a week's, some of them 
a mouth's wages, and the saloons then be- 
came more attractive than other " fares." 
And one of the sad sights of the day was 
the poor old cab horses, from Harlem to 
the battery, tied to lamp posts near 
saloons, while the drivers caroused within. 
The suffering of the poor animals during 
the i>elting storm of cold sleet and snow- 
was terrible; and by a sad irony of fate 
their best friend, Henry Bergh, passed 
away that very morning, when his myriad 
of friends, the dumb animals, most 
needed him. 

So balmy had been the weather the pre- 
ceding week that many of the leading re- 
tail stores had made elaborate prepara- 
tions for their " Spring Openings " on 
this Monday morning, and pages of the 
Sunday papers announced their attrac- 
tions. Among them was Macy's great 
store, but a reporter who called during 
the forenoon found the snow banked six 
to eight feet high against the great show 
windows while the porters could scarcely 
keep the entrances clear. At Altman's 
through the forenoon one woman ventured 
in, who bought two spools of thread. In 
view of these conditions, and the fact that 
the fury of the storm was steadily increas- 
ing, by noon all the great department 
stores closed, and the thousands of clerks 
and salesmen and women began the battle 
of their lives with the elements to reach 
their homes. The great stores on the 
lower East Side were better situated than 



those farther up town, as the Secon<l 
avenue elevated was the last to yield to 
the storm ; so that the thousands of their 
employees stood a better chance of reach- 
ing their homes. The Grand and Allen 
street stations became the most lively 
centres in the city for a few hours, — 
streets, stairways, and station platforms 
becoming one solid mass of anxious but 
good-natured men and women struggling 
to reach tlie trains as they slowly crawled 
along. 

The day was not half spent before every 
kind of business, except the hotels and 
saloons, and eveiy means of transporta- 
tion had become completely paralyzed. 
All railroads leading into the city were 
blocked, and not a train moved in any 
direction; while on all roads were stalled 
trains, whose passengers were destined to 
suffer from cold and hunger from thirty- 
six to sixty hours, before they should get 
relief. But the storm had only begun. 
All through the afternoon the atmosphere 
became thicker and darker, and the force 
of the gale increased. Streets and lo- 
calities became unrecognizable, and people 
lost their way, wandering aimlessly about 
as one might in a dense wilderness. Even 
so early in the storm's career a hand 
thrust through the snow revealed to a 
policeman or chance traveler the location 
of some unfortunate who had been over- 
come, and already was well-nigh buried. 
As the hurricane gained force men and 
women were bodily hurled into drifts, or 
thrown against buildings. Hundreds of 
pedestrians were cut and bruised, and but 
for the timely arrival of a policeman 
would have perished in the snow. And 
with all the other horrors of the situation, 
the steadily falling temperature made 
conditions even more intolerable; for be- 
fore night set in the mercury was rapidly 
approaching the zero mark, — an extreme 
for New York city. All telegraphic and 
telephonic connections had been destroyed 
very early in the day, the Atlantic cable 
being the only means of cormnunieation 
with the outside world. 

One pitiable sight was the great num- 
ber of dead sparrows, the only bird that 



4G2 



FEOM COLU^'Y TU WOiiLJU POWER. 



remains with us through all kinds of 
weather. Driven with tremendous force 
against the windows and buildings they 
were killed by hundreds. Flocks of them 
were driven into the hotels around Madi- 
son square, where they were fed, being so 
tame as to take food from the hands of 
the guests. One is reported to have flown 
into the barroom of the Gilsey House, 
where he remained on the bar for over an 
hour, an interested spectator, and a centre 
of attraction. 

But no words can express the horror of 
the general situation as night came on. 
In homes throughout the city and its 
suburbs there reigned the most painful 
suspense as to the whereabouts of some 
member of the family. All were equally 
helple.ss; no inquiries could be instituted, 
no search made; all must simply wait in 
dumb suspense. Many cases were later 
reported where people were stricken with 
dangerous diseases, but neither a doctor 
nor medicines could be procured. While 
the storm was raging furiously, Monday 
afternoon, Manager Eckert of the West- 
ern Union Telegraph Company found two 
girls, aged thirteini and fifteen, lying in 
the snow in the doorway of the Coal and 
Iron Exchange building, at the corner of 
Liberty and Church streets. Thi>y were 
clasped in each other's arms, and both 
already unconscious. With great ditfi- 
cnlty he succeeded in partially arousing 
them, and in carrying them through the 
storm and the drifted snow to the Astor 
House. During the afternoon the driver 
of a baker's wagon, who had undertaken 
to make his calls in spite of the storm 
and the cold, was found sitting on the 
seat of his wagon, still holding the reins 
and with wide open eyes, — but, frozen to 
death. And so the sad tales began to 
come in, as they were learned by the in- 
defatigable reporters for the papers, who 
performed the most herculean feats and 
were the means of saving many lives. 

As the day wore towards night the ques- 
tion of how they were to get to their 
homes became an intensely serious one for 
those who had gone down town in the 
morning. Knowing the keen anxiety that 



would be felt in their homes, and having 
no means of communicating with their 
families, many took the trip uptown not- 
withstanding their experience of the 
morning, and unmindful of the vastly 
worse conditions that must exist as a re- 
sult of the furious storm through the day. 
Kvcry inch of available space in all the 
downtown hotels was early bargained 
for; cots were laid in all the parlors, cor- 
ridors, and even bathrooms, and all were 
quickly taken. Billiard tables and floor 
spaces were eagerly sought. All the down- 
town clubs threw open their doors; and 
even the Bowci'y lodging houses were 
overrun with a class of patrons never seen 
within their doors before. Of course all 
the jjolice stations were crowded to the 
doors with refugees and the great railroad 
stations were packed with people, many 
<jf whom gladly sought rest on the hard 
floors after the exhausting experiences of 
the day. All the sleeping cars in the sta- 
tion yards were placed at the disposal of 
travelers who could not get into the 
hotels. Many and heart-rending were 
the stories told by those who undertook 
to walk uptown. This was a much 
harder task than getting down, as they 
now had to face the gale and the driving 
snow which had beat vipon their backs in 
the morning. One case, which illustrates 
the hardships endured by many, was that 
(if a young lady, a public stenographer in 
the Stewart building, at the corner of 
Broadway and Chambers street. Having 
faithfully promised to complete some work 
for a lawyer that day, she had gone down 
early in the morning on a train that got 
through. In the afternoon she started to 
walk to her home at .'51,) West Nineteenth 
street. Though the distance is hardly more 
than two miles, she buifeted with the storm 
and the drifts for seven Iiours, and was 
nearly dead when she reached her door. 
She had to be carried into the house, 
when she immediately fainted. Her 
clothes were frozen to her body. There 
were scores, perhaps hundreds of these 
cases, and not a few were overcome and 
perished in the snow. One of the number 
who barely escaped with his life, and who 



THE GREAT BLIZZAED — 1888. 



4g:] 



died only about a month later as a result 
of the terrible strain and exposure, was 
the well-known ex-United States senator 
from New York State, Roscoe Conk- 
ling. A man noted throughout the country 
for his superb physique, his tremendous 
will power, and great physical strength, 
which he had always cultivated by con- 
stant and regular exercise, he felt 
little hesitation in facing the storm 
and starting on his walk downtown. 
From his office in Wall street to his 
destination, the New York Club, the 
distance is about two and a half 
miles, which Mr. Conkling would ordi- 
narily have walked in forty minutes. As 
he has left an account of his experience 
it will fitly close this imperfect suggestion 
of the frightful conditions that obtained 
in New Y^ork on that first day of the 
storm. He says: "There wasn't a cab or 
carriage of any kind to lie had. Once dur- 
ing the day I had declined an offer to ride 
uptown in a ean-iage because the man 
wanted fifty dollars ; and I started up 
Broadv.-a.v on my pins. It was dark, and 
it was useless to try to pick out a path, 
so I went magnificently along, shoulder- 
ing through drifts, and headed for the 
north. I was pretty well exhausted when 
I got to Union square, and wiping the 
snow from my eyes tried to make out the 
triangles there. But it was impossible. 
There was no light and I plunged right 
through on as straight a line as I could 
determine upon. Sometimes I have run 
across passages in novels descriptive of 
great adventures in snow storms, — for 
example in stories of Russian life, where 
there would be a vivid description of a 
man's struggle on a snow-swept and 
windy plain, but I have always considered 
the presentation an exaggerated one. I 
shall never say so again: for after what 
I encountered in last night's blizzard, I 
can believe that the strongest description 
would fail to approximate the truth. I 
had got to the middle of the Park 
(Square) and was up to my arms in a 
drift. I i^ulled the ice and snow from my 
eyes and held my hands up there till every- 
thing was melted off so I could see, — but 



it was too dark and the snow too blind- 
ing. For nearly twenty minutes I was 
stuck there and I came as near giving up, 
and sinking down there to die, as a man 
can do it, and not do it. When I reached 
the New York Club on Twenty-fifth street 
I was covered all over with ice and packed 
snow and they would scarcely believe I 
had walked from Wall street. It fool- 
Ihrce hours to make the journey." 

xVll through the night the storm con- 
tinued to rage with unabated fury. But 
with the dawn of Tuesday the fall of the 
snow ceased, though the high wind con- 
tinued through the day, filling the air 
with driven snow and piling many of the 




KOSCOE CONKLING. 

drifts still higher. Immediately all the 
energies of men, women, and children 
were turned toward freeing themselves 
from their snowbound condition. Thou- 
sands of men were set to work clearing 
paths, other thousands, under the direction 
of the street department, to opening up 
the drifts along the principal avenues and 
streets, while still other thousands were 
set to work by the street railway com- 
panies in an effort to clear their main 
tracks. All through the day everyone 
worked with a will; but with all their 
united effort little business could lie 
transactp<l. Toward night the elevated 
roads got into fair condition, and began 



-KJl 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



niiiuiiig trains, but iio attempt was made 
til run the surface cars. As it is expected 
that the city will have all tlie leading 
streets cleared of snow very soon after it 
ceases to fall, — and as a rule, it does, — ■ 
very few merchants or storekeepers, or 
even liverymen, have sleighs or sle<ls. 
Cuuseiiuently, in this emergency, every 
kind of a box was i)ut on runners; and 
carpenters worked day and night to fit 
out any kind of a rough sled for the 
grocers, butchers, bakers, and tradesmen. 
Some very patriarchal old coaches on 
runners — relics of days gone by — were 
unearthed and put in service between the 
hotels and the downtown district. After 
a careful study of the situation, the 
street commissioners estimated that the 
amount of snow below Forty-second street 
that must be carried away would reach 
to at least 25,000,000 cubic yartls; which 
at the usual rate of two cubic yards to ;i 
load meant 12,500,000 loads that must be 
shoveled, carted to the wharves, and 
dumped in the rivers. While ever.vthing 
was being done to open up the buried cit.v, 
the steam railroads were no less active in 
their efforts to release the passengers from 
the stalled trains, and to lift the embargo 
on travel. Seventy-two loaded xiassenger 
trains were reported snowbound almost 
witliin sight (d' the city. But it was 
Wednesday morning before the New York 
Central railroad got its local tracks clear; 
and by noon it hail brought into the Forfy- 
second street station all trains that had 
been stalled south of White Plains. 
Fortunatel.v there were but two or three 
alarms of fire during the blizzard's reign. 
In responding to the alarms, scouts were 
sent ahead on horseback to mark the way 
for the engines and hose carriages which 
followed, each drawn by six or eight 
jiowerful horses, tin- drivers mounted on 
one of the rear teams and lashing the 
leaders, — having every appearance of a 
battery going into battle. 

All through Tuesday most distressing 
tales of suffering were reported from all 
Quarters. One well-known merchant was 
found dead on Seventh avenue, having 
evidi'ntly fallen from exhaustion and tlien 



Ijccn frozen to death. Another was found 
dead in the suow on the edge of Central 
Park, whither he had apparently wandered 
after losing his way. A woman was 
fiiund dead from exposure in an area wa.v 
off Broadway. About three o'clock in the 
murning two Herald reporters were forg- 
ing their way uptown on snow shoes, 
when at the corner oi Broadway and 
Twent.v-third street they espied a dark 
object about six feet from the walk, and 
partially covered with snow. Uncovering 
it and turning it over, they discovered 
that it was a policeman who, worn out 
with the excitement and exertions of the 
night, had fallen in the drift and was too 
weak to rise. Though unconscious, he 
was taken into the Herald's uptown office 
near by and revived. The hospitals were 
crowded to the doors with men, women, 
and children, — some seriously cut. or with 
lioibs broken a« a result of the hurri- 
cane's rough work; others suffering from 
frozen ears, faces, hands, and feet. Tliat 
Jlonday night was one that no one who 
was in any wa.v exposed to its horrors 
will ever forget. A peculiar feature of 
such a calamity as had befallen New 
^ ork is the great number of serious situ- 
ations that arise of which even a very 
observing and inquisitive person would 
hardly ever learn. This is forcibly illus- 
trated by the fact that no interments of 
the dead had been possible since Sunday ; 
and Wednesday more than six hundred 
bodies were awaiting burial. This num- 
ber was uot materially affected b.v the 
storm, as, so far as known, but twenty lives 
were lost as the direct result of the bliz- 
zard. As this number represented the 
deaths in the old city only, and was ex- 
clusive of Brooklyn and the other suburbs 
where similar conditions existed, one is 
forcibly impressed as to the death rate of 
a great city. 

On Wednesday the wheels of industry 
began to move again ; and although all 
conditions were abnormal in the extreme, 
still all pulled together, and with a will, 
for the common good, everyone manifest- 
ing the best of nature and infinite 
patience. It has been said that great 



THE GKEAT BLIZZAED — 1888. 



465 



cities like London ;uul Xew York are 
never more tlian one week removed from 
want, and already New York had begun 
to realize the truth of the saying. Provi- 
sions and poultry were already very scarce 
and prices rose Wednesday from ten to 
thirty per cent. No milk had come into 
the city since Sunday, which caused 
serious inconvenience and even suffering 
in families where there were very young 
children and invalids. Coal had also be- 
come scarce, — and conditions were such 
as to make it very clear that, had the em- 
bargo on communication with the outside 
world continued for a week, tremendous 
suffering and want must have ensued. 

To aid the sun in its benefieent work of 
melting the snow, lionfires were built in 
and under the drifts all over the city. 
One statistical reporter rstini:it?d that 
there were over twenty thousand such 
fires on Wednesday, below Forty-second 
street, and some streets presented all the 



this drift ; " another, " Man buried under 
this drift; hurry up and dig him out;'' 
and still another gave greeting to the 
home of blizzards with these words, 
" Dakota, thanks awfully ; " while planted 
high on snow peaks all over the city could 
be seen the familiar injunction, " Please 
keep off the grass." 

But it's an " ill wind that blows none to 
good:" and New York's dire extremity 
was Dakota's golden opportunit.v. The 
feelings of the average New Yorker had 
been hurt in many ways during the days 
of the blizzard's force ; but to have the 
first open wires bring messages like the 
following seemed like adding insult tn 
injury: 

BiSMARciv, N. D., March 14. 
Mayor Hewitt, New Yorh: 

Subscription paper reported passed 
through Dakota for aid of storm sufferers 
in New York, and surrounding country. 
Citizens of territory express deep sym- 



'S^=''^:^^_vfi^iS«l)ar'r''J^^^, 

















K 






,.^- 



.SNOU DUlhrS ON SIDK STREET. 



appearances of a great conflagration. All 
over the city large placards began to ap- 
pear on top of the huge drifts. One an- 
nounced a " reward of five thousand 
dollars for a diamond ring lost under 



pathy for your people, and are respondiny- 
liberally — would you prefer clothes, or 
food, or both? 

J. M. QUINN, 
Bismarck Tribune. 



466 



FltOil COLONY TO WOlILU l-UWi.!:. 



llLiio.x, D. T., Marcli 14. 
j\I.\Yoi! Hewitt, Xcw York: 

Huron, Dakota, under a mild spring 
sun, sends her sympathy to blizzard- 
strieken New York. If needed, you may 
draw on us for $50 to reUeve the storm 
sufferers. 

And the following- message was sent to 
Senator Conkling, eongratulating him 
upon his escape from death in the storm. 

FAli(iO, X. D., March 14. 
Hun. KoscoK OoNKLiXG, Nfw Yurk: 

Tlie Dakota robins, sifting on orange 
frees in lAoom, join in thanks for your 
safe delivery from New York's snow 
drifts. Here in the Tribune office all join 
me in congratulations to yon. and say : 
Coinr to the lianana tjeft. where every 
man is your v.-cll wisher. 

A. W. EDWARDS, 

Editor. Farf/u Trilniiie. 

Many days, of course, passed before the 
city assumed a normal condition, auti the 
effects of the blizzard were obliterated. 
For weeks it was the common topic fur 
conversation and discussion ; and many 
were the t(>rrible experiences that were re- 
counted. In summing up the tlireet re- 
sults, so far as the city alone was con- 
cerned, it was found that twenty people 
had perished in the snow drifts or were 
frozen to death, though many others, like 



Senator Conkling, doubtless succumbed 
later to the effects of the storm. The 
property loss was vai'iously estimated at 
from fifteen to twenty million dollars. It 
should be remembered that all these sta- 
tistics apply to the old city of New Y'^ork 
alone, the present borough of Manhattan, 
— as Brooklyn and the outlying districts 
had not then been annexed. And it must 
also be remeniljered that tins description 
of conditions which existed in New York 
applies with equal truth and force to the 
surrounding country. The story of the 
blizzard's career and effects iu the city 
alone has been told here, because it was 
the storm centre, and the locality where 
its fury was most severely felt and where 
the havoc wrought would naturally be the 
greatest. Other coast cities suffered only 
in a lesser degree, — AVashingtou, Balti- 
more, Philadelphia, and Boston, all re- 
ceiving a liberal share of the storm's at- 
tention. It did not, however, extend 
further west than Buff'alo, and even there 
it was not marked by unusual severity, 
lint as the must interested students of its 
phenomena could tind no other storm re- 
i-orded in the history of the country with 
which to compare it, so it may be hoped 
tliat it may long retain its rightful claim 
tu the title of "The Blizzard," and that 
neither New York nor any other city may 
again have to go through a like ex- 
perience. 



XLV. 
THE NEW NAVY— 1883-1909. 



Conditions Preceding Spanisli War. — President C leveland's Attitude Regarding Cuban Affairs. 
President McKinley's. — Republican Platform of 1896. — Senator Proctor's Description of 

Conditions in Cuba. — Destruction of the Maine. — Resolutions of Congress Declaring War. 

History of American Xavy. — Sentiment of Colonial Leaders. — John Paul Jones. — Total 
Strength of Revolutionary Navy. — ■ First Secretary of Navy. — Character of Vessels Built 
After War. — ^ First Application of Steam and of tlie Proiieller. — Tin- Demoloyos. — The 
Monitor and Uerrimac. — Condition of Xavy After Civil War. — Birth of Xew >favy. — Tlie 
Wliite Squadron. — Tlie Battlesliip Era. — The Oregon. — The Battle of Manila. — Departure 
of Admiral Sampson's Fleet to Blocka<le Cuba. — Cervera's Squadron and the Santiago 
Blockade. — The Blowing Up of the Merrimac. — Destruction of Cervera's Fleet. — Fall of 
Santiago and Close of War. — Schley and the Famous Loop. — Improvement in Navy 
Following Close of Spanish War. — Comparison of Navy of 1893 and 1908. — Naval Appro- 
jjriatiiins of Treading World Powers. — Cruise of the Battlesliips. — Itinerary of Trip. — 
Reception of Fleet and Review in Hampton Roads, February 22, 1909. 



" Why prate of peace? When, warriors all, 
We clank in harness into hall. 
And ever bare upon the board 
Lies the necessary sword." 

— HoBEitT I.ofis Stevenson. 




HE year 1898 marks an epoch in the history of the United 
States. For one hundred years the young nation had been 
expanding from the Atkrntie to the Pacific; liad been in- 
creasing at an unprecedented rate in population ; had been 
steadily advancing from a position of weakness and even 
contempt to one of the most exalted moral and material 
influence among the nations of the world; had, by the in- 
ventive genius, shrewd common sense, and aggressive 
intelligence of its people reached a very high degree of 
attainment in every branch of practical science, in manu- 
factures, in commerce, in the liberal arts and in educa- 
tion ; had, fro;ii a low and disordered financial condition advanced to a state of 
enormous wealth ami unparalleled abundance of material resources; and had, by the 
severest test of the Kepublican form of government in two wars, and in repeated 
trying emergencies in home affairs, established beyond question the practicability 
and inherent virtue of popular institutions. After a vigorous and honorable youth 
the country had achieved a position of respect and influence among the nations of the 
world that was unique. A well established tradition of noninterference with the 
affairs of other peoples, based upon the "teachings of the fathers" and formulated 
in the Monroe Doctrine, had secured innnuiiity from foreign entanglements, and the 
peace necessary for a phenomenal internal development; while the moral influence of 
the nation had become second to that of none of the great powers of the world. This 
fact had very recently been demonstrated when, in 1895, M'ithout an army of any 
consequence and practically no available navy, the principles of the Monroe Doctrine 



-K58 



FROM COLONY TO WOltLD POWER. 



a-s asserteil by President Cleveland liad 
been accepted by the most powerful of 
the nations of the world, which had ceased 
its aggressive encroachments upon the 
rights of a weaker power, and liail sub- 
mitted its cause to arbitration. While 
there was nuieh in the conduct ni domes- 
tic aft'airs and in thi' achniiiistration of 
municipal governments tliat was with 
reason deplored, still the people could look 
back upon the period of the nation's youth 
witii just pride, and felt warranted in 
facing- the twcntictli century with assur- 
anre and confidence in the maturity of 
tlieir powers and in the benetieence of the 
established customs and institutions. As 
Prof. Coolidge. in his "United States as 
a World Power." has said: "They be- 
li<'ved their country to be the best, the 
tinest, the richest, the happiest in tlie 
world, and they gave due recognitinn to 
tlii'ir (iun merits which had made it 
so. With a tine self-confulenc, public 
iipiniiin. when forced to admit the charges 
against anything American, consoled it- 
self with the belief that things would 
soon be better. There was a comfortable 
conviction that if the Americans had 
failed in any respect, it was only because 
ihcy bad been tiio busy elsewhere to turn 
llicir attention in that particular direc- 
tidu; that, wlien once they had established 
tiicir material conditions on a thoroughl.v 
firm fciundation, they could attend to 
such matters as tinlvcring- the weak places 
in the macliiue of go^'ernment or develop- 
ing ihe a'Sthetic capabilities of the race." 
Jkit unconsciously the youthful nation 
was alread.v face-to-faee with new eondi- 
lious that were to test its moral and ma- 
terial strength. When Mr. ilcKInle.v 
was inaugurated as president, on March 
-1. IS'.tT. the Country was at jieacc with 
all the world, and the people were looking 
forward with eager confidence to an era 
of commi'icial prosjierity after four years 
of financial and business depression. No 
o}i<' >aw any cloud on the political hori- 
zon that portended war, nor any threat- 
ened complications that would swerve the 
country from its purpose to maintain the 
existing peace with all nations, and to 



devote all its energies to the task of ad- 
vancement of home industry and the 
furtlier development of its vast material 
resources. President McKinley's inau- 
gural address was devoted almost entirely 
to economic questions, including the 
tariff. It is true that public opinion in 
the United States had been aroused and 
sliocked b.v the deplorable state of affairs 
in Cuba, where the insurgents had not 
been able to overthrow the Spanish gov- 
erinnent, nor had the latter been able to 
maintain any stable authority outside two 
or three of the large cities. In his mes- 
sage to Congress on December 7. ISOtl, 
President Cleveland analyzed the situa- 
tion, and referred, in no uncertain terms, 
to the imperative need of making an 
end, in some way. to the state of anarchy 
that existed on the island. " The spec- 
tacle," he said, " of the utter ruin of an 
adjoining countr.v. by nature one of the 
njost fertile and charming on the 
globe, would engage the serious attention 
of the government and people of the 
United States in any circumstances. In 
point of fact, the.v have a concern with it 
whieli is b.v no means of a wholly senti- 
mental or philanthropic character. It 
lies so near to us as to be hanlly sepa- 
rated from our territory. Our actual 
l)ecuniar,v interest in it is second only to 
that of the jieople and government of 
Spain. It is reasonably estimated that 
at least from $30,000,000 to $.50,000,000 of 
American capital are invested in planta- 
tions and in railroad, mining, and other 
business enterprises on the island. The 
volume of trade between the United 
States and Cuba, which in 1880 amounted 
to about $(U.00(.).0(10, rose in 1893 to about 
$lo;j,0OO.O(it) and in 1894, the year before 
the present insurrection broke out, 
amcmuted to nearly $96,000,000. Besides 
this large pecuniary stake in the fortunes 
of Cuba, the United States finds itself 
ine,\tricabl,v involved in the present con- 
test in other ways both vexatious and 
costly ... It would seem that if Spain 
should (iffer to Cuba genuine autonomy — 
a measure of home rule which, while pre- 
serving' the sovereignty of Spain, wouhl 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



4(iii 



satisfy all rational requirenieuts of her 
Spanish subjects — there should be no just 
reason why the pacification of the island 
might not be efFected on that basis. Such a 
result would appear to be in the interest of 
all concerned ... It should be added that 
it cannot be reasonably assured that the 
hitherto expectant attitude of the United 
States will be indefinitely maintained. 
While we are anxious to accord all due 
respect to the sovereignty of Spain, we 
cannot view the landing conflict in all 
its features and projierly apprehend our 
inevitably close relations to it, without 
considering that by the course of events 
we may be drawn into such an unusual 
and unprecedented condition, as will fix a 
limit to our patient waiting for Spain to 
end the contest, either alone and in her 
own way, or with our friendly co-opera- 
tion." 

Y>y its platform for the presidential 
campaign of 1896, the Kejiublican party 
placed itself on record as favoring inter- 
ference in Cuban affairs, to the end that 
hostilities in the island should be termi- 
nated. " From the hour of achieving their 
own independence," read one paragraph 
of that declaration of party principles. 
" the people of the United States have 
rc^garded with s^^npathy the struggles of 
<pther American peoples to free themselves 
from European domination . . . The 
government of Spain having lost con- 
trol of f'uba and being unable to protect 
the lives or property of resident American 
citizens, or to comply with its treaty obli- 
gations, we believe that the government 
of the United States should actively use 
its influence and good ofiices to restore 
jieace, and give independence to the 
islands.'' When President McKinley suc- 
ceeded President Cleveland, March 4, 
1897. he made no change in the policy 
which the latter had ijursued, but con- 
tinued the insistent pressure by which it 
was sought to persuade the Spanish gov- 
ernment to give a satisfying measure of 
free government to its great dependency. 
In conformity with that policy and the 
expressed attitude of his party he early 
addressed himself to the Cuban question. 



the new administration's position being 
first communicated to Spain by a note 
from Secretary of State Sherman, dated 
June 27, 1897, to the effect that the 




Photo. Copyrighted by J. E. Purely. Boston. 
REDFIELD PHOCTOH. 

United States, in the name of humanity 
and in its own interests, protested against 
the decrees and acts of General Weyler, 
especially his reconcentration order. On 
August -Ith the Spanish government re- 
plied that the situation on the island was 
not as bad as reported ; that General Wey- 
ler's orders were not unusual, and were 
no more severe than measures adopted by 
Hunter and Sheridan in the Virginia 
Valley, or by Sherman in Georgia. And 
in conclusion the attention of the Ameri- 
can government was directed to the 
activity of the Cuban Junta in New 
York, and to the aid the Cubans were 
constantly receiving from the United 
States. 

General Woodford having succeeded 
Ilannis Taylor as Minister from the 
United States to Spain in September, 
1897, a further communication was pre- 
sented to the Spanish govenimeni setting 



470 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD TOWEK. 



Inrth in detail the views of the adminis- 
tration, and once more tendering the good 
ofRees of this government for the adjust- 
ment of Cuban affairs. Very shortly aftei- 
this the SiJanish ministry resigned, and, 
on October 14, a liberal ministry assumed 
control of that nation's interests. Three 
days later General Blanco was apjwinted 
to succeed General Weyler as governor 
and captain-general of the island: and 
iiu the 23d the new ministry replied to 
(ieneral Woodford's last note, promising 
to grant autonomy to Cuba, and again re- 
quested the United States to enforce with 
more vigor its neutrality laws. The de- 
cree of autonomy was made public in 
Madrid November 27, and a summary of 
its contents was immediately cabled to 
Washington so that it might be considered 
by the President before sending his mes- 
sage to the Congress about to convene. 
In that message President McKinley fully 
reviewed the Cuban situation, but advised 
that it was only fair to Spain to give the 
new ministry time to test its policy of 
autonomy. He also referred to the recall 
of General Weyler, the mitigation of the 




FITZHTT.n LEE. 

evils of reconcentration. and stated that, 
so far as this government knew, not a 
single American citizen was then under 
arrest or in confinement in Cuba. 



But it immediately became manifest 
that autonomy had come too late, and that 
it was greeted with scant favor by either 
party. On January 13, 1898, serious riots 
occurred in Havana, which were intended 
as a popular demonstration against the 
entire scheme. About this time Senator 
Proctor, of Vennont, visited Cuba, and on 
March 17, 1898, he delivered a speech in 
the Senate, relating the results of his ob- 
servations, which inflamed public opinion 
to a white heat. " It is not peace, nor is 
it war,"' he said: " it is desolation and dis- 
tress, misery and starvation ... I saw 
no house or hut in the four hundred miles 
of railroad ride from Pinar del Kio 
in'ovince in the west across the full width 
of Ilabana and Matanzas provinces, and 
to Sagua la Grande on the north shore 
and to Cienfuegos on the south shore of 
Santa Clara, except within the Spanish 
trochas . . . The dividing lines between 
the parties are the most straight and clear- 
cut that have ever come to my knowl- 
edge. The division in our war was by no 
means so clearly defined. It is Cuban 
against Spaniard. It is practically the 
entire Cuban population on one side, and 
the Spanish army and Spanish citizens 
on the other . . . There is no doubt 
that General Blanco is acting in entire 
good faith : that he desires to give the 
Cubans a fair measure of autonomy. He 
has, of course, a few personal followers; 
lint the army and the Spanish citizens do 
mil want genuine autonomy, for that 
iiicans government by the Cuban people. 
And it is not strange that the Cubans say 
it conies too late." In the course of this 
speech. Senator Proctor described in de- 
tail the horrible sufferings of the people 
as a result of the concentration system ; 
the wretched misery of the country peojjle 
huddled together like animals within the 
military stations, where they were dying 
by hundreds every day from disease and 
starvation. The effect of his speech was 
electrical, and the people throughout the 
United States declared with one voice 
that such barbarity must cease. From 
that day it was a foregone conclusion 



THE NEW XAVY — 1883-1909. 



471 



that the Spaniards must g'et out of Cuba, 
however long diplomatic formalities 
might postpone the event. But an unfore- 
seen disaster was close at hand which was 
to precipitate the crisis. Upon the occa- 
sion of the riots in Havana in January, 
General Fitzhugh Lee, who was then 
Consul-General of the United States at 
Havana, advised the government that the 
presence of war-ships would probably be 
desirable later on for the protection of 
American citizens, but not then. The 
g-overnment, however, decided to send a 



laved. But the Maine, under the com- 
mand of Captain Sigsbee, had already 
sailed for Havana, where she arrived Jan- 
uary 25th, without any demonstration on 
the part of the people. There she remained 
for three weeks, no appreciable excitement 
attending her stay. On the contrary a 
feeling of relief and confidence seemed 
to follow the long-interrupted friendly 
intercourse. So noticeable was this that 
General Lee strongly urged that the pres- 
ence of our ships in Cuban waters should 
be continued by retaining the Maine at 




Photo. Copyrighted by Underwood <& Underwood, N. Y. 

THE MAINE. 



war vessel to Havana ; but to avoid as far 
as possible any suggestion of an aggres- 
sive or unfriendly aet General Lee was 
officially informed, on January 24, that it 
was " the purpose of this government to 
resume friendly naval visits at Cuban 
ports. In that view the Maine will call 
at the port of Havana in a day or two. 
Please arrange for a friendly interchange 
of calls with authorities." General Lee at 
once urged the postponement of the visit 
for a few days until the excitement oc- 
casioned by the riots should be further al- 



Havana, or, in the event of her recall, by 
sending another vessel there to take her 
place. But at forty minutes after nine, 
on the evening of February 15, the Maine 
was destroyed by an explosion, by which 
the entire forward part of the ship was 
utterly \\-recked. In this horrible catas- 
trophe two officers and two hundred and 
sixty-four of her crew perished, those who 
were not killed outright by the explosion 
being penned between decks and drowned 
by the immediate sinking of the hull. 
Prompt assistance was rendered by all the 



472 



FllOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWER. 



vessels in the harbor, the Spanish Cruiser 
Alfonso XII. being especially active in 
this regard. The wounded wore tenderly 
cared for by the authorities, the hospitals 
being freely opened to them, while the 
earliest recovered dead were interred by 




CAPTAIN CHARLES U. SIGSBEE. 

the municipality. Tributes of grief and 
sympathy were also offered from all of- 
ficial quarters of the island. 

A naval Court of Inquiry was at once 
appointed, made up of officers of rank and 
experience. The Spanish authorities re- 
quested i>ermission to take part in the in- 
vestigation, but their request was refused. 
After twenty-three days of arduous labor 
their report was completed March 21, and 
submitted to the President. T!ie testi- 
mony showed that there were two explo- 
sions, the first like a report of a gun, the 
second more open, prolonged, and id 
greater volume. The conclusions of tlie 
Court, as officially reported, were: "That 
the loss of the Maine was not in any re- 
spect due to the fault or negligence on 
the jiart of any of the officers or members 



of her crew ; that the ship was destroycil 
by the explosion of a submarine mine, 
wliirh caused the partial explosion of two 
or more of her forward magazines; and 
that no evidence has been obtainable fix- 
ing the responsibility for the destruction 
of the Mdine upon any jierson or persons." 
Not being allowed to join in the investi- 
gation made l>y the American officials, 
the Spanish authorities made one on their 
own account, examining many witnesses, 
and concluded that the destruction of the 
Maine was due to an explosion in her 
forward magazine. The real cause of this 
most lamentable catastrophe has never 
been definitely established. If the sub- 
marine mine theory is accepted, still no 
thoughtful person, reviewing all the con- 
ditions and evidence, has ever believed 
that the Spanish government either 
planned the destruction of the vessel, or 
had any knowledge of such a purpose. Ko 
act, as they well knew, could have been 
perpetrated that would more surely spur 
the American people on to war: and Spain 
<lid not then want war. The insurgents 
were the only ones who were working to 
incite the United States to active hostili- 
ties, and the most logical supposition is 
that, if the Maixe was blown up by a 
I torpedo or mine, the placing and explod- 
ing of it were the rash acts of hot-headed 
Cuban insurgents. 

Pending the report of the Court ap- 
pointed to investigate the affair, the peo- 
ple manifested a remarkable degree of 
patience and sanity, as public opinion had 
been aroused to a point only equaled by 
the frenzy that followed the attack on 
Fort Sumter in 1861. But as soon as 
the findings of the Court were made pul>- 
lic the pent up anger burst forth. " Ee- 
member the Maine" became the watch- 
word, and an immediate declaration of 
war was demanded. Just at this juncture 
several of the European powers united in 
an appeal to the President to maintain 
peace; and the Pope directed Archbishop 
Ireland to j^roeeed to Washington as his 
representative to work for the same end. 
Put convinced that further negotiations 
witli Spain would be useless, and being 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



473 



hotly pressed by an impatient Congress 
now thoroughly dominated by the popular 
sentiment, the President, on April 11, 
1898, sent a message to Congress in which 
he reviewed the situation, concluding that 
forcible intervention alone could solve the 
existing difficulties; this, he asserted, was 
justitied on the grounds of humanity, as 
well as on those of furnishing the neces- 
sary protection of the lives and property 
of American citizens in Cuba, and of end- 
ing a conflict that was a constant menace 
to the peace of the United States, while 
it entailed a great expense on our govern- 
ment. After several days of heated dis- 
cussion, on April 19, Congress adopted 
the following resolutions, which were rec- 
ognized as equivalent to a declaration of 
\\'ar : 

" Resolved by the iSenatc and House of 
Representatives of the United States in 
Congress Assembled, 

" First : That the people of the island 
of Cuba are, and of right ought to be, free 
and independent. 

" Second : That it is the duty of the 
United States to demand, and the govern- 
ment of the United States does demand, 
that the Government of Spain at once re- 
lincpiish its authority and government in 
the island of Cuba, and withdraw its land 
and naval forces from Cuban waters. 

" Third : That the President of the 
I'nited States be, and he hereby is, di- 
rected and empowered to use the entire 
land and naval forces of the United 
States, and to call into the actual service 
of the United States the militia of the 
several States to such extent as may be 
necessary to carry these resolutions into 
effect. 

"Fourth: That the United States 
hereby disclaims any disposition or inten- 
tion to exerciss sovereignty, jurisdiction, 
or control over said island except for the 
pacification thereof, and asserts its deter- 
mination, when that is accomplished, to 
leave the government and control of the 
island to its people." 

As soon as the President approved the 
Resolutions, which he did on the follow- 
ing day, the Spanish ilinistcr left Wash- 



ington, and on the next day General 
Woodford severed his relations with the 
Spanish government, leaving Madrid for 
Paris; and a state of war between the 
United States and Spain became an es- 
tablished fact. 

In the light of sul: sequent events it 
should be noted that, while putting these 
Resolutions into effect would unquestion- 
ablj' involve the country in a war with 
Spain, it is, at the same time, most ex- 
plicitly declared that the purpose of such 
war is not to conquer Spain as a nation, 
nor to attack her in the possession of any 
of the other of her dependencies. Apart 
from the effect of the disturbed condi- 
tions in Cuba upon the United States, 
the country had no cause for war with 
Spain, and with the surrender of that is- 
land, the whole object for which the war 
was declared was accomplished. The ac- 
quisition of Porto Rico, and the subse- 
quent demand for the cession of the Phil- 
ippines, are hardly consistent with the dis- 
interested, and highly moral purpose 
a\"owed in the fourth resolution. More- 
over, it would seem that if the fourth 
resolution expressed the purpose and in- 
tent of the Administration, there could 
hardly have been complete harmony in 
its counsels ; for on Februai'y 23, only five 
days less than two months before the 
Resolutions were approved by the Presi- 
dent, the following despatch was sent by 
the Navy Department to Commodore 
Dewey, commanding the Asiatic Squad- 
ron: "Order Squadron, except Monoc- 
acy, to Hong Kong. Keep full of coal. 
In event of declaration of war with Spain, 
your duty will be to see that the Spanish 
Squadron does not leave the Asiatic 
Coast, and then offensive operations in 
Philippine islands." 

The history of the Spanish war is al- 
most entirely a record of the valorous 
action and achievements of the Navy. As 
President Roosevelt said: "The most im- 
pressive thing in the prosecution of this 
war was the preparedness of the Navy and 
the unpreparedness of the Army." Not 
only for this reason, but also because there 
is alwavs a romantic sentiment associated 



474 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POV\LR. 



with the naval life and its activities, we 
shall devote a large part of this chapter 
to the history of the so-called " New 
Navy," which did such valiant and heroic 
work during- the war, and has continued 
to excite the pride and patriotism of 
every American, as the cruise of its fleet 
of battleships around the world has 
elicited the enthusiastic admiration of the 
people of every country whose ports it has 
visited. 

The continued employment of large mil- 
itary forces (standing armies) or of great 
fleets has always been regarded as incon- 
sistent with ReiJublican principles. From 
the earliest days of their national life 
down to the last decade the American 
people have watched with jealous eyes any 
propositions that looked toward tin- main- 
tenance of more than a police force, 
either on land or sea, in times of peace. 
During the entire life of the nation no 
measure introduced in Congress to in- 
crease the size of the Army or Navy, un- 
less war was immediately innnimut, has 
ever escaped the keenest scrutiny, or. per- 
haps, the strenuous opisosition, of the pop- 
ular party. When, at the close of the 
eighteenth century, it was urged in Con- 
gress that a new and more powerful navy 
was a necessity, one of the Senators from 
Pennsylvania, in the course of a long- and 
powerful speech in oyiposition to the bill, 
said: "It is the design of the Court 
party (refei-ring to those who were 
charged with a purpose to make the new 
government conform as nearly as possi- 
ble to the monarchical ideas of the old 
world) to have a fleet and an army. This 
is but the entering wedge of a new mon- 
archy in America, after all the blood- 
shed and suffering of a seven years' war 
to establish a- republic. The Indian War 
is forced forward to justify our having- a 
standing army, and eleven unfortiniate 
men now in slavery in Algiers is the pre- 
text for fitting out a fleet. . . . This 
thing of a fleet has been working among 
our members all the Session. I have 
heard it break out often. It is another 
menace to our repuhlican institutions!" 
Obedient to this sentiment the largo forces 



in both arms of the service that would be 
assembled during- the prosecution of a 
war have always been dissipated as soon 
as i^eace was assured. And few things il- 
lustrate more clearly the changed char- 
acter of American political thought and 
theory as a result of the Spanish war 
than do the establishment of an army of 
close to one hundred thousand men on a 
peace footing, and the huilding and main- 
taining of one of the most powerful 
navies of the world, wdiile the country is 
at peace with all nations. 

On the 1-lth of June, 1775. just three 
days before the battle of Bunker Hill, the 
Continental Congress appointed a Com- 
mittee to " consider, inquire, and report 
with respect to the organization of a naval 
force." Ten days later the Chairman of 
this Committee was authorized to " invito 
John Paul Jones, Esq., Gent., of Virginia, 
Ma-.ti'r ilariner," to come to Philadelphia 
and favor the Committee with his advice. 
As a result of this conference, Jones, 
Xi<-h(ilas Piddle, and three other captains 
of merchant ships were directed to ex- 
amine the vessels lying at Philadelphia 
and to reconnnend such as seemed suit- 
able for service as war vessels. Acting 
upon their advice tlic Congress purchased 
two ships and two brigs. The larger of 
the ships had been in the East India 
trade, and when purchased was named the 
A If red, after Alfred the Great. Although 
she -was of oidy four hundred and forty 
tons burden, after being strengthened sho 
was armed with eight 12-ix>unders, twelve 
9-pounders, and eight C-poundei's. and 
carried a crew of two hundred and twenty 
officers and men. Tliis was tlte origin of, 
and iliese were tiie ressels tlial consti- 
tuted, the first Xar/i of the United States. 
On December !'■>. 1775, Congress voted 
to build thirteen cruisers. A successful 
attempt was made to produce vessels that 
shcudd be a little, at least, in advance of 
vessels of their class in any other navy, — 
a policy that has been the ideal of the 
Navy Department down to the present 
day. Of the thirteen cruisers the Han- 
coc.li, Bandolph. Baleigh, Trumhiill. and 
Prnridenrp. only, got to sea, and all rcn- 



THE XEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



t/.) 



(lered good accounts of themselves ; and, 
later iu the war, the Alliance and Con- 
federacy were built, which even surpassed 
their predecessors as the best specimens 
of naval architecture. As fighting ma- 
chines these vessels contrast strangely 
with the war vessels of to-day, marking 
no less emphatically than the other trans- 
formations recorded in this volume the 
marvelous develoiiment of the inventive 
genius of the nineteenth century. The 
Alfred, for example, in which John Paul 
Jones first sailed in the service of the 
United States as Lieutenant, firing all of 
her twenty-eight guns at once, could dis- 
charge only three hundred and eighty 
pounds of balls, or one hundred ninety 
at a broadside. At the test of the new 13- 
inch gun, now in place on our latest bat- 
tleships, made at Indian Head, in 1894, 
an eleven hundred pound shell was used, 
which was driven through seventeen 
inches of steel plate. 

The total " salt-water " Navy in service 
during the Revolutionary war included 
forty-seven vessels of all classes, — ships, 
brigs, schooners, and sloops. The two 
most formidable vessels of the period were 
never of service to the nation, as policy 
dictated their presentation to the King of 
France. These were the Iiidien, built at 
Amsterdam, which it was intended to 
place under the command of John Paul 
Jones, whose guns could throw a total of 
twelve hundred and six pounds of shot, 
or a broadside of over six hundred 
pounds; and the America, launched late 
in the progress of the war, which was a 
ship of the line, carrying seventy-four 
guns. These were as formidable as any 
ships of war afloat at that time. Those 
were the romantic days of our naval his- 
tory, the tales of which have fired all 
youthful hearts for a centur\-. There was 
no long-range fighting, but broadsides were 
exchanged at such close quarters that a 
spar shot away on one vessel was liable to 
fall upon the deck of an antagonist ; and as 
batteries were disabled, eager preparations 
were made for boarding and hand-to-hand 
fighting on the deck of one or the other 
of the ships. The other vessels that 



achieved tlie most notoriety were the Bon 
Homme Richard, the Randolph, and the 
Ranger. The English navy truly ruled the 
seas at this time, and the sentiment of 
the Continental, and even later National, 
(.'ongresses was, that our vessels should 
be kept at home for harbor defense, as it 
was not believed, vessel for vessel, that 
they could stand any chance of victory 
over the British war-ships. It was not 
oidy their love of adventure and a fight 
that led the early naval officers to take 
great risks; they also wished to demon- 
strate to the weak and timid home gov- 
ei'nment and people that, under any ap- 
proach to fair conditions, the vessels and 
the crews of the United States Navy were 
the equals of those of any navy in tlio 
world; and this they abundantly proved in 
a series of most brilliant and thrilling en- 
gagements extending over all the troubled 
years until the end of the war of 1812. 
It is related that Jones and Captain Bid- 
die of the Randolph had often talked this 
matter over, and had agreed upon the 
wonderful results that would accrue to 
their country if " by exceedingly desperate 
fighting one of our ships should conquer 
one of the English of markedly superior 
force; " and each of these gallant oflScers 
watched anxiously for the opportunity, 
and hoped to be the first to demonstrate 
the superiority of yankee ships, yankeo 
gunnery, and yankee grit and pluck. The 
lot fell first to Biddle who, in command 
of the Randolph, in March, 1778, was 
cruising near Barbardos. His ship 
mounted only thirty guns. One afternoon 
the British ship Yarmouth, mounting 
sixty-four guns, and, because of their 
greater size, of more than four times the 
force of the RandolpJi's batteries, bore 
down on Biddle's ship, and the little con- 
voy of merchant sloops accompanyiu';' 
him. He at once waited for the Yarmouth 
to come up, and when she had come 
within range the Stars and Stripes were 
flung to the breeze, and a broadside was 
sent crashing against the enemy's hull, to 
which the Yarmouth immediately replied. 
After the exchange of two or three rounds 
it was clear that the Randolph could fire 



47G 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



iiliout three broadsides to the Yarmouth's 
one; but the heavier guns of the hitter 
\\ere too mueh for the former to with- 
siand. Biddle had been shot down early 
in the fight; but, seated in a chair, he 
cheered his men on. Seeing that he eouhl 
not win by direct firing- against the en- 
emy's more powerful batteries, he ordered 
a movement that would bring him along- 
side the Yarmouth, intending to grapple 
i'ud board her, and then fight it out on 
her deck. Just as he was coming close to 
the enemy, however, fire reached the Ran- 
dntph's magazine directly un<ler Biddle's 
icet, and she was blown clean out of 
water. Only four of her crew were saved. 
I'bough all was lost the superb bravery 
I'f officers and crew cheered the despond- 
I lit hearts of the American people and 
stiffened the Congressional backbone. The 
great victory Biddle and Jones had talked 
of was reserved for the latter when, in 
the Bon Homme Bichard, he captured 
the Serapis in 17T8, and established the 
standard of seamanship ami unflinching 
courage which it has since been the high- 
est purpose of the officers and men of the 
American navy to maintain. In the 
meantime, however, an honor of a dif- 
ferent character fell to the lot of Jones. 
On the 14th of June. 1777, Congress en- 
acted that " the flag of the thirteen 
Tnited States shall be thirteen stripes, 
alternate red and white; that the union 
be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, 
representing a new constellation." On 
the first of November following Jones 
sailed from Portsmouth, N. II., in the 
sloop Ranger, just completed, flying the 
new American flag, which he displayed 
for the first time in European waters; 
and on December 15 he sailed through 
the French fleet at Quiberon bay, near 
Xantes, whither he convoyed a fleet of 
.Vmerican merchantmen, with the Stars 
ami Stripes at his mast-head, which was 
there for the first time saluted by a for- 
eign flag-ship, and an Admiral's fleet. 

On April 30, 1798, a separate Navy De- 
jiartment was created, and Benjamin 
Stoddert was appointed the first Secre- 
tary. Previous to that date the naval af- 



fairs had been conducted as a branch of 
the war department. By an act of Con- 
gress, July 11, 179S, a permanent Marine 
Corps was also established, having eight 
hundred and eighty-one officers and men, 
all under the command of a Major. Be- 
fore the end of the century the cruisers 
which had achieved such brilliant records 
during the war had all been dismantled 
or sold. But war with France becomiii"; 
imminent, and the depredations and in- 
sults of the Barbai-y Corsairs passing en- 
durance. Congress was, by a small major- 
ity, led to authorize the building of an- 
other fleet. A group of frigates, ten in 
number, were launched between 1797-99, 
which were a marked advance upon the 
cruisers of the Revolution. The most 
noted of these were the United States, 
Constellation, Chesapeake and the Consti- 
hillon, which was later to immortalize 
herself in the famous fight with the 
Guerriere. Vessels of this class were so 
successful that an occasional one was 
added to the fleet down to 1S47. As a 
part, also, of a plan to gradually 
strengthen the Navy the government 
liuilt, between 1814-18, several vessels of 
a new class, — seventy-four gun ships of 
the line. Among these were the Franklin, 
(llilo. North Carolina, and Vermont. 
These vessels were easily the finest battle- 
ships afloat: and the appearance of the 
North Carolina in Mediterranean ports, 
in 1825, with her one hundred and two 
guns in three tiers, awakened the deepest 
interest, European naval officers pro- 
nouncing her the most formidable war 
vessel in the world. In his most valuable 
History of the United States Navy, Mr, 
]Maclay has brought together some of the 
expressions by foreign naval experts of 
their appreciation of America's success in 
naval construction and administration 
which would seem to warrant the pride in 
their Navy which the people of this coun- 
try are sometimes thought too ready to 
manifest. In 1820, ho .says, the British 
government sent a naval officer to inspect 
our Navy. He reported that " the organ- 
ization of the American Naval Depart- 
ment, either for administrative duties or 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



47: 



for practical work, is the best system ex- 
trmt. Their ships are the best built and 
their timber is unsurpassed. Their frig- 
ates are competent to cope with ships of 
the line, and their ships of the line with 
three deckers; and the whole administra- 
tion of the Navy is conducted with com- 
paratively little expense.'" Maclay fur- 
ther states that in the introduction to a 
new edition of James's " History of the 
British Navy," the editor says: "It is 
liut justice, in regard to America, to men- 
tion that England has benefited by her 
(America's) example, and that the large 
class of frigates now (182(3) employed in 
the British service is modeled after that 
of the United States." 

But a new factor in tlie history of all 
ship-building- was now forcing itself upon 
the attention of all constructors. Eulton 
had already established the practicability 
of steam as a motive power for sea-going 
vessels, and early urged upon Congress 
the construction of a steam war ship. The 
result of his efforts was the building' of 
the Demologos, as Fulton called her, or 
Fulton Numher One as she is known in 
the Navy lists. This unique vessel is thus 
described in the " Life of Fulton: " " The 
Demologos, or Fallon, measured one hun- 
dred and forty feet over all, fifty-five feet 
beam, and drew onfv eiglit feet of water. 
The superstructure was built on two hulls, 
sejiarated from end to end by a channel 
fifteen feet wide and sixty-six feet long. 
One hull contained the boiler, which was 
ii;ade of copper, for generating steam. 
The machinery occupied the othei- boat. 
The water-wheel revolved in the space be- 
tween them. The main, or gun deck, sup- 
])orted the armament, and was protected 
by a parapet five feet thick, of solid tim- 
ber, pierced by embrasures. Her upper, 
or spar deck, upon which many hundred 
men might parade, was encompassed with 
a bulwark for safety. She was rigged 
with two stout masts, each of which sup- 
poi'ted a large lateen yanl and sails. Slic 
liad two bowsprits and jibs, and four rud- 
ders, one at each end of each boat, so that 
she might be steered with either end fore- 
most." In addition to these features this 



remarkable vessel had a battery of twenty 
long 32-pounders, which was supplemented 
b,v a submarine gun designed to throw 
a hundred-pound shot. She was also 
ecjuipped with an engine for tlie purpnse 
of forcing an immense column of water 
through an enemy's port-hole with a view 
to sinking the vessel, and had a furnace 
for hot shot. After the war of 1812 the 
Demologos was stationed at the Brooklyn 
Navy Yard as a receiving ship until 1829, 
when she was blown up, with a terrible 
loss of life. Fulton the Second, designed 
as a defense vessel for New York harbor, 
was built in 1837. She had sloping bul- 
\varks of the best live oak five feet thick, 
a model that undoubtedly suggested the 
sloping sides of the Merrimac and the 
other iron-elads of her class that were 
fitted out by the Confederate government 
during the Civil War. The Navy Depart- 
ment, however, was slow to adopt steam, 
even as an auxiliary motive power. By 
1838 both England and France were build- 
ing steam war vessels; but it was not 
until 1841 that the- prejudices of the 
United States officials were overcome. In 
that year the two side-wheel steamers 
.][ississipjti and ilissouri were con- 
structed, and in 1847 two more of the 
same class, the Susquehanna and the 
Powhatan. The Missouri was burned at 
Gibraltar, in 1-843 ; but her sister-ship, the 
Mississippi, had a long and notable career. 
She was the flagship of the naval forces 
in the Gulf during the war with Mexico; 
also Capt. Perry's flagship when he visited 
Japan, and negotiated the treaty with that 
country; and was at last destroyed by fire 
when, under Farragut, she was trying to 
pass the Confederate batteries at Port 
Hudson during the Civil War. 

But the inventive mind was still active 
and the time had arrived for the adoption 
of a new propelling force for vessels, A 
submerged screw had been experimented 
with in France as early as 1823; but, 
though satisfactory results were achieved 
in trials, the idea was generally regarded 
as impracticable by all naval authorities. 
In 1830, liowcver, the Rolert Field Stocl- 
tun crossed the Atlantic, using a propeller 



478 



I'KUM COLO^'Y TO ■\VOKLD POWEE. 



i:i-;tead of side wheels. Captniu Stoektou I 
had borrowed his ideas largely from John 
Ericsson, who was then in London ; and 
after the successful trip of the Stockton, 
he urged his plans upon Congress, with 
the result that the first steam propeller 
was launched and built in 1844, and, in 
honor of Captain Stockton was named 
the Princeton, after his home city. So 
great was the success of this venture that, 
between 1856-9, the government was led 
to build the splendid fleet of screw war 
vessels that were at once recognized 
everywhere as superior to all existing war 
-laps. Among these were the Niagara, 
}'Jerrimac (later the Confederate iron- 
clad), Waliash, Minnesota, BrooHi/n, Lan- 
caster, etc. They were all ship-rigged, 
and very efficient whether under sail or 
steam. 

Yet formidable and perfect as these 
latest vessels appeared, their practically 




THE ERICSSON STATUE, NEW YORK CITY. 

utter uselessness was soon to be demon- 
strated. Tt is doubtful whether any battle 
ever fought on the water was so moment- 
ous in its results as the duel between the 
Monitor and Merrimac. The ease with 



which the Merrimac, the day before, had 
shelled and rammed and sunk our best 
vessels at Hampton Eoads, readily 
demonstrated that the day of the wooden 
war ship was over. This was recognized 
liy foreign nations as well as our own. 
A distinguished member of Parliament, 
speaking on the subject the day after the 
receipt of the news of the battle doelared, 
" Our whole Navy is useless : we must be- 
gin anew." More than this, the fight be- 
tween the two ironclads determined tho 
tj-pe of vessel that would be the battle 
ship of the future. As Maclay says : 
" Ericsson in his Monitor gave the cue to 
naval designers all over the world, the es- 
sential feature of his invention, the tur- 
ret, being introduced in all first-class 
war ships to-day. In fact, strictly speak- 
ing, our heavy war vessels of 1900 are 
nothing more than highly developed Mon- 
itors. The two turrets, one forward and 
one aft, and, in ships of the Oregon class, 
the auxiliary turrets containing 8-inch 
guns, classify them unmistakably with 
the improved Monitor, the only essential 
difference being the greater freeboard 
designed to secure better accommodatiiiu 
for the officers and crew. This freeboard, 
however, is in no way estimated in the 
main defensive scheme of our battleships. 
1'lie heavy armor belt is carried not much 
higher above the water line than in the 
originial Monitor, while the heavily 
armored protected deck of the Oregon is 
iii much the same position as that on 
Ericsson's invention. Stripped down to 
her real offensive and defensive concep- 
tion the Oregon would bear a remarkable 
proportional resemblance to the Monitor, 
the superstructure built above the real 
pi'otective deck and belt being designed 
so that it could be riddled with shot with- 
out it any way affecting- the vitality of 
the ship." And a prominent English 
Xaval expert, speaking of the Goliath 
(1S98") as the latest and most powerful 
battleship constructed in Great Britain, 
is quoted as saying : " It is of historic 
interest that the modern ironclad with its 
turrets and massive plates had its root 
idea in the famous monitors designed for 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



47!) 



the United States government by Eries- 
son, who sought to eombine invulnerabil- 
ity with very heavy ordnanee." 

The years following the Civil Wnr were 
years of stagnation in naval affairs. For 
a brief period the jiowerful monitors that 
were built during the later years of the 
war, with their 15-ineh Dahlgren guns, 
were the most formidable lighting ma- 
chines afloat. But European nations soon 
had battleships of far greater size than 
our monitors, armed with imj^roved 
breech-loading rifles. The sentiment of 
the American government was to patch 
up our old wooden ships, and to let Europe 
" make experiments for us." The natural 
result was that the Navy, by 1S80, had be- 
come one of the most inefficient in the 
world. The year 1881, however, marked 
the beginning of the " new order," and 
was the natal year of the " New Navy." 
On June 29th a Board was appointed by 
the Secretary of the Navy to consider its 
state, and report what action ought to be 
taken by Congress. After mature delib- 
eration the Board recommended the 
building of twenty-one battleships and 
seventy cruisers, besides torpedo-boats and 
rams. The immediate result was the con- 
struction of one " worthless ram." But the 
luatter was now before Congress and the 
jjeople, and constant agitation of the ques- 
tion by the press and by naval writers was 
destined to secure early results. Sijeak- 
ing of this period Lieutenant Spear, a 
historian of the Navy, saj'S : " For sev- 
enteen years we had allowed foreign coun- 
tries ' to do the experimenting for us.' In 
that time England had learned how to 
build an Inflexible with armor from eight- 
een to twenty-four inches thick, and car- 
rying four built-up rifles of 16-inch cal- 
ibre, firing a projectile weighing seven- 
teen hundred pounds, that was able to 
pierce twenty-seven inches of wrought 
iron armor at a range of five hundred 
yards. Our best naval ship was a mon- 
itor carrying smooth-bore guns that fired 
a shell as little able to penetrate the armor 
of the day as a flint-lock musket would 
have been. But we had a complete book 
knowledge of the best of the British ships. 



and now we were to begin using the ad- 
vantages we had gained by allowing other 
nations ' to do the exijerimcnting for us.' " 
Even after the Secretary of the Navy had 
determined to commence building the 
ships authorized by Congress, it was found 
that there was not a ship-yard in the 
country adapted to the construction of a 
five-thousand-ton cruiser, not to speak of 
an armorclad vessel. Nor was there a mill 
in the country that could make the steel 
plates and frames required, nor the armor. 
The Department was, therefore, forced 
to begin by building a despatch boat and 
two small 3000-ton cruisers, the Dolphin, 
the Boston, and the Atlanta. The eon- 
tract for the construction of these vessels 
was made with John Koacli, July 23, 
1883, by which the mills for tlM making of 
such steel plates as were needed were 
guaranteed. By a later contract of June 
1, 1887, with the Bethlehem Iron Com- 
pany, facilities for making the best of 
steel armor and forgings for the largest 
of steel guns were provided. The Dolphin 
was launched in 1884, and the Atlanta 
and Boston in 1885. The two latter had 
armaments of two 8-inch and si.x G-inch 
guns, besides a secondary battery, which, 
with a speed of fifteen knots, made them 
very creditable war vessels for the time. 
Having fairly entered upon the new work, 
each succeeding Secretary of the Navy 
earnestly labored to improve upon the 
work of his predecessor; and new and 
larger vessels of improved types and 
greater fighting power and speed followed 
each other in rapid succession. The first 
armored ship worthy of particular men- 
tion in the New Navy, or the '•' White 
Squadron " as the vessels were familiarly 
classed, was the Maine, destined to meet 
such a tragic fate in Havana harbor eight 
years later. She was launched Novem- 
ber 18, 1890, had side armor twelve inches 
thick, and carried 10-inch guns in each 
turret. But the first vessel whose trial- 
trip banished all pessimism from the 
minds of naval authorities and gave dis- 
tinct promise that the United States 
Navy was fairly in line once more for the 
first rank among the great navies of the 



480 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



world, was the New Yuri,-. Shu was 
launched December 2, 1891; was 380.5 
feet long, 65 feet wide, and had a disislace- 
incnt of 8200 tons. Under the terms of 
the contract with her builders she was to 
have a guaranteed speed of twenty knots 
an huur, and a premium was offered for 
any excess of speed. An enthusiastic 
naval officer thus speaks of her trial trip: 
" On !May 22. 1S'J2, she was at sea for her 
(jtKoial trial, and if we consider the effect 
of that trial upon the Navy and the na- 
tion we shall find few other days to com- 
pare with it. For because of the pessi- 
mistic habit of thought cultivated during 
the dark ages of the Navy even the offi- 
cers who were to test her had not full con- 
fidenc'o that she Mould make good the rec- 
ord for which she was designed. But 
when with eager eyes they watched the 
swift beating of connecting rods and the 
smooth whirr of shafts, and in tlie midst 
of the perspiring heat of the air they 
found the bearings cool, while the indi- 
cator cards showed such power as they 
liad never seen before, their fears faded 
away. For four hours they kept their 
eyes on engine-room and taffrail log and 
clo<-k ; and then, when the time was done, 
the whole crew burst into cheers while a 
sailor climbed aloft, and lashed a broom 
to the mast-head. She had covered twenty- 
one knots an hour. No such ship as that 
had ever floated the 'gridiron flag;' no 
such ship of the class floated any flag. 
The shame that ha<l for twenty-five .years 
rested on our Navy was wiped out. The 
^f)D York was the Constitution of the 
Ne\v Navy we atfcctionately called the 
* White Squadron.' " 

rSut the battleship era was now on. By 
the .Vrt of June 30, 1890, Congress pro- 
vided for the construction of three " coast 
defense" battleships. Benjamin F. Tracy 
was then Secretary of the Navy, and 
he is reported to have said to the head 
of the Construction Bureau : " Now, sir, 
what you're to do is to design a ship 
that can lick anything afloat." And the 
Orrgnn was the result. She was equipped 
with two 13-inch guns, the most power- 
ful then made, in each of two main turrets 



placed over the keel at bow and stern. 
Two other turrets were located over each 
rail, in each of wliich were mounted two 
S-inch guns; and along the side armor 
walls were placed four 6-inch guns. Her 
armor varied from fifteen to eighteen 
inches in thickness, her displacement was 
10,300 tons, and her speed was fifteen and 
a half knots. It was generally conceded 
(liat the naval constructor had faithfully 
e.NCcuted the orders of Secretary Tracy, 
and the Oregon at once took her place as 
tile Queen of the New Navy. The Massa- 
cliusetfs and the Indiana, of the same 
class as the Oregon, quickly followed. 
These vessels were classed as " coast line 
battleships," and while powerful and ef- 
fective within their range, they w-ere de- 
fective in their coal capacity, and so could 
not be relied upon for long-distance ser- 
vice. As will be seen a later class, ordered 
and built after the Spanish war, like the 
Louisiana, were constructed of more than 
double the displacement of the " coast- 
line " ships, capable of taking in coal 
enough to go half way round the world 
and arrive at any jjoint ready for action 
without delay for coaling. The " New 
Navy " consists of four types of ships ; 
the battleships, cruisers, torpedo-boats, 
and auxiliaries. There are, too, subdivi- 
sions of each of these classes, — as the 
battleships into "coast-line" and sea- 
going vessels; the cruisers, into armored 
cruisers, protected cruisers, gunboats, and 
scouts; the torpedo boats, into torpedo boat 
destroyers, submarines, etc. In 1891 the 
Columbia and Minneapolis were added to 
the fleet, each with a speed of twenty- 
ihree knots an hour, which were readil.v 
recognized as the most efficient armored 
cruisers designed as commerce destroyers 
afloat ; while in 1895 the Brooklyn, an ad- 
vance on the Xew York both in speed and 
strength of armament, took her place at 
the head of the armored-cruiser class. 
By constant addition to all classes of the 
fleet, our Navy had become a formidable 
one by the time our affairs with Spain 
took a serious turn, and naval officers 
were anxious to test its efficiency in 
actual war. When the Spanish war be- 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



481 



(.•nine an undoubted fact, however, it was 
deemed necessary to add to the fleet a 
large number of vessels from the mer- 
chant marine. The great and swift ocean- 
liners New York, Paris (renamed respec- 
tively the Harvard and Tale), St. LouU, 
and St. Paul were chartered at an enor- 
mous rental, to act as despatch boats, 
scouts, etc. ; while a large number of 
smaller craft, — tugs, big steam-yachts, 
and similar vessels, — were bought. In 
this manner the total number of vessels, 
(if all classes, that were engaged in actual 
service during the war, was brought up 
to one hundred and fifty-five. 

Although it is generally stated by 
writers upon the subject, as it was by the 
leaders of public opinion at the time, that 
the Spanish war was in reality unex- 
pected, — especially that part of it which 
was conducted in the Orient ; yet it seems 
111 have been understood in the Navy De- 
partment, at least, for some weeks before 
tlic destruction of the Maine, that matters 
would assume the course they did, and 
that not only the destruction of the Span- 
ish fleet in Asiatic waters was contem- 
idated, but the acquisition of the Philip- 
pines as well. At the opening of the year 
1898 there were forty-eight war ships of 
the various classes in commission or 
available for active service. Of these 
fourteen were on the North Atlantic Sta- 
tion, seven were on the Pacific ocean, 
tlnee were in the South Atlantic, two 
were in European waters, and six were on 
the Asiatic station. As early as January 
11. the Department began sending mes- 
sages to the Commanders of the different 
squadrons to retain men whose terms of 
enlistment were about to expire, and to 
keep their vessels full of coal, and be 
ready for immediate and important 
orders. The work of the Secretary of the 
Navy, John D. Long, at this time de- 
mands the highest praise. By adroit 
maneuvering he brought all the import- 
ant vessels of the European and South 
Atlantic squadrons into Cuban waters 
without arousing suspicion, or assembling 
such a force at one point as would take 
on the appearance of an act of wnr. 
31 



On January 3 Commodore Dewey suc- 
ceeded to the command of the Asiatic 
.-■quadron, and on the 2Tth, he was reached 
by a cable message at Yokohama, which 
led him to repair at once to Ilong Kong, 
where he was shortly after instructed 




Photo. Copyrighted by J. E. Furdy, Boston. 
JOHN D. LONG. 

to assemble all his squadron except the 
Monocacy. On February 26 the Balti- 
more, then at Honolulu, was ordered to 
join Dewey's squadron with all possi- 
ble despatch, as was the revenue cutter, 
Hniyh McCulloch, then in the South Pa- 
cific. As a result of these prompt meas- 
ures there were soon assembled at Hong 
Kong, ready for any emergency, the Olyra- 
pia, Baltimore, Boston, Raleigh, Concord, 
Petrel, and Hugh McCulloch. On Feb- 
ruai'y 25 Assistant Secretary Roosevelt 
cabled Dewey at Hong Kong : " Secret 
and confidential. Order the squadron, 
except Monocacp, to Hong Kong. Keep 
full of coal. In the event of declaration 
of war with Spain your duty will be to 
see that the Spanish squadron does not 
leave the Asiatic Coast, rind th?.n offensive 
ope'-aHons in the Philippines.'' 



482 



FROM COLOXY TO WOULD I'OWER. 



One of the vessels of the Pacific Siiuad- 
ron was the Oregon then at the Bremer- 
ton Navy Yard, on Puget Sound, oppo- 
site Seattle. Under date of March 7 the 
Secretary of the Navy telegraphed to her 
Commander: "The situation is getting 
worse. You should go to San Francisco 
as soon as possihle and get ammunition." 
Three daj's later the Orenon passed 
through the Golden Gate into San Fran- 
cisco bay. As the cruise of the Oregon, 
of which Captain Charles E. Clark as- 
sumed command at this time, was one of 
the most notahlo in all naval history and 
the most spectacular event of the war, 
the Captain's orders are of interest. On 
March 12, Secretary Long telegraphed: 
" When in all respects ready for sea. pro- 
ceed with the vessel under your com- 
mand to Callao, Peru, and await further 
orders. In view of the present critical 



drilled, the jiassage of the ship not to be 
delayed thereby.'' Our space does not ad- 
mit of any extended account of this most 
remarkable run for a war ship of tliis 
class, eventful and interesting as it was. 
Leaving San Francisco on ilarch 19 she 
arrived at Key West on the morning' of 
May 2(5, having covered the run of four- 
teen thousand miles in sixty-eight days, 
and in such perfect condition that she was 
ready for battle the hour of her arrival. 
Stops had been made at Callao, Val- 
paraiso, Sandy Point (Straits of Magel- 
lan), and Rio de Janiero for coal. From 
Rio on the cruise was made the more ex- 
citing for officers and men by the re- 
ported presence of torpedo boats in the 
vicinity of the Brazilian capital, and by 
the news conveyed to Captain Clark by 
the Department that he might possibly 
come in contact with Cervera's fleet. 




Photo. Cojiyrighlcd hif Underwood & Underwood A'. Y. 

THE OREGON. 



condition of affairs the Oregon should 
leave San Francisco at the earliest possi- 
ble date and arrive at Callao as soon as 
practicable. The crew is to be constantly 



which was then supposed to be some- 
where among the Windward islands. In 
view of this emerg'oncy the govern- 
ment had given Captain Clark a free 



THE NEW NAVY — 1S83-1909. 



483 



hand, trusting absolutely to his discre- 
tion as to whether he should fight or 
ti-y to elude the enemy. There was, 
however, but one sentiment on board 
the Oregon, from the Captain to the pow- 
der boy, and that was if Cervera appeared 
on the scene he must fight. One is al- 
most temjited to wish that the Oregon 
mig-ht have had added to the glory of her 
unique cruise the supreme achievement 
of annihilating Cervera's squadron single- 
handed, which it is generally believed she 
could have done, following the plan of 
battle which Captain Clark had decided 
upon. It is probable that the course of no 
other single vessel in all the world's his- 
tory has been followed with such intense 
interest and tense anxiety as was that of 
the Oregon on this unparalleled voyage; 
and when the news of her safe arrival at 
Key West was telegraphed over the coun- 
try, a great sigh of relief, and the voice 
of thanksgiving, was heard in everj^ town 
and village of the land. 

It was six o'clock on the evening of 
April 21st when Eear-Admiral Sampson, 
recently raised from a captain to the 
rank of Eear-Admiral and given chief 
command of all vessels in the Atlantic 
waters, received a message from the Sec- 
retarj' of the Navy directing him to 
" Blockade coast of Cuba immediately 
from Cardenas to Bahia Honda. Block- 
ade Cienfucgos if it is considered advis- 
able;" and the war with Spain was on. 
With the early dawn of the next day the 
vessels of the squadron got under way, 
with their bows pointed toward Havana. 
But before even an effective blockade had 
been established about Cuban ports, the 
people of the country were electrified by 
the news of Dewey's victory at Manila, 
which naturally, therefore, claims our 
first attention. 

As has been said, Dewey had assembled 
the vessels of the Asiatic squadron at 
Hong Kong and was there through March 
anxiously awaiting developments. On 
April 7 he received orders to land all 
woodwork and stores not necessaiy for 
operations, and on the 21st was informed 
that the fleet had left Key West to estab- 



lish the blockade about Cuba. He at onco 
had all his ships painted a slate color; 
and as, on the 24th Great Britain issued 
a proclamation of neutrality, Dewey at 




.IDMIRAL GEORGE DEWEY. 

once withdrew the squadron from Hong 
Kong to Mirs Bay, about thirty miles to 
the north, to await his final orders. On 
the same day these were forwarded from 
the Naval Department in the following 
terms : " War has commenced between 
the United States and Spain. Proceed 
at once to Philippine islands. Commence 
operations at once, particularly against 
Spanish fleet. You must capture vessels 
or destroy. TJse utmost endeavors." In 
accordance with these instructions the 
squadron left ^Firs bay on the 27th of 
April and sighted the island of Luzon on 
the 30th. As it had been reported that 
Admiral Montojo had withdrawn his 
fleet from Manila bay to Subig bay, a few 
miles to the north, Commodore Dewey first 
went there to meet him only to find that 
the Spanish fleet had returned to Manila 
bay, where he soon located it lying under 
the protection of the guns at Cavitc. 



484 



FKO-M COLOXY TO WOELD POWER. 



Dewey at once assembled his officers on 
l)oard the flagshiii, and announced his 
intention of entering Manila bay that 
night and attacking- the enemy with the 
f;i'?t dawn of day. There was to be no 



led the way, until as day broke they found 
themselves to the north of Cavite and 
;il>rcast the city. Witli their field glasses 
the officers could see the people crowding 
every point of vantage to watch the de- 




riifilo. Copijriiilitriihij rii'h-ni-oml it Uiulerirood. N. V. 

MANIL 

time wasted in reconuoiteriiig or study- 
ing the situation. The most distinctive 
feature of the battle on that May-day 
morning was not the mere victory over 
the enemy's fleet; that was a foregone 
conclusion, if the two squadrons came to- 
gether, as the Spaniards were entirely out- 
classed in every respect. But the prompt- 
ness, decision, and cleanness which cluiv- 
acterized the whole proceeding is almost 
without parallel. Dewey's orders at Ilong 
Kong were to capture or destmy Montojn's 
fleet ; and when he turned the prows of 
his ships toward Manila he never faltered 
one moment until the enemy's fleet was 
before him and he was ready to com- 
mence an action. Silently through the 
early hours of May 1 the American ves- 
sels felt their way over the unfamiliar 
waters of Manila liay. which were said to 
be filled with mines. With all lights ex- 
tinguished except one stern signal to 
guide the ships in the rear, the Oh/mpia 



\ BAY. 

structiou of the hated American fleet. 
Turning to the east and south the flag- 
ship soon came within range of the gams 
of the Cavite forts; and lying off the 
point was the object of Dewey's search, — 
the fleet of Admiral Montojo. Continu- 
ing his course until within a range of 
abiiut five thousand j'ards, Dewey, at 
flirty minutes after five, leaned over the 
rail and in a quiet voice uttered the words 
tliat have now become famous in history, 
" Wlicn you are ready you may fire, 
Gridlcy.'" Every man on all the ships 
had been anxiously waiting for this word, 
and the suspense had become well-nigh 
intolerable; so that it is said that the 
response to Dewey's command came from 
the Olympia's heavy 8-inch battery just 
one second after the Commodore ceased 
s])eaking. The plan adopted for the fight 
was one that was used with marked suc- 
cess in some of the naval engagements 
of the civil war, which involved keeping 



THE NEW XAVY — lb83-1909. 



485 



the vessels in motion so as to deprive the 
enemy of the advantage of a stationary 
target. In harmony with this plan Dewey 
led his ship three times to the westward 
and twice to the eastward in front of the 
Siianish fleet and batteries, each time 
running a little closer in and delivering 
more eifective fin', the range getting as 
low as two thousand yards. The fire 
from the Spanish fleet and forts was 
vigorous, but proved absolutely ineffective. 
As the American fleet was making its 
second passage past the enemy the Spanish 
flagship was seen to leave her consorts 
and advance, as if to give battle to the 
Oliiiiipin at close range. But she had 
liardly proceeded tlu'ee ship's lengt.hs be- 
for the concentrated fire from Dewey's 
squadron turned her back, torn and smok- 
ing, with her steering gear sipparently 
shot away. As her stern was exposed to 
the fleet the most beautiful shot of the 
day was made. One of the American 
gunners carefully aimed an S-inch gun at 
her and fired, sending a two hundred and 
fifty pound projectile at the rate of two 
thousand feet per second, which struck 
the Spanish flagship squarely on the stern, 
and went crashing through all bulkhea<ls 
and partitions in the engine-room, e>xplod- 
ing one of the boilers and ripping up the 
protective deck above. The ship gave a 
terrible lurch forward, and her career was 
ended. After two hours of continuous 
fighting it was evident that the Spanish 
fleet was effectually disabled, and Dewey 
humanely drew his fleet off and gave 
orders to cease firing, so that the crews, 
who had fought on a cup of coffee served 
at four A. M., might have their l)reakfast 
and some rest. An hour later Connnodoro 
Dewey signaled to the several Command- 
ers to come aboard the flagshiii, as he 
wished to learn just the condition on each 
vessel. The sum total of these official re- 
ports was that not a man had been killed 
or seriously hurt, not a gun was out of 
v.'orking order, not a ship had been dis- 
rbled in any way. All were ready and 
anxious to renew the battle and finish the 
work assigned to the fleet. At 11.1.5 A. "M. 
the squadron returned to the attack with 



renewed energy, and it was but a short 
time before the balance of the Spanish 
fleet was in flames, and the shore batteries 
quiet. At 12.40 the American fleet had so 
elFectually completed the work assigned 
to it that the squadron withdrew from the 
scene of battle and anchored off Manila, 
the gunboat Petrel being left to destroy 
two or three small gunboats that wore ly- 
ing behind the point of Cavite. Thus 
ended the memorable battle of Manila, 
the American fleet being practically un- 
injured, with only seven men slightly 
wounded, while it had destroyed ten ship.^, 
— the entire naval force of Spain In 
Asiatic waters, — had silenoed three bat- 
teries, and three hundred and eiglity 
Spaniards were killed, and many move 
wounded. The McCullocJi was at once 
despatched at top-speed to Hong Kong to 
cable th© news to Washington, where it 
was received early in the morning of May 
6. The public had been taken into the 
government's co)ifidence veiy little so far 
as the movements of the Asiatic squadron 
were concerned, so that the report of 
Dewey's brilliant victory aroused un- 
bounded enthusiasm. All eyes were 
turned toward the Orient; and people 
who, when the battle and its results were 
made public did not, as a satirical writer 
said, " Know whether the Philippines 
were islands or canned goods," began at 
once to talk of strategical positions in the 
far East, spheres of influence, world 
power, etc. The recognition of Dewey's 
fine and effective work was immediately 
proclaimed by the government. President 
McKinley at once making him a Rear- 
Admiral, also recommending that the 
grade of Admiral be revived for his 
special honor, and that he should receive 
the thanks of Congress. All these honors 
wore subsequently bestowed upon him. 

The destruction of Montojo's fleet re^ 
lieved the government of any anxiety as 
to trouble from that quarter, and so al- 
lowed it to concentrate its entire atten- 
tion and resources upon the movements 
and conditions near home. It was known 
that Admiral Cervera with a Spanish 
st)uadron had left the Cape Verde islands 



486 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



April 29, destination unknown, though it 
was naturally and rightly believed to be 
the West Indian islands. A panic of fear 
possessed the people of the Northern 
Atlantic coast cities, however, which 
seems supremely ludicrous as one looks 
back upon the situation. The government 
endeavored to quiet this sentiment, kiiuw- 
iug- well that vessels of the capacity of 
Cervera's could not carry coal enough to 
cross the Atlantic and engage in of- 
fensive operations upon our coast with- 
out coaling. There was no i)lace outside 







k^ 


H-* 


^^I^^^^^IAi\ '^HIb 


ll^^ 




■ 




i. 



ADMIKAL WILLIAM T. SAMPSON. 

the West Indies where they could procure 
more coal. It was, therefore, evident that 
as soon as they entered any port, the 
government would at once know of their 
location, and use its strong fleet in those 
waters accordingly. But the nervousness 
of the people was not to be allayed by any 
such reasoning. The Navy Department 
Avas, therefore, iiractically forced to estab- 
lish a northern Patrol squadron to cruise 
north of the Delaware Capes. This fleet 
was under the command of Commodore 
Tlowell, whose flagship was the San 



Francisco, which was supported by tlie 
auxiliary cruisers Yankee, Dixie, Prairie, 
and Yosemite; and in May this squadron 
was greatly strengthened by the addition 
of the fastest cruisers of the Navy, — the 
Columbia and Minneapolis. A " Flying 
Squadron " was also established, with its 
base of operations at Hampton Roads, 
which was placed under the command of 
Commodore W. S. Schley, to which was 
attached the Brooklyn as a flagship, the 
battleships 3Iassachusetts and Texas, and 
the ram Katalidin. For the first throe 
weeks of the war the gTeat question that 
agitated the people and interested the 
government was, " Where is Cervera's 
fleet ? " Having established a more or less 
effective blockade at Havana and Cieii- 
fiiegos, on May 5 Admiral Sampson in his 
flagship New Yorh, supported by the Iowa 
and Indiana and several smaller vessels, 
began a cruise toward the Windward 
Passage (between Cuba and Haiti), so 
as to be in a position to intercept Cer- 
vera's fleet in case that officer should de- 
cide to make a dash for the American 
coast from Porto Rico. Sampson con- 
tinued his course as far east as San Juan, 
Porto Rico ; and satisfying himself that 
the Spanish fleet was not there, on May 
12 he steamed away to the northeast and, 
when out of sight of land, turning to the 
west, returned to Havana. The swift 
American liners St. Louis and Ilarrard 
had been sent out April 30 to cruise along 
a north and south line eighty miles east- 
ward of Guadeloupe and Martinique. By 
their orders they were to meet at the 
middle of the course once each day, com- 
municate, and then go back in opposite 
directions. If by May 10 tliey had seen 
nothing of the Spanish fleet, the Harvard 
was to touch at Martinique, and the St. 
Louis at Guadeloupe, cable the depart- 
ment and Sampson, and then, unless 
ordered to the contrary, proceed at once 
to Hampton Roads. From the log of the 
Cristobal Colon it was -afterwards learned 
that at noon of May 10, the day the 
cruisers abandoned this patrol, Cervera's 
fleet had reached a point one hundred and 
thirty miles cast of Martinique, showinir 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



48/ 



tliat if the Harvard had continued her 
patrol one day longer she would have un- 
doubtedly sighted the Spanish squadron, 
and tlie whole course of the war would 
have been changed. On May 12 the Navy 
Department learned that Cervera had been 
off the coast of Martinique the day before. 
On the 15th the department got into coni- 
nuniication again with Sampson and was 
able to advise him that Cervera had been 
at Curasao the day before, that Schley 
with the " Flying Squadron " had been 
ordered to Key West, whither he (Samp- 
son) should proceed at once to receive 
further orders. It had been reported that 
Cervera's squadron had munitions of war 
destined for Havana, and that his orders 
were to reach that port or Cienfuegos, 
whence his supplies could be sent to 
Havana by rail. Sampson reached Key 
We.st on May 18, and on the 19th Schley 
was ordered to Cienfuegos, having under 
his command the Brooklyn, Massachu- 
setts, and Texas: and he was joined later 
by the Iowa and some cruisers. On the 
very day that Schley left for Cienfuegos, 
and Sampson began to watch the coast 
adjacent to Havana, Cervera with his 
squadron quietly slipped into Santiago. 
Though spies in Havana reported to the 
Department by cable the arrival of Cer- 
vera, and the Secretary strongly advised 
Sampson to send Schley to Santiago at 
once, the latter was doubtful about the 
truth of the report, still believing Cien- 
fuegos would be Cervera's objective point. 
On May 23, however, Sampson ordered 
Schley t« proceed to Santiago, if satisfied 
that the enemy's squadron was not in 
Cienfuegos. At 5.30 P. M.. May 26, 
Schley reached a point about twenty miles 
south of Santiago, when he was joined by 
several of the cruisers on scouting duty. 
The officers of these vessels informed him 
that they knew nothing positively as to 
the whereabouts of the Spanish squadron, 
whereupon at 7.45 P. !M., two hours after, 
his arrival, Schley signaled to his vessels : 
" Destination, Key West, via South side 
of Cuba and Yucatan Channel, as soon 
as collier is ready; speed nine knots." 
Thus, without any effort on his own part 



to determine whether Cei"vera's fleet was 
within Santiago harbor, Schley began tlie 
famous retrograde movement, which no 
one has ever been able to understand or 
explain, and which was one of the chief 
subjects of the investigation which Schley 
demanded some years later. For two days 
he with the squadron drifted aimlessly 
about along the southern coast of Cuba. 
He then reversed his previous orders and 
returned to Santiago May 28, where he at 
once established a blockade. On June 1 
Admiral Sampson arrived off the port with 
his squadron, and assumed direct com- 
mand of the entire fleet. 









^ 




I 


M 




K/ 


k 


m^^^^^^^^KlMb''^^^ 





ADMIR.4L PASCU.1L CERVERA. 

The vessels composing Admiral Cer- 
vera's fleet, which had without molestation 
run into Santiago harbor on May 19, were 
the cruisers Maria Teresa (the flagship), 
Vizcaya, and Oquendo, each of seven 
thousand tons, carrying two 11-inch and 
ten 5.5 inch guns, and credited with a 
sjjeed of twenty knots; and a fourth 
cruiser, the Colon, of sixty-eight hundred 
tons, carrying ten 6-inch and six 4.Y inch 
guns, though her main battery was not on 
board. There were also the torpedo boats 
Pluton and Furor. As the entrance to 



488 



FKOM COLOSY TO WOKLD POWER. 



Siintiu^-o hnrboi- was but threa liuudred. 
fi'et wide, with a winding channel, it was 
deemed impossible to run the American 
fleet in and attack the enemy in the 
harbor. Consequently Admiral Sampson 
established a very close watch over the 
entrance and awaited developnients. The 
ships of his Squadron were assigned posi- 
tions in a semicircle, with a radius of 
six miles from "\Iorrii, the foi't which 
stood on the bluff overhauf'iii.u the en- 
trance to the bay. On the left, at a point 
about two miles from the shore was the 
Vixen, then the MarhleheaJ , the Broo!:- 
li/n, the Tf.riis, the Massachuseds, the 
lotra, the latter being the centre of the 
semicircle, and directly opposite the 
Mori'o. Tlien came the Orcpon, Sew 
York, I'orli'f, Xeu^ Orleans a:id Ma.i/- 
floircr, which was two miles from the 
shore at the right of the line. These 
were the dj.iy stations. At night the wliole 
line was drawn in to a radius of about 
two miles from ilorro, while two battle- 
ships drew still nearer in, one of which 
kept her powerful searchlights playing on 
the entrance all through the night while 
the other, her own lights all extinguished, 
lay in the sliadnw ready to open f.re with 
her heavy guns, should there be any at- 
tempt on the part of Cervera's fleet to 
escape. Working inside this circle, too, 
were the smaller craft, — the Gl()}ire.'</er 
(which was formerly J. Pierpont Morgan's 
pleasure yaclit, Corsair), the Scorpion, 
the Suivaiire, and some steam launches. 
These ran close in shore and kept eager 
watch under the searchlights of the 
battleship. This blockade was maintained, 
in form and manner, until Cervera's 
squadron made its famous dash for liberty 
on July 3. 

As has been stated, the entrance to the 
harbor of Santiago is only about three 
hundred feet wide; and even before leav- 
ing Key AVest for that port Sampson had 
been consulting with his officers as to 
some means of obstructing this channel, 
so that some of the blockading vessels 
might be withdrawn for other service. 
The result cf their deliberations was 
the determination to run the collier 



Merrimac into the channel, and sink her 
in the narrowest part b.v means of torpe- 
does attached to her hull. Naval con- 
structor Eichard P. Ilobson had taken 
part in these conferences, and before 
Sampson's fleet arrived oS Santiago on 
June 1, Ilobson had perfected a scheme 
\\hieh met the approval of the Com- 
mander-in-chief. As Admiral Sampson 
said: "I was greatly impressed with the 
faitli and absolute fearlessness which Mr. 
Ilobson displayed. Xot in the least par- 
ticular did he show a particde of doubt 
of success, lie had developed the whole 
plan to such a degree that no one else had, 
or probably could have, the matter so 
completely in mind. For this reason alone 
prudence demanded that he should be en- 
trusted with the principal command." 
When the call was made for volunteers 
to accompany Ilobson on this perilous 
venture the traditional spirit of the 
American sailor was shown. " To my 
surprise," said Sampson, " enough officers 
and men volunteered to man a hundred 
Merrimacs, there being hundreds of offers 
from a single ship. As oidy seven men 
were required, it was a difficult matter 
to decide wlm should be chosen to go.'' 
The general plan which Ilobson had pro- 
posed was to attach ten torpedoes on the 
port side of the collier, below the water 
line, which were to be exploded by electric 
wires from the bridge of the vessel when 
in the channel. After considerable delay 
the seven men necessary for the under- 
taking were selected, each being chosen 
for his special fitness to execute some par- 
ticular feature of the plan. At half-past 
one A. ^r., June 3, after serving coifec and 
sandwiches, Ilobson ordered his crew to 
(|uarters, and the Merrimac started on her 
course for the entrance to the channel. 
Xo oiiposition to her advance was made 
until she had passed in tnider Morro 
castle. Then she was discovered and a 
general fire was opened upon her from 
both sides of the channel. Paying no at- 
tention to this the vessel was quietly di- 
rected toward the point where it had been 
decided to sink her. At the crucial mo- 
ment the current bore her stern around 



THE NEW NAVY — 1SS3-1909. 



4S!» 



until she came close to the Morro side of 
the channel, making- it necessary to chan^;;o 
the helm so as to get the hull across the 
entrance before discharging the torpedoes. 
It was then discovered, however, that the 
steering gear had been shot away. An 
anchor was then thrown out in the hope 
that the current might carry the stern 
around, but this expedient was only par- 
tially successful. As there was nothing- 
more that Hobson or his men could do to 
change this unfortunate situation and 
they were exposed to a galling fire from 
all sides, orders -were given to discharge 
the torpedoes. Number one worked 
effectively, but the next three failed to ig- 
nite, the connections having been broken, 
as they were of all the remaining five. 
Shortly after her own torpedoes had been 
discharged, a mine was exploded under the 
Merrimac from the shore, which expedited 
the work of sinking her. Yet it was 
twenty-two minutes before she went down, 
and the men could escape to the raft 
which had been thrown over. To avoid 
detection they kept their bodies under 
water, and several search boats drew near 
the sunken collier but did not discover 
the float. Soon after sunrise a steam 
launch approached containing Admiral 
Cervera and a recoiuioitering party. 
When they had come within about one 
hundred feet, Hobson called out that they 
were Americans and wished to surrender 
to a Spanish officer. He then swam to the 
launch and was taken on board by the 
Admiral and his officers; and after a few 
moments all the others were rescued. 
Hobson and his crew were generally well 
treated by the Spaniartls, and were ex- 
changed on July 6. Like most of such 
daring and unusual ventures that have 
been made in the coui'se of wars, this was 
only partially successful, as the Merrimac 
sank lengthwise in the channel, and 
near to the easterly side, so that the pas- 
sage of vessels was not seriously inter- 
fered with. But the heroic action of 
Hobson and his seven associates thrilled 
the people of the United States; and 
when they returned to America after the 
close of the war they were everywhere 



received with tumultuous enthusiasm. As 
was illustrated in this case, too many un- 
usual and uncertain conditions are to be 
faced in all such movements to warrant 
the assurance that any successful results 




Photo. Copyrighted bt/ J. E. Purdy, Bnxton. 
LIEUT. RICHARD P. HOBSON. 

can be achieved. Happily the brave crew 
escaped all the dangers attending the 
blowing up of the Merrimac while their 
valor won for them considerate treatment 
by their captors. 

As soon as it was definitely settled that 
C'crvera's entire fleet was shut up in San- 
tiago, Sampson increased the vigilance of 
the blockading- squadron. Early in June 
the fleet was divided into two squadrons, 
the first, under his inunediate command, 
consisting of the New York, Iowa, Orf- 
00)1, New Orleans, Mai/flower, and 
Poricr, was to guard the eastern side of 
the harbor entrance; while the second, 
under the command of Commodore Schley, 
consisting of the Brooklyn, Massachusetts, 
Texas, Marhlehead, and Vixen, watched 
the west side. On June 2 Sampson issued 
the standing order for battle, in the fol- 
lowing words. " If the enemy tries to 



•i!)U 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



t'soape, the ships must close and engage 
as soon as possible, and endeavor to sink 
Cervera's vessels or foree them to run 
ashore." How strictly this order was ob- 
served, with but a single exeeptioii. the 
story of the battle of Jul.v 3 will demon- 
strate. To further tighten his grip upon 
the enemy's position, on June 12 Samp- 
son reduced tlie radius of the blockade's 
semicircle from six to four miles by day; 
and each <'onimander was instructed to see- 
that the bow of his vessel was constantly 
turned toward the harbor entrance so that 
not a moment need be lost in i-onnnen- 
cing the attack whenever the Spanish 
fleet should make its appearance. 

During the jjeriod since the beginning 
uf the war the government had been 
actively engaged in recruiting troops and 
massing them at different points in the 
South. As has been said previously this 
was pre-eminently a naval war; and it 
would have been fcirtunate fur the prestige 
of the War Department if Sampson could 
have engaged and destroyed Cervera's 
fleet before the army had been despatched 
from our own shores; for the masterly in- 
competency tliat was manifested in its 
(■(juipnient and direction makes a chap- 
trr in the history of the Spanish war for 
which every patriotic American must 
wish the material had never been ijr(]- 
vidcd. In response to the President's calls 
nearly two hundred thousand volunteers 
had been as-sembled. An immense number 
of officials of every character were ap- 
pointed from private life to command, or 
minister to the wants of, this great army; 
with the result that tlic petty claims of 
office seekers and not the effectiveness of 
the army received the supreme attention 
of the Department. ^lost of the regular 
infantry and cavalry and some of the 
volunteer regiments had been assembled 
at Tampa, Florida, and organized as the 
Fifth Army Corps, wliich was held in 
readiness to land in Cuba as soon as the 
Xavy should have made the way safe for 
transports. General !Miles, the head of the 
army, believed that the final and impor- 
tant battles of the war would be fought 
about Havana, and so detailed General 



Shaffer to take command of the force 
about to embark for Santiago. On June 
1 tlie Indiana, with some smaller war-ves- 
sels, was ready to convoy the transports, 
and embarkation began ; but so poorly 
was it conducted that it was not until the 
14th that the fleet could set sail. The 
exijedition consisted of 815 officers and 
10,(172 enlisted men, all regulars with the 
exception of the Seventy-first New York, 
and the first Volunteer Cavalry, popularly 
known as the " Rough Riders." This 
motley aggregation of cowboys, full- 
blooded Indians, and college graduates 
was enlisted chiefly in Arizona, New 
Mexico, and Oklahonm, by Colonel Wood, 
with Theodore Roosevelt, who resigned his 
office of Assistant Secretary of the Navy 
to take this connnand, as Lieutenant- 
( 'olonel. On June 20 the fleet of trans- 
IHirts arrived off Santiago ami Admiral 
Sampson at once had a conference with 
(ieneral Shaffer, the result of which was 
the decision to laml the troops at Daiquiri, 
a few miles east of the entrance to the 
bay. When preparations for disembark- 
ing were begun it was found that no prep- 
aration of any kind had been made for 
such purijose. As Senator Lodge has said 
ill his "War with Spain": "The Army 
had neither lighters nor launches. They 
had been omitted, forgotten, or lost, like 
an umbrella, no one knew exactly where; 
so the work of disembarking the troops 
foil upon the Navy." This unexpected 
burden fell upon the shoulders of Cap- 
tain Goodrich of the St. Lovis. By the 
use of Navy launches, and in sjiite of a 
heavy swell and high surf, six thousand 
trrxjps were landed the first day, June 22, 
and by the 26th the entire force, v.-ith a 
large quantity of ammunition and sup- 
lilies, had been safely put on shore. But 
" confusion doubly confoundei! " reigned 
everywhere among the land forces. The 
troops had been crowded like sheep into 
the transports with no reference to order; 
officers were separated from their com- 
mands; artillery-pieces were on one trans- 
port, the horses on another, and the har- 
ness on a third, with no means of finding 
out where any of them were. As thci'o 



THE NEW NAVY 



1SS3-1909. 



491 



were no lighters the horses were thrown 
into the sea, where many of them were 
drowned, some in bewilderment swimming 
out to sea instead of to the shore. Im- 
mediately upon landing the first detach- 
ment of troops General Lawton advanced 
along the shore and seized Siboney, eight 
miles nearer Santiago, where Kent's di- 
vision landed. General Wheeler then 
Ijushed on, and on the 24th defeated the 
Spanish force at La Guasima, with a total 
loss of fifteen killed and fifty-two 
wounded. During the following week the 
land forces were concentrated at Sevilla. 
During these days the troops suffered 
from tlie heavy rains, lack of rations, and 
15oor camp accommodations. No proper 
provision had been made for the landing 
of supplies or transporting them to the 
camp; with the result that, while there 
was an abundance aboard the transports, 
the troops were in actual want. On June 
30 it was decided to make an advance ; but 
to reach Santiago the important points 
San Juan hill and El Caney must be 
taken. In these engagements, which 
covered three days, the only serious en- 
gagements on land which were fought, 
the Spaniards offered stubborn resistance 
at each point. The troops, too, were in a 
wretched plight, half sick from exposure 
and climatic conditions. They had, too, 
to march and fight under a scorching 
.semi-tropical sun in the heavy woolen uni- 
forms worn in regular service, as no khaki 
uniforms were available until the trans- 
fer to Montauk Point, a month later, was 
begun. The spectacular event of the 
campaign was the charge up San Juan 
hill. As the roughness of the ground and 
wire fence obstructions broke up all 
regular military fonnations, it proved to 
be a fight where individual bravery and 
energy won the day. The Rough Eiders, 
though raw and unexperienced troops, 
won marked distinction, and with the 
troops of the First Regiment of regulars, 
were the first to gain the enemy's in- 
trenchments. Here they were nobly sup- 
ported by the negro troops of the Tenth 
Cavalry. The fighting continued with 
more or less regularity until about noon 



of July 3, when the Spaniards ceased 
firing. The losses during the three days 
fighting were eighteen ofiicers and one 
hundred and twenty-seven men killed, 
sixty-five officers and eight hundred and 
forty-nine men wounded, and seventy-two 
missing. The condition of the troops 
after the battle was most deplorable; a 
large proportion were sick, and all suffered 
wretchedly from the lack of adecjuate sup- 
plies. Notwithstanding the victories of 
the three days which had put his army in 
possession of the strong out-posts about 
the city, the valiant General Shaffer 
cabled the Secretary of War, July 3, that 
he was " seriously considering withdraw- 
ing about five miles and taking up a new 
position on the high ground between the 
San Juan river and Siboney," as he con- 
sidered it impossible to take Santiago by 
storm with the forces he then had. But, 
happily, the Navy was again to come to 




GENERAL JOSEPH WHEELER. 

the rescue of the Army, and spare it the 
disgrace of a retreat after its brave and 
victorious advance. 

The events of July 1 and 2 forced upon 
the Spanish governor some decision in 



492 



PEOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



iX'iCi-eiiee to Cervera's fleet in the harbor. 
Under the Spanish regulations the Ad- 
miral and his fleet were under the abso- 
lute control of the Captain-General of 
the island, Blanco; and on July 1, the 
latter telegraphed Cervcra : " In conform- 
ity with the opinion of the Government 
you will re-embark those of your crews 
which were landed, taking advantage of 
the first opportunity to go out of the 
harbor with all your ships;." In the 
course of Shatter's inland advance on 
Santiago, ('crvera had landed a thousand 
of his seamen, who seemed indispensable 
for the protection of the city. Upon the 
receipt of General Blanco's message, Cer- 
vcra called a council of his otfieers to con- 
sider the situation, and all agreed that it 
would be suici(hd to force the blockade; 
and the Admiral was fully determined 
that he would not take the responsibility 
of any such course. These views of him- 
self and officers were communicated to 
Blanco: but an imperative order was at 
once returned, instructing Cervcra to " re- 
embark landed troops of squadron as fast 
as possible and go out immediately." 
This order was received on July 2 very 
early in the morning, and Cervera deter- 
mined to go out at four o'clock that after- 
n(K)n. But uiJon gathering in his sailors 
who had been engaged about the city, he 
found many of them so exhausted that 
the dash out of the harbor was postponed 
until the morning of the third. Cervera's 
plan of action was based upon the sup- 
position that the ships of the blockading 
scpiadron would maintain the same posi- 
tions they had held during the i^receding 
four weeks. Captain Coneas, his chief of 
staff and captain of the flagship, in an ac- 
count of the fleet's cruise and destruction 
published later said: "Close in shore, 
toward the west, there was a yacht (the 
^'ixen), which we supposed to be in con- 
stant communication with the insurgents, 
and supporting the yacht was the Brouk- 
hin, in the centre of the interval and far 
away from the other ships, consequently 
leaving a large space open to the south- 
west between the Texas and the coast. 
Supposing, therefore, that the Brooklyn 



was at her usual station when we came 
out, the Infanta Maria Teresa (Cervera's 
flagship) was to engage her in battle, en- 
deavoring to ram her, and while the rest 
of the enemy's squadron was grappling 
with our flagship, the other ships, headed 
by the Vizcaija, without delaying to suc- 
cor the ilaria Teresa, were to pass in 
eolunni between her and the coast and 
endeavor to escape. Those of the ships 
which succeeded in escaping were to gain 
Havana or Cienfuegos." This programme 
is interesting as showing the purpose of 
the gallant Admiral to sacriflce himself, 
crew, and shii^ in a valiant endeavor to 
engage Sampson's entire fleet, and single- 
handed hold it in check, while the re- 
mainder of the Spanish vessels stole away. 
— a plan whose unselfish heroism honored 
the Commander wdio conceived it and 
merited better results than followed his 
action. 

The morning of July 3 dawned clear 
and bright, the sea was calm and beauti- 
ful, sparkling under the rays of the tropi- 
cal sun, and a holy quiet befitting the 
Sabbath morn seemed to brood over the 
whole scene. Before dawn the Massaelm- 
setis had gone to Guantanamo for coal, 
and so failed of any share in the glorious 
action of the day. At 8.55 A. M. Admiral 
Sam.pson signaled to the other vessels of 
the fleet. " Disregard movements Com- 
mander in chief," and in the ^ew York 
leisurely steamed toward Siboney, where 
he was to land and go several miles inland 
to confer with Shaftcr, by appointment. 
Just as the New York was off Siboney, 
and still in full view of the fleet, the 
lookout on the bridge called out : " Smoke 
in the harbor!" and an instant later 
shouted " The fleet's coming out." 
Glasses were at once trained on the en- 
trance and Sampson calmly replied. "Yes, 
they are coming out. Hoist two-fifty." 
tliat signal meaning " close in toward 
harbor entrance and attack vessels." 
Checking the course of the New York to 
the eastward, she was at once brought 
about and with all steam on hastened 
toward the scene of action. While Samp- 
son was nearing Siboney, the Iowa, at 



THE NEW NAVY — 1S«3-1909. 



493 



9.31 A. M., first discovered the hostile 
tleet comiug out, and at once Captain 
Evans signaled " Enemy's ships coming- 
out ! " and fired a signal gain. Cervera's 
vessels were sighted at nearly the same 
time by all the ships of the blockading- 
squadron, and in confoi-mity -with t^amp- 
son's pennauent order of June 2, all be- 
gan to close in and attack. As President 
Roosevelt afterward said of it, it was 
a " Captain's fight." The Spauisli fleet 
came out in the following order, — Maria 
Teresa (flagship), Vizcaya, Cristobal 
Colon, and Almirante Oquendo. At first 
there was some doubt as to the course the 
hostile ships would take ; but as soon as it 
was evident that it was to be a dash for 
liberty toward the west all the fleet, with 
one exception, turned in that direction, 
keeping- up a terrific fire on the Spanish 
ships. After facing the enemy for about 
ten minutes, however, the Bronlhjn 
(Schley's flagship) made a broad loop to 
the right, or east, away from the fleeing 
enemy. In making this movement he 
forced the Texas, which had been headed 
at once to the w'ost and was fighting hard, 
to reverse her engines and lose all the 
headway to avoid being- rammed by the 
Brooklyn. Speaking of this movement 
Eear-Admiral (then Captain) Philip said 
to the historian Maelay : " The Texas at 
this time was doing her best to close on 
the Spaniards, when to my surprise and 
consternation, I saw the Brooklyn swing- 
round with port helm — when all the 
other American war ships had used the 
starboard — away from the Spaniards and 
place herself directly in our course. I was 
compelled to stop and reverse our engines, 
and even then came nearer to a collision 
than I could wish. On account of this 
circumstance the Texas lost a splendid 
chance of closing with the enemy." Pas- 
sing the Texas the Brooklyn steamed far 
to the south, out of the range of the 
enemy's guns, and then turned west, her 
commander keeping a battleship between 
liiniself and the Spanish ships during the 
remainder of the fight. When it is re- 
membered that the Brooklyn outclassed 
every vessel of the Spanish fieet in all re- 



spects, — speed, armament, men, and gen- 
eral fighting strength, — this famous 
" loop "' must take rank as the most unique 
movement ever made by any ofiicer of the 
American Navy during its entire history. 
A historian of the war thus sums this 
matter up : " The one great lesson that 
Nelson gave in naval strateg-y -svas ' that 
a captain is never out of position when 
alongside an enemy.' Farragut's groat 
axiom, sixty years later, was that ' the 
nearer you got to your enemy the harder 
you can stril'ie.' Schley's contribution to 
naval strategy, as too plainly shown by 
his conduct throughout this campaign, 
was 'Avoid your enemy as long as possible, 
and if he makes for you, run.' " As was 
said this was a Captain's fight, and once 
it was on, each commander used his own 
discretion as to where he could fight most 
effectively. Shot and shell fairly rained 
upon Cervera's ships, -which they returned 
with vigor but with little effect. The 
Maria Teresa, struck bj' several shells 
and on fire -vvas first turned to shore at 
quarter after ten, only six miles west of 
Morro Castle. The Oquendo had been re- 
ceiving a similar pounding, and riddled 
with shot and also on fire, she was run 
upon the beach about a half mile west of 
the Teresa, at 10.20. The entire fire of 
tlie American fleet was then turned upon 
the Vizcaya and Colon, the pace attained, 
however, becoming too much for the older 
battleships. At 11.05 the Vizcaya was 
run ashore about fifteen miles west of the 
Morro, while the Oregon, with the Brook- 
lyn, at a safe distance outside, put on full 
steam to overtake the Colon. It was a 
wild and exciting- chase. The Oregon had 
won the most glorious honor by her trip 
from the Pacific coast, but now she fairly 
outdid herself. Built to make fifteen 
Ivnots, Captain Clark, by the eager and 
terrible work of his aids in the engine 
room, forced the monster battleship up to 
a speed of seventeen to eighteen knots. 
For some time it was simply an ocean 
race, no shots being fired by any of the 
vessels; but steadily the Oregon, gained, 
and when Captain Clark considered him- 
self within range a shot was fired which 



494 



FKOM COLOXY TO WOULD POAVEE. 



fell beyond the Colon; ami the Spaniards 
saw at once that the end had come. At 
1.15 P. il. the Colon turned to shore about 
forty-five miles west of Santiago, and 
surrendered. 

Tlius ended one of the most excitiii};- 
and remarkable battles in jSTaval history, 
and the United States squadron had done 




CAPTAIN CHARLES E. CLARK. 

its work as cleanly and effectively as did 
Devifey's fleet at Manila. Not a vestige of 
the enemy's fleet remained. And most 
remarkable of all was the fact that the 
American ships were hardly injured and 
only one man had been killed and one 
wounded. The news of the victory 
reached the United States on the eve of 
the usual Fourth of July celebration; and 
it is hardly necessary to saj' that rarely, 
if ever, has the nation's natal day been 
(ibserved with such wild enthusiasm. 
Some particular act of bravery and hero- 
ism was told of nearly all the Captains 
and crews; and for the time Dewey and 
^Manila were forgotten while the air rang 
with the shouts for Sampson, Clark, 
Philip, and Evans, and plucky Wain- 
v.-right who, in his unarmed yacht, had 



boldly attacked the Spanish torix-do-boats, 
and had been chiefly instrumental in de- 
stroying them. 

Though Santiago had not been cap- 
tured, nor any foothold firndy established 
I in Spanish territory, everyone looked 
upon the destruction of Cervera's fleet as 
virtually ending the war; and the further 
land movements were watched with only 
a listless interest. On July 3 General 
Shatter demanded the surrender of San- 
tiago, which was refused. On the 10th 
anil 11th the city was bombarded b.v the 
land and sea forces. About this time 
General Miles reached Santiago with 
troops intended for Porto Hico. With 
General Shafter he met the Sjianish Cqui- 
niander. General Toral, under a flag of 
truce, and arranged tenns for a surrender, 
which took place ou the 17th. In the 
meantime the condition of the American 
Iroops had become desiderate in the ex- 
Irenie, while the war department seemed 
unconscious of their existence. The whole 
force had become so reduced by malarial 
fevers that an epidemic of yellow fever 
seemed imminent. Then it was that the 
leading officers and surgeons met at Gen- 
eral Shafter's headquarters and signed 
the famous " round-robin '' addressed to 
the Secretary of War, reciting the shock- 
ing conditions that prevailed and urging 
that the troops be at once removed to the 
United States. This appeal so aroused 
[lublic sentiment through the country that 
even the War Department woke from its 
lethargy, and on August 4 orders were is- 
sued to remove the command to Montauk 
Point, Long Island. 

General Miles, with an entire force of 
about 16.000 men and a convoy of battle- 
ships, then began the illustrious campaign 
in Porto Rico, which was to wrest from 
Sjiain her last territory on the Western 
Continent. After a leisurely march of 
about two weeks over about two-thirds of 
the island, meeting no opposition worthy 
of the name, further movements were 
checked by the signing of the Peace 
Protocol, August 12, 1908; and the Span- 
lali war M'fls of an end. Compared with, 
other modern wai's, it was not a great one. 



THE XEW NAVY — 1S83-1909. 



49.3 



There were two real battles, and iu both 
the honors went to the New Navy, whose 
work had been, quick, sharp, and decisive. 
As the vessels returned to home waters, 
crowds flocked from all quarters to the 
ports which they visited to see the ships 
that had been so nobly tested, and not 
found wanting-; while the arms of the peo- 
ple of every city and town throughout the 
land were wide open to receive any of the 
officers or crews that had distinguished 
themselves. The Navy had worthily es- 
tablished its claim for the recognition of 
the people, and they responded in no un- 
certain manner. He would have been rash 
who should have favored in Congress a 
course similar to that which had been fol- 
lowed after previous wars, — a course 
which allowed the Navy to fall into de- 
suetude and inefficiency. 

The improvement in the Navy follow- 
ing the close of the Spanish war was 
rapid, and the treatment of the Depart- 
ment by Congress and the people was most 
generous. In 1893 there was not a single 
battleship in commission, and but few 
cruisers. In 1908 the efficient Navy in- 
cluded twenty-seven battleships, ten 
armored cruisers, twenty-eight cruisers, 
sixteen torpedo boat destroyers, thirty- 
eight torpedo boats, twelve submarines, 
ten monitors, and thirty-eight gunboats. 
For 1893 the entire appropriation for the 
Department, to cover all expenditures, in- 
cluding construction, was $23,000,000. 
The appropriations for the navy in the 
budget for 1909 sum up $135,000,000. In 
1893 there were about fifteen thousand 
sailors and marines enrolled; at the begin- 
ning of the present year, 1909, there are 
over forty-five thousand. These statistics 
express more emphatically than any 
words the vast importance the " New 
Navy " has assumed in the national econ- 
omy. When the appropriation bill was 
introduced in Congress in the Fall of 
1908 four new battleships were asked for, 
to be larger, more powerful, capable of 
steaming faster, and more heavily armed 
than any other battleships afloat. These 
were to be of the 26,000 ton class, and 
their estimated cost was about $8,000,000 



each. In view of the rapidly increasing 
deficit in the national revenue, however, 
a strong spirit of opposition to a further 
enlargement of the navy at this time man- 
ifested itself. There also appeared a well- 
defuied suspicion that we had been build- 
ing rapidly but not too wisely. Serious 
defects in the plans of some of the later 
battleships were openly charged, even by 
active officers of the fleets, and many 
hearings have been held upon the subject. 
Early in the present year the President 
appointed two separate commissions to in- 
vestigate the condition of the navy whose 
reports have not yet been made. All these 
conditions, however, made it evident to 
congressmen that a policy of retrench- 
ment was advisable. For a time it seemed 




GENERAL NELSON A. MILES. 

doubtful whether any new ships would be 
authorized this year. But under the spur 
of the President's earnest advocacy, and 
the powerful influence of the Department 
itself in Washington, a compromise was 
reached and authority was given for the 
construction of two of the enormous bat- 
tleships. A potent influence that has 



490 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWLE. 



been cultivated and exploited to support 
the President's policy has been the ever- 
present " war scare." For two years every 
eifort has been made to keep the probabil- 
ity of a war with Japan before the ijublic, 
and so create popular sentiment to sup- 
])ort the ambitious programme of the Ad- 
ministration. There has s'vown up amouf;- 
tliou.ditful people, however, an assured 
feeling that this bogy was being too 
strenuously worked. As Representative 
Burton, Chairman of the Committee on 
Xaval Affairs in the House, said, when 
the current bill was being- discussed, 
" there is a period of war scare every 
time a naval bill comes up for considera- 
tion. Believe me, it will all pass away, a 
phantom of the air." While the appro- 
priation for the British navy for the year 
1908 was only $170,000,000, notwithstand- 
ing- that country's purpose to maintain a 
fleet at least ten per cent greater than the 
fleets of any other two powers combined ; 
and the appropriations for the German 
and French navies for the same fieriod 
were $8;3.0OO.OOO and $64,000,000 respec- 
tively; it would seem that the United 
States could well afford, for the present, 
to adopt a " go-slow " principle in reganl 
to' naval affairs. The appropriation for 
the Xavy Department for the year 1908 
was $118,700,000, about $17,000,000 less 
than for the current year. But even on 
that basis more fluin sixly-five per cent 
of tlie entire revenue of the United States 
fnr I lie year 1908 went to pay for past 
irai-s or preparations for future wars. In 
view of the many arbitration treaties that 
have recently been made between leading 
nations of the world, and the theoretical 
indorsement that is given by the Govern- 
ment and the people of the United States 
to the principles of the Hague Confer- 
ences, it would seem to be the wiser 
course to act as if war could be honestly 
avoided and peace honorably maintained. 
In another chapter of tliis -work (Inter- 
national Courtesies) extended reference 
was made to the part so-called " Yellow 
journals " play in the delusion of the pub- 
lie, and in the creation of an inmioral 
and erroneous laiblic sentiment. Surely 



in this twentieth century a people so 
widely and highly educated as are the 
people of the United States should refuse 
to be moved by such irresponsible utter- 
ances. The sober thought and saner judg- 
ment of the people of all nations are to- 
day looking toward peace. Under such 
conditions it should appear the -^viser 
course for governments to abandon the 
childish policy of tr;\-ing each to build a 
greater war monster than another can 
produce. 

During the Fall of 1907 i-umors became 
current that it was the purpose of the 
Government to send a large fleet of bat- 
tleships around ('ape Horn to the Pacific 
Coast. These rumors were later con- 
firmed, and the jslan of the Department 
was fully disclosed. The proposition 
caused widespread discussion and much 
connnent. As troubles over the School 
question in California had greatly irri- 
tated the Japanese people it was consid- 
ered by many an unwise move. Opposi- 
tion, however, was quieted by the declar- 
ation, frequently rei»ated, by the Govern- 
ment that the proposed cruise had no 
political significance, but was merely an 
extended practice-cruise of a large fleet, 
such as smaller squadrons were con- 
stantly taking- in the Atlantic waters. Ac- 
cordingly, after an imposing review by 
the President, sixteen of the finest battle 
ships of the United States and of the 
world steamed out of Hampton Roads, 
on December 16, 1907, under connnand of 
Acbniral Robley D. Evans. It is needless 
to remark that the deepest interest of the 
nation was centred upon the fleet, es- 
pecially until after it had sucessfully 
passed through the Straits of Magellan 
and was plowing the more friendly waters 
of the Pacific ocean. The first port 
reached was Trinidad, where the vessels 
arrived December 23, and where the 
Christmas holidays were passed. The re- 
ception there accorded ofiieers and men 
was but a foretaste of the friendly feeling 
that was ever;vT\'here manifested. It is not 
too nmcli to say that every port at which 
the fleet stopped was theirs, and all that 
it contained. Receptions, formal dinners. 



THE NEW NAVY — 1883-1909. 



49 



excursions, picnic parties, barbecues fol- 
lowed each other in quick succession; and 
had it not been for the long reaches be- 
tween ports, with the recuperative tonic 
and foroe of ocean airs, no human organ- 
ization could have witlistood the demoral- 
izing effects of such open-handed hospi- 
tality. By March of 1908 the ships had 
reached the California coast, and from 
Sau Dieg-o to San Francisco one day of 
festivity followed anotlier without cessa- 
tion. On May 6 the fleet entered the har- 
bor of San Francisco, which was origi- 
nally its objective point. But some time 
before this it had been reported that it 
was the purpose of the Government to 
have the battleships continue their cruise 
until it should cover the circle of tlie 
earth; and during the stay of the vessels 
at San Francisco this report was con- 
firmed and the requisite instructions were 
issued. Admiral Evans had been in poor 
health during the greater part of the 
cruise from Hampton Roads, and, at his 
own request, was relieved of active com- 
mand of the fleet, Admiral Sperry finally 
and permanently succeeding him !May 15. 
After continuing the cruise to the North 
and visiting the Puget Sound cities, the 
great fleet again turned its course toward 
the West, reaching Honolulu July 10. 
From Honolulu to Auckland, 3,851 miles, 
was the longest leg of the cruise, and is 
said to have been the longest run ever 
made by war ships witliout coaling; but 
tlie vessels reached their destination with 
coal enough in their bunkers to steam an- 
other thousand miles. Auckland opened 
its arms to receive the visitors on August 
8 ; and on the 19th Sydney's population 
imdertook to outdo the hospitality of 
their New Zealand brethren. At Mel- 
bourne the same kindly feeling and genial 
reception awaited the fleet; and another 
link for the chain that binds the English- 
siieaking races together was forged. The 
enthusiasm and wannth of the recep- 
tion accorded the fleet by English colo- 
nial governments and peoples was hardly 
second to that of the Americans of 
our West Coast. Leaving Melbourne Sep- 
tember 4 Manila w'as reached October 
32 



2; and after a brief stay the cruise was 
continued to Japanese waters. There, 
from the 20th to the 23th of October, the 
Japanese, from the Mikado to the hum- 
blest laborer, vied with each other to do 
honor to the American representatives. 




Photo. Copyrighted 1907, by Underwood i- Cnderu'ood, 
.•ADMIRAL ROBLEY D. EV.\NS 



and to manifest in the most generous 
manner their friendliness toward the 
American Government and people. This 
reception was naturally different in many 
respects, so far as customs were con- 
cerned, from what had been accorded the 
fleet in other ports. That it was one the 
officers and men of the squadrons will 
never forget has since been manifested in 
a most practical way. Before the fleet 
reached Hampton Roads on the homeward 
voyage twenty-one hundred dollare had 
been subscribed by its ofiicers and men to 
procure an elegant and costly loving-cup 
to be presented to the Japanese Navy as 
an expression of the appreciation by the 
American sailors of the courteous atten- 
tion shown them by their Japanese fellow 
seamen. This absolutely unique tcsti- 



498 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



inonial ought to go far toward strengthen- 
ing the sentiments of peace and amity 
between the two peoples. 

After leaving Japanese waters the bat- 
tleships made a brief visit to Amoy, where 
another unexpectedly cordial reception 
was accorded them. Certainly if the 
Oriental nations and peoples are not truly 
friendly to the United States and its peo- 
ple every person on our fleet, from Ad- 
miral Sperrj' to the cabin boys, will give 
them the credit of being the most con- 
summate and entertaining actors that 
ever appeared on any stage. From Amoy 
the course lay toward Manila, where a 
second and longer stop was made. Leav- 
ing the capital of the Philippines Novem- 
ber 30, after visits at Singapore and Co- 
lombo, the Suez Canal was reached Jan- 
uary 3, 1909. Happily all the vessels 
passed through the great water-way with- 
out accident, one of the ships only ground- 





J 


•i^4 








/^% 
«-<^ 
»? 






jJM 




irt^ 


'"■^fni 


«B 




^B 


iijfP 


l^^l 




'Hf 











Photo, Copyriijhted 1909, by Underwood t& Undericood 

jV. r. 

ADMIRAL CHARLES S. SPERRY. 

ing for a few hours, and being quickly 
floated again without damage. After en- 
tering the Mediterranean the fleet was 
for a time broken up. separate squadrona 
being sent to different ports, all to 



rendezvous again at Gibraltar at the end 
of January to prepare for the homeward 
cruise. At all the ports of the countries 
bordering on the Mc<literranean the same 
royal welcome was accorded the American 
ships and their crews. 

Saturday, February 6, was as bright 
and clear a day as one could wish for a 
final display of the American fleet in 
European waters. Not a cloud was in the 
sky. A fair breeze just crested the 
waves with foam which sparkled in the 
genial sunlight. All was excitement and 
jiiyful anticipation on board the great 
battleships, for the time had come to bid 
farewell to all foreign shores. At eleven 
o'clock the Connecticut, which had been 
the flagship throughout the entire cruise, 
steamed majestically from her position in 
the harbor of Gibraltar to take her place 
at the head of the line of the fleet. The 
homeward run was begun. Great enthu- 
siasm was manifested at all points along 
the shore and on the rocky cliffs. As ves- 
sel after vessel swung into line cheer upon 
cheer from the si^ectators expressed the 
kindly feelings the American sailors were 
leaving behind, as well as the apprecia- 
tion due the perfect maneuvering of the 
squatlrons, and the striking beauty and 
.-significance of the spectacle. For twelve 
miles the course was due south. Then, 
being clear of the southernmost point of 
Europe, Cape Tarifa, the fleet turned 
sharply to the West and, passing the pil- 
lars of Hercules, steamed out into the 
Atlantic and began the last stretch of the 
cruise which should end in the longed-for 
liome waters. Before leaving Gibraltar 
Admiral Sperry expressed his unqualified 
satisfaction with the results of the long 
run of close to 45,000 miles, summing up 
what seemed to him its inestimable ad- 
vantages and achievements in these 
words ; " Tliis ciTjise marks an epoch in 
our naval annals, for the fleet has found 
ilsdf — has been weldeil into a unity. An 
aggregation of battleships, irrespective of 
the power and efficiency of the individual 
units, is not a fleet in the highest sense of 
the term until by long, faithful, and har- 
monious work on the part of the personnel. 



THE NEW XAVY — 1883-1909. 



49!) 



the spirit of the fleet has heeii developed. 
That now has been accomplished. The 
American people have come to appreciate 
the appearance of sea power as one of the 
most potent factors in the preservation 
of a just peace; and they should appre- 
ciate what it means to have a fleet like 



of repairs. The ofiicers and men respon- 
sible for repairs have met evers' test, and 
the results prove that the ships have been 
better cared for than when they depend 
upon the navy-yards. . . . For tech- 
nical work the cruise has been ideal. The 
lonff stretches between ports permitted un- 




Photo, Copyrighted 1908, by Underwood di Vnder^cood, N. Y. 

THE CONNECTICUT 



this. The lessons of the cruise have been 
many, and it is no exaggeration to say 
that the condition of our ships is better 
to-day than when they sailed from Hamp- 
ton Roads in December, 1907. During 
these fourteen months the fleet has been 
practically self-sustaining in tlie matter 



remitting daily exercises and maneuvering'. 
The degree of gunnery efficiency has been 
greatly improved, as the conditions of 
drilling and training during long-distance 
cruising cannot be equaled in homo 
waters, where there is constant interfer- 
ence. This is proved by the unequaled 



500 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLJJ POWEK. 



results of the target practice at Magda- 
lena bay and Manila. 

" The fleet everywhere has encountered 
unbounded hospitality. The lavish enter- 
tainment and perfect good feeling- dis- 
played were almost without precedent, 
and they should always be remembered by 
oiu' people. While the cruise has been 
intensely interesting and valuable to of- 
ficers and men, there is naturally wide- 
spread elation throughout the fleet at tho 
prospect of reaching home in a fortnight." 

If the skies were bright and nature 
smiled as the fleet started from Gibraltar 
for home, she had no such welcome to 
offer the ships as they entered Hampton 
Roads again on the morning of February 
22, 1909, — one year and sixty-eight days 
after they had left that roadstead. All 
prejiarations had been made for receiving 
the fleet in the most royal manner. Bat- 
tleships and cruist'rs on the home station 
had met the incoming fleet about one 
thousand miles east of Cape Tlatteras, 
and accompanied it to the place of ren- 
dezvous. President Roosevelt came down 
from Washington Sunday night on the 
Mayflowe?; to act as the supreme review- 
ing ofticer as the fleet entered the Roads. 
Promptly at eleven o'clock the Connecii- 
cuf came out of the mist and fog into 
sight of the reviewing boat, and soon after 
belched forth the President's salute from 
her big guns. In regular order followed 
the other vessels of the fleet, the ships be- 
ing four hundred yards apart. Notwith- 
standing the inclemency of the weatlier 
the shores were lined with enthusiastic 
spectators, and hundreds of small boats 
darted in every direction. The entire 
fleet had passed in review before two 
o'clock, at whicli hour the Admirals and 
Captains assembled on board the Mai/- 
flower to pay their respects to the Com- 
mander-in-chief of the Navy of the 
United States. nn<l to receive the official 
" Well Done " of the President. That this 
was bestowed without stint and in ful- 
some eulogy need hardly be said. This 
ceremony completed, the President en- 
tered a launch and was conveyed first to 
the Cniinorficiif. and then to the flagship 



of each of the other squadrons in turn. 
To officers and men alike he expressed his 
joy and gratification that they and their 
vessels were again at home after such a 
record-making cruise. The many predic- 
tions of calamity that were made fourteen 
months before had been proved visionary, 
and the wisdom of the President vindi- 
cated. Rarely have there been occasions 
when " joy unconfined " reigned so su- 
premely in every heart. On all the ves- 
sels the men cheered the President as only 
tlie strong- throats of the lusty sailors can 
cheer ; and as, when he went over the side 
of tho Connecticut, another and louder 
cheer broke out, he turned and laughingly 
said, "I'd cheer you tlie sauie way if 
there was only enough of me." 

By five o'clock all the official formali- 
ties had been observed and completed, and 
the most remarkable, as well as the most 
spectacular and sensational, cruise ever 
made by any naval fleet was at an end. 
As the subject will long interest the peo- 
ple of the United States an itinerary of 
the cruise, and the distances covered is 
given here, which may prove of value for 
future reference : 

Hampton Roads to Trinidad 1850 

Trinidad to Rio de Janeiro olOO 

Rio do Janeiro to Punta Arenas. .. 2228 

Punta Arenas to Callao 2666 

Callao to Magdalena Bay 3050 

Magdalena Bay to San Francisco. . 1200 

San Francisco to Honolulu 2100 

Honolulu to Auckland 3850 

Auckland to Sydney 1284 

Sydney to Melbourne 575 

Melbourne to Albany 1350 

Albany to Manila 3.500 

Manila to Yokohama 1753 

Yokohama to Amoy 1343 

Amoy to Manila 666 

Manila to Singapore 1368 

Singapore to Colombo 1560 

Colombo to Suez 3440 

Suez to Gibraltar 1920 

Gibraltar to Hamjiton Roads 3500 

These figures represent a total of 42,303 
miles covered in direct course. From 
San Francisco side trips were made to the 



THE NEW XAVY 



1S83-1909. 



501 



Puget Sound ports; and in the Mediter- 
ranean various irregular routes were fol- 
lowed so that the total number of miles 
covered is generally placed, in round 
numbers, at forty-five thousand. 

Reviewing the admirable conduct of the 
crews of the different vessels of the fleet 
under conditions naturally tempting to ex- 
cessive indulgences and license; the mag- 
nificent appearance of the vessels them- 
selves and their manifest adaptability for 
all the demands to which such sea mon- 
sters may be subjected ; and the fact that 
these superb battleships are but the most 
imposing class of a much larger fleet 
equally fit and ready for service, — the 
American people, whatever views may be 



held as to the necessity of a great navy, 
may take a peculiar and just pride in 
what has been accomplished in but little 
over fifteen years. But while we glory in 
these achievements it is cei'tainly the 
hope and prayer of all Christian and civ- 
ilized people that never one of the great 
guns of our monster battleships may speak 
a word hostile to any one of the nations 
or peoples who during the past fifteen 
months have so spontaneously and un- 
grudgingly given of their affection and 
their substance to manifest their respect 
and regard for this great Christian nation, 
and the noble and humane principles 
which its theory of government rep- 
resents. 




THE DKWEli ARCH, NEW YORK CITY. 



XL VI. 

THE VENEZUELAN BOUNDAEY DISPUTE — THE MONROE 

DOCTRINE - 1895. 



Alexander I. of Russia and Mme. de Kiudenev. — Tlie P^inperor's Religious Enthusiasm.— 
His Part and Purpose in Forming the Holy Alliance. — Text of That Remarkable Document. 
— The Holy Alliaucf liecomes Association of Despots For Overthrow of Liberty. — Spanisli 
Colonies in Western Hemisphere Declare Independence. — Purpose of Holy Alliance to Re- 
.store Power to Spain. — Canning's Proposals. — Views of John Quinoy Adams, Secretary of 
State. — Declares Again.-t Acting "As a Cock-boat in Wake of British Man-of-War." — 
"Make an American Cause and Adhere Inflexibly to That." — Statement of His Doctrine 
as Announced by President Monroe in 1S2.'5. — Reception of ilessage by British Press. — 
Canning's Duplicity Proved. — Doubtful Position of the United States Government as to 
Doctrine for Seventy Years. — " To Be Asserted Wlien, and to What Extent, Individual Con- 
ditions Demand." — Polk's Attitude as Congressman and Later as President. — Applica- 
tion to French Occupation of Mexico. — Interpretations and Indorsements in Many Party 
Platforms. — History of Differences between Great Britain and Venezuela. — Intervention of 
the United States. — Olney versus Salisbury. — Latter's Contempt for Monroe Doctrine. — 
President Cleveland's Vigorous Message. — Ap])ointment of American C-ommission to De- 
termine True Boundary Line. — Great Britain Assents to Arbitration. — Distinguished 
Arbitrators. — Character of Award and Results. — Final Determination of Status of Monroe 
Doctrine. 



" I mistake the American people if they favor the odious doctrine that tlu-ve is no such thing as Inter- 
national morality, that there is ore law for a strong nation and another for a weak one. and that even by 
indirection a strong power may with impunity despoil a weak one of its territory." — Grovee Cleveland. 



FTER Napoleon had been safely banished to St. Helena in 
1815, and the allied powers betook themselves to the task 
of re-establishing- conditions which the great soldier's 
career and the liberated spirit of freedom had seriously 
shattered, Alexander of Russia came naturally to the front 
as the foremost European potentate, distinguished alike, 
at that time, as a soldier and a wise statesman actuated 
by the highest moral purposes. It vras during the pro- 
tracted sittings of the representatives of the different 
powers to restore the peace of Europe that the Czar first 
came in touch with one of the most remarkable of women, who had charmed all 
the noted people of the different courts of Europe by her wit, cleverness, and 
beauty in youth ; and who, later in life, deeply penitent for the sins of her earlier 
life, became the ascetic pietist and lay preacher, Mme. de Ivrudener. Herself of 
Russian descent, of an exceedingly sentimental and poetic temperament, at the 
age of nineteen she became the wife of an aged and very distinguished Russian 
diplomat, who was well known and highly esteemed at every court of Europe. She 




VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONROE DOCTRINE— 1895. 50c 



spent some years in the great capitals of 
the world, reveling in all the excitements, 
gayety, and license which the utter lack of 
moral sense of the age made possible. 
Failing health, an uneasy conscience, and 
some scandals led her to retire to a quiet 
life about 1807, when a little over forty 
years of age, when she came under the 
influence of the Moravian Brethren, the 
mystical side of whose religious beliefs 
appealed strongly to the sensitive nature 
of the brilliant wonian, weary of sin and 
of self. From this time until her death 
among some poor colonists in Crimea, in 
1824, her entire life was devoted to 
preaching the simplest gospel of Christ 
and to deeds of self sacrifice and noble 
charity. There is abundant evidence that 
the wonderful political events of the 
three years preceding the year 1815 had 
most seriously impressed Alexander I., the 
Emperor of Russia, and that he recog- 
nized the Divine purpose in their develop- 
ment; so that he was in the frame of 
mind best suited to absorb the exalted 
teaching and be intluenced by the impas- 
sioned appeals of !Mme. de Krudener. 
Visionary in Iier thought and subject to 
the spiritual uplifting of a devout mys- 
ticism, she has left an account of her 
first meeting with the Emperor, while on 
the road to Paris, in 1815. Without for- 
mal introduction, and with absolute fear- 
lessness, she at once called upon him to 
repent of all the sins of his past life as 
man and Emperor, and as a child to con- 
secrate his entire strength of mind and 
body and all his mighty influence to the 
honor and glory of the one God. For 
nearly three hours this earnest exhorta- 
tation was kept up, the Emperor being 
greatly impressed and moved, at last fall- 
ing on his knees witli the two or three 
present while Mme. de Krudener prayed 
earnestly that his sins might be made 
clear to him, and that he might be led 
to realize the great powers God had placed 
in his hands for the good of his fellow- 
men. So powerfully was the Emperor at- 
tracted by the noble and pure thought of 
the woman that he insisted upon her keep- 
ing near him. and helping him by her 



uplifting conversations and prayers. And 
as soon as the imperial palace had been 
occupied, the Emperor made it his first 
business to see that proper apartments 
were secured in the immediate vicinity 
for Mme. de Krudener and her attendants. 




ALEX.\NDER I. OF RUSSIA. 

By a rear entrance the Emperor, attended 
by a single servant, could unseen enter 
the apartments of his spiritual teacher; 
and there, after the stormy political dis- 
cussions of the day were over, he spent 
three or four hours of every night reading 
the Bible, listening to his teacher's ex- 
positions, and in earnest prayer. This 
absoi-ption in religion and in spiritual 
thought continued until late in Septem- 
ber, 1815, the climax of the situation be- 
ing reached on the 11th of that month. 
During the summer the great Russian 
army had been encamped in Champagne. 
Before setting out for the return to Russia 
the Czar determined to hold a grand 
review on the 10th of September, his 
birthday, to be followed on the 11th 
by a solemn religious service of thanks- 
giving and consecration. Accordingly 



504 



FKOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEK. 



seven great altars were erected on the 
plain, at which masses were simultane- 
ously celebrated, with all the gorgeous ac- 
cessories of the ritual of the Greek 
Church. On an elevated spot in full view 
of the one hundred and fifty thousand 
soldiers assembled on the vast plain was 
the Imperial tent; and before it, in sight 
of the whole great multitude, the Emperor 
and his spiritual adviser participated in 
the services, prostrating themselves in 
prayer and oifering up devout thanksgiv- 
ing to the Almighty for the especial pro- 
tection accorded the Russian troops in 
the recent campaign. The distinguished 
writer and critic, Sainte-Bcuve, on the 
authority as he affirms of an eyewitness, 
thus described the scene: " The honors 
paid by Louis XIV. to Mme. de Main- 
tenon at the camp of Compiegne did not 
surpass the veneration with which Mmc. 
de Krudener was treated by the con- 
queror. It was not as the granddaughter 
of Marshal Miinnich, it was not even as 
his favorite subject; it was as llie ambas- 
sadress from Heaven that he receired her. 
and conducted her into the presence of 
his armies. Bareheaded, with her still 
golden hair falling to her shoulders, and 
a few curls gathered together and 
fastened over her forehead ; clad in a long- 
dark gown confined at the waist by a 
single girdle, and rendered elegant by her 
manner of wearing it; thus she appeared 
at this period, thus she arrived in the 
plain at dawn, ami thus, erect, at the 
moment of prayer she seemed as a new 
Peter the Hermit, in the presence of the 
prostrate troops." " This day," declared 
the Emperor at its close, " has been the 
most beautiful of my life, and one that I 
can never forget. My heart was filled 
with love for my enemies; I was enabled 
to pray fervently for them all: and it was 
whilst weeping at the foot of the crijss of 
Christ, that I interceded in behalf of 
France." " There is no doubt." says the 
biographer of Mme. de Krudener. " that 
this religious solemnity on the Plains of 
Vertus must be regarded as indicating 
the high water mark of Mme. de Ivni- 
(lener's career in the eyes of the world. It 



made patent to all Europe what until then 
had only been realized in its entirety by 
the initiated few, namely, the overwhelm- 
ing influence of her religious teachings 
upon the mind of the Czar. It was the 
signal for all the arts of diplomacy to be 
init in motion in order to rescue Alex- 
ander from what, in the eyes of his eon- 
temporaries, was nothing less than a 
lamentable infatuation." And diplomacy 
and the separation between the Emperor 
and Mme. de Krudener which followed 
soon after the remarkable scene on the 
Plains of Vertus, were only too effective 
in weaning him from the noble sentiments 
that then fully possessed him. Before de- 
jjarting for Russia, however, the Emperor 
determined to testify openly before all na- 
tions as to the faith that was in him, and 
to set an example before Europe of the 
practical application of the doctrines of 
Christianity to the problems of interna- 
tional politics. Accordingly he drew up a 
paper expressing his thought, which was 
for years one of the most discussed and 
least understood documents of European 
history, and one which was a determining 
factor in the fate of nations during the 
fir-it lialf of the nineteenth century. This 
cldcument or agreement is known as the 
" II oil/ Alliance : " and as it became one 
of the determining elements in the de- 
velopment of the Monroe Doctrine, and is 
so uni(iue and interesting in itself, we 
shall briefly describe and quote it. 
Many have gone so far as to ascribe 
to Mme. de Krudener. not only the 
inspiration, but also the composition 
(if the paper. But her faithful at- 
tendant and fellow-preacher for man.v 
y(>ars wrote of its origin as follows: "A 
few days before his departure, the Em- 
juror said to us, 'I am going to leave 
Prance, but previous to my departure I 
wish to render public homage to God, — 
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, 
— in return for the protection He has 
vouchsafed to us, and to invite the na- 
tions to enroll themselves under the ban- 
ner of obedience to the gospel. Here is 
the draft of the act, which I beg you to 
go through carefully, and if it contains 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDAEY DISPUTE — MONROE DOCTRINE — 1895. 505 



any expression of which you do not ap- 
prove, I trust you will inform me of tlie 
fact. I wisli the Emperor of Austria and 
the King of Prussia to imite themselves 
with me in this act of adoration so that, 
like the Wise Men of the East, we may 
be seen openly acknowledging the su- 
preme authority of one Divine Saviour. 
You will unite yourselves with me in 
prayer that my allies may be disposed to 
sign.' The following day he returned for 
the draft ; we were profoundly touched by 
the humility with which he was pleased to 
listen to the suggestions we made to him. 
The next day he took the document 
to the allied sovereigns to sign, and 
he had the satisfaction of seeing them 
enter at once into his views. That same 
evening he came to inform us of the steps 
he had taken and to render thanks to God 
for the success with which they had been 
attended." And M. Capefigue, the his- 
torian of the Restoration, states that ho 
personally inspected the original of the 
treaty, written throughout in the hand of 
the Emperor Alexander, with corrections 
by Mme. de Krudener, by whom the wor<ls 
"Holy Alliance" were interpolated. The 
essential parts of this remarkable agree- 
ment were as follows: 

" In the Name of the Holy and Un- 
divided Trinity. 

" Their Majesties the Emperor of Aus- 
tria, the King of Prussia, and the Em- 
peror of Russia, in consequence of the 
great events which have occurred in Eu- 
rope in the course of the last three years. 
having become profoundly convinced that 
it is necessary to base the principle of 
conduct to be adopted by the Powers, in 
their mutual relations, on the sublime 
truths contained in the eternal religion of 
Christ, our Saviour; declare solemnly 
that the present act has for its sole object 
to manifest, in the face of the vmiverse, 
their unalterable determination to adopt 
as their rule of conduct, whether in the 
administration of their respective states 
or in their political relations with all 
other governments, no other principles 
than those of their holy religion, precepts 
of justice, of charity, and of peace, which. 



far from being exclusively applicable to 
private life, ought, on the contrary, 
directly to influence the resolutions of 
princes, and guide all their decisions, as 
offering the only means of consolidating 




MME. DE KRUDENER. 

human institutions and remedying their 
imperfections. 

" In consequence their Majesties have 
adopted the following articles: — Art. 1. 
In accordance with the words of Holy 
Scripture, which command all men to re- 
gard one another as brothers, the three 
contracting Monarchs will remain united 
by the bonds of a true and indissoluble 
brotherhood and, regarding each other as 
compatriots, they will lend one another 
aid, and succor in all places, and under 
all circumstances ; believing themselves to 
be placed toward their subjects and their 
armies in the position of a father toward 
his children, they will direct them in a 



506 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



similar spirit of brotherhood, for the pro- 
tection of religion, peace, and justice. 

" Art. II. As a result, the only principle 
in operation, either between the said gov- 
orrunents or between their subjects, will 
Jie that of rendering reciprocal service; to 
display to one another, by an unalterable 
good will, the mutual affection with which 
each should be animate<l ; to regard one 
another without exception as members of 
one and the same Christian nationality; 
the three allied princes themselves only 
considering themselves as delegated by 
Providence to govern three branches of 
one and the same family, to wit: Austria, 
Prussia, and Russia ; thus confessing that 
the Christian nation of which they and 
their people form a part has really no 
other sovereign than Him to whom alone 
supreme power belongs, because in Him 
alone are containetl all the treasures i>f 
love, of knowledge, and of infinite wis- 
dom, that is to say in God, our divine 
Saviour Jesus Christ, the incarnate word. 
Their majesties consequently recommend 
to their i)eopIe with the most earnest 
solicitude, as being the only means of 
enjoying that peace that is born of a good 
conscience, and which alone is lasting, 
daily to fortify themselves more and more 
in the principles and practice of those 
duties which our Divine Saviour imposed 
on mankind." A sublime and exalted 
teaching this, but of differing value as 
translated in the language and spirit of 
JTme. de Krudener, or of Prince Metter- 
iiich; and unfortunatel.y he, the tricky 
diplomatist, had the ears of the three 
allied sovereigns. " That the King, the 
Emperor, and the Czar," says Professor 
McMaster, " had any hidden motive in 
forming this far-famed Holy Alliance ; 
that they said one thing and meant an- 
other; that their intention was less to rule 
in accordance with the maxims of Christ 
than to set up and maintain absolute gov- 
ernments; that when they signed that 
league they knew the.v were forming a 
bond of union against the spread of lib- 
eral ideas, and even then contemplated a 
system of meddling in the affairs of other 
nations, — there is no evidence whatever. 



. . . That this little society of Chris- 
tian monarchs should have any interest 
for us of to-day is due to the fact that 
their treaty contains the words ' Holy 
Alliance,' that the signers have ever since 
been called the ' Holy Allies,' and that to 
their league have wrongfully been attrib- 
uted results wliich sprang from the 
'Quadruple Treaty' siijned tivo months 
later by Russia, Prussia, Austria, and 
Gieat Britain; a new alliance which 
bound the four powers to do four things: 
exclude Xaijoleon forever from power: 
maintain the government they had just 
set up in France; resist with all their 
might any attack on the army of occupa- 
tion ; and meet in 1818 to consult con- 
cerning their common interests, and to 
take such measures as should then seem 
to be best fitted to serve the peace and 
happiness of Europe." Continuing, Mc- 
Master says, "By the Quadruple Treaty, 
signed at Paris in 1815, England, Prus- 
sia, Russia, and Austria bound themselves 
to maintain the government they had just 
set up in France, and to hold a Congress 
of the Powers in 1818. They met, accord- 
ingly, in September at Aix-la-Chapelle, 
and with that conference a new era opens 
in the constitutional history of Europe. 
Theti and there was formed the real ' Con- 
spiracy of Kings' The reactionaiy move- 
ment of three years had extinguished in 
the hearts of the best of them the last 
trace of liberalism, and they all stood to- 
gether on a common ground of hatred of 
popular liberty. It was the conference at 
Aix-la-Chapelle that united the sovereigns 
in the project of a joint regulation of 
European affairs, and turned the Holy 
Allies into a miilaal association for the 
insurance of Monarchy. Having, in the 
language of the time, taken the ijeople of 
Europe into their Holy keeping the three 
autocrats declared that henceforth all 
useful or necessary changes in the legisla- 
tion and administration of states must 
emanate alone from the free-will, the re- 
flecting and enlightened impulse of those 
whom God rendered responsible for 
power." 

Taking advantage of the domestic 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONKUE DOCTRINE— 1895. 507 



troubles that ovei-whelmed the different 
European states early in the nineteenth 
century, tlie Spanish colonies of North 
and South America began about 1810 to 
revolt against their mother country and 
to set up governments of their own; and 
by 1820 these colonies had so far estab- 
lished their independence that individual 
governments veere recognized by the 
United States, and diplomatic relations 
were established with each. About 1818 
Russia made a settlement on the coast of 
California, and seized a small island of 
the Hawaiian group. AUliough this move- 
ment aroused some apprehension it was 
not until 1822 that the extent of the Rus- 
sian pretensions was brought directly to 
the attention of the government at Wash- 
ington. Then the Russian Minister 
placed in the hands of tlie Secretary of 
State an Edict of tlio Emperor Alexander 
granting to Russian subjects alone all 
rights of commerce, whaling, and fishing, 
whether on the islands or in the ports and 
gulfs of tlie northwest of America, from 
Bering' Sea to fifty-one degrees north lati- 
tude. Foreign vessels were, therefore, fm- 
bidden not only to land on the coast and 
islands, hut even to come witliin one lnui- 
dred miles of tliein. This unexpected at- 
tempt to define the boundaries of the two 
countries aroused the government of the 
United States, and led to immediate de- 
mands for explanations, protests, an<l 
statements as to the respective positions 
of the two countries; and in July, 1823, 
in conversation with the Russian Min- 
ister, John Quincy Adams, the Secretary 
of State for the United States, announced 
explicitly that " we should contest the 
right of Russia to any territorial estab- 
blishment on this Continent, and that we 
should assume distinctly the principle 
that the American Continents are no 
longer subjects for any European colonial 
settlements," — a concise and emphatic 
statement of the principle that has since 
become so widely known as the " Monroe 
Doctrine." 

The fall of the "Holy Allies" from 
grace, and from their exalted spiritual 
position as announced in 181.5, was rapid 



and complete. From an alliance based on 
the most divine sentiments of the religion 
of Christ it swiftly became a close asso- 
ciation of a few despots actuated by the 
principles and morals of the Spanish In- 
(]uisition, and secretly pledged to extir- 
pate every movement or tendency looking 
toward the spread of popular government. 
It is not surprising, therefore, to find 
these " lords of creation " closing their 
conference at Laybaoh, in 1821, with the 
solenm declaration that henceforth all 
" useful or necessary changes in the leg- 
islation and administration of states must 
emanate alone from the free-wilt, the re- 
flecting and enlightened impulse of those 
u'liom God has rendered responsible for 
power, — (their modest manner of refer- 
ring to themselves); nor to learn that at 
Verona, in 1822, they " secretly made 
additions to the Treaty of the Holy Al- 
liance." whose first two sections read as 
follows : 

" The undersigned, specially authorized 
t(] make some additions to the treaty of 
ihe ' Holv Alliance,' after having ex- 




*'^ 



JOHN QUINCT ADAMS. 

changed their respective credentials, have 
agreed as follows : 

■' Article I. The high contracting 
powers, being convinced that the system 
of representative government is equally as 



5U8 



FKOiU COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



iiicumpatihle ivilh the monarchical prin- 
ciple as the maxim of tlw sorereignty of 
tlie people with tlie deriiic riijht, engage 
uiutuiilly, in the most solemn manner, to 
ttse all their efforts to pat an end to the 
system, of representative ijorernment, in 
whatever country it may exist in Europe, 
and to prevent its being introduced in 
tliose countries where it is not yet known. 
" Article II. As it cannot be doubted 
tliat the liberty of the press is the most 
piiwerful means used by the pretended 
supporters of the rights of nations to the 
detriment of those Princes, the hif>li con- 
tracting parties promise reciprocally to 
adopt all proper measures to suppress it, 
not only in their own states, but also in 
the rest of Europe." These " additions " 
to the original treat.v were signed b.y the 
authorized representatives of Russia, 
Austria. France, and Prussia. In har- 
mony with the general spirit of the con- 
ference it was agreed before adjournment 
that France, in the name of the Holy 
Alliance, should send an army into Spain 
to put an end to the system of representa- 
tive government which had been strug- 
gling, and with a good measure of success, 
for supremacy in that country. Accord- 
ingly in April, 1S■J■^. a French army 
under the Due d'Angouleme crossed the 
Pyrenees and, after a feeble resistance on 
the part of the revolutionists, re-estab- 
lished Ferdinand iipon his despotic 
throne. Of course the independence of 
the Spanish Colonies in North and South 
America had not been recognized by any 
power excepting the United States; the 
colonists were, as yet, simpl.v subjects in 
revolt against their rightful sovereigii ; 
and Ferdinand was begging lustily of the 
Allies that tliey would aid him in redu- 
cing his rebellious subjects to submission. 
The matter was seriously discussed by the 
Powers at Verona, but was left open for 
decision at a subsequent Conferewe to be 
held in the fall of 1823. Such was the 
situation that faced the nine million peo- 
ple of the Uiiitcd States, who seemed en- 
gaged in a vain effort to guarantee politi- 
cal freedom, and the blessings of repre- 
sentative government, to all the people of 



this hemisphere! "The moment was a 
critical one," as Professor McMaster has 
well said. " It was not Mexico, nor 
Buenos Ayrcs, nor Chile that the Holy 
Allies proposed to attack, but the repub- 
lican institutions, and the republican gov- 
ernments of the new world." England 
had already established quite an extensive 
trade with the Spanish colonies, and was 
so situated as regards the Allies that her 
government wished to appear in the most 
favorable light to the Colonists but with- 
out committing itself to any jjosition that 
might be uncomfortable in the near 
future. Accordingly in the spring of 
1823, "Mr. Canning, then the English 
prime minister, opened negotiations and 
proposals through Mr. Rush, the Amer- 
ican minister at the Court of St. James; 
but nothing of a prai-tical nature resulted, 
though Canning Inter assumed all the 
glor.y of having conceived and set up the 
Slonroe Doctrine, — or, as he sententiously 
exjiressod it, " I called the new world into 
existence to redress the balance of the 
old." 

As the time approai-bcd for President 
Monroe to prepare his annual message to 
Congress, the dominant consideration 
seemed to be the relation that should exist 
between the peoples of the two continents, 
and their several governments. Soon 
after receiving the full statement of Can- 
ning's proposal through Mr. Rush, Presi- 
dent Monroe took occasiim to lay all the 
documents and jjapers bi>fore ox- President 
Jefferson, who was then living in retire- 
ment at Monticello, and before ex-Presi- 
dent Madison. In bis reply to Monroe's 
connuunication, Jefferson said: "The 
question presented by the letters you have 
sent me, is the 7nost momentous winch 
has ever heen offered to my contemplation 
since that of Independence. That m,ade 
vs a Nation, this sets our compass and 
points the course irhirli we are to steer 
through the ocean of time opening on lis. 
And never could we embark on it under 
conditions more auspicious [Mr. Jefferson 
here had in mind a coalition in some form 
with Great Britain]. Our first and fiin- 
damenlnl mn.rim .'should he. never to en- 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONEOE DOCTEINE — 1895. 509 



tanyle ourselves in the hrolls of Europe. 
Our second, never to suffer Europe to 
intermeddle with cis-Atlantic affairs. 
America, North and South, has a set of 
interests distinct from those of Europe 
and peculiarly her own. She should there- 
fore have a system of her own, separate 
and apart from that of Europe. While 
ihe last is laboring- to become the domicil 
of despotism, our endeavor should surely 
be to make our hemisphere the domicil of 
freedom." Meeting after meeting of the 
cabinet was held to discuss the questions 
involved from every standpoint; and no- 
where did the President find a stauneher 
supporter, wiser counselor, or more 
sturdy advocate than in his Secretary of 
State, John Quincy Adams. Mr. Adams 
believed emphatically in an unqualified 
and explicit statement of our position; 
that matters should not be minced in the 
least, hut that wdiat we wanted and what 
we proposed to stand for should be so 
sirai^ly and plainly stated as to admit of 
no ambiguity; and that, instead of follow- 
ing the usual course in such matters of 
sending diplomatic notes and polite mes- 
sages through secret channels, the pro- 
nouncement should be made in the most 
public manner, in the plainest language, 
and from the most authoritative source. 
But there were earnest divisions in the 
cabinet itself on the matter. Calhoun 
doubted the necessity, or even advis- 
ability, of publishing " so ostentatious a 
display of rei)ublican principles." Wirt, 
the Attorney-General, who had been ab- 
sent from all of the meetings up to within 
a week of the convening of Congress, now 
joined the cabinet discussions and, with a 
mind uninfluenced by former spirited ar- 
guments, ijroceeded to examine Mr. 
Adams' proposals afresh. He coolly sug- 
gested that the whole statement might 
seem mere bombast ; for if the Allies 
should actually begin hostile operations 
against South America, would the United 
States back up Mr. Adams' declaration 
with men and guns? To this Mr. Adams 
could only reply, " That is, and has been 
to me, a fearful question." With eloquent 
earnestness Adams endeavored to allay 



the fears of his colleagues who were 
alarmed at the possibility of the spread of 
war. But while he dismissed tliis danger 
as remote, he pictured vividly the perilous 
alternatives in case the Allies subjugated 
Spanish America ; California, Peru, and 
Chile might go to Eussia ; Cuba to Eng- 
land ; and Mexico to Erance. The danger 
was even at our door, he declared, for 
within a few days the minister of France 
had openly threatened to recover Louis- 
iana. More and more convinced of the 
soundness of his position as the days 
passed, he persisted with increased ear- 
nestness that this country ought to decline 




JiMIS MONROE 

the overture of Great Britain, and avow 
its principles explicitl.y to Eussia and 
France, " rather than to come in as a cock- 
boat in the wake of British man-of- 
war;" that the reply to Eussia and the 
instructions to Eush in England must be 
part of a comhined system of polirij. 
" The ground that I wish to take," he 
said, " is that of earnest remonstrance 
against the interference of European 
powers by force with South America, but 
to disclaim all interference on our part 
with Europe; to make an American cause 
and adhere inftexihhj to that." And when, 
on December 2, 1823, Presiilent Monroe 
submitted his annual message to Con- 



510 



riiOM COLONY TO WOKLI) POWER. 



gress, voicing for the first time, officially, 
the political sentiments on those subjects 
which have since borne his name, it was 
noted that in practiea-Uy every case he 
had adopted the idea, if not the phrase- 
ology, of his Secretary of State. As a part 
of his review of our relations with Russia, 
the President, in his message, said: "In 
the discussion to which this interest [the 
rights of the United States on the north- 
west coast of America] has given rise, 
and in the arrangements by which they 
may terminate, the occasion has been 
judged proper for asserting, as a principle 
in which llie rii/hls and inferesis of (be 
United t^liitcs are involved, thnt Ihc 
American Continents, by the free and in- 
dependent condition which they have 
as^;umcd and maintained, are hence- 
furlh nut to he considered as subjects 
for future colonization hy any Euro- 
pean powers." Referring' next to the 
" Holy Alliance," the President said : 
" We owe it, therefore, to candor and 
to the amicable relations existing be- 
tween the United States and those powers, 
to declare tiint tve shonhl consider any at- 
tempt on tlieir part to extend their sy-stem 
to any portion of this hemisphere as dan- 
gerous to our peace and safety. With the 
existing colonies or dependencies of any 
European power w-e have not interfered 
and shall not interfere. But with the gov- 
ernments w'ho have declared their inde- 
pendence and maintained it, and whosc- 
indepcndence we have, on great considera- 
tion and on just principles, acknowledged. 
tve could not view any interposition for 
the purpose of oppres.'iiny them or con- 
trollini; in any other manner their destiny 
hy anil European Poiver, in any other 
liyht than as the manifestation of an un- 
friendly ilisposition toward the United 
S'iaies. Our policy in regard to Europe, 
which was adopted at an early stage of 
the wars which have so long agitated that 
quarter of the globe, nevertheless remains 
the same, ^vhieh is not to interfere in the 
internal concerns of any of its powers: to 
consider the government de facto as the 
legitimate government for us ; to cultivate 
friendly relations with it. and to preserve 



those relations by a frank, finn and manly 
policy; meeting in all insta7ices the just 
claims of every power, submitting to in- 
juries from none. But in regard to these 
continents circumstances are eminently 
and conspicuously different. It is impos- 
silAe thai the Allied Powers should extend 
their political system to any portion of 
either continent without endangering our 
peace and happiness: nor can anyone be- 
lieve that our Southern brethren, if left 
to themselves, would adopt it of their own 
accord. It is c^iually impossible, there- 
fore, that we should behold such inter- 
position, in any form, with indifference." 
Such is the text of the JVIonroe Doctrine 
in the words of its propounder; it has 
however, been more conveniently and 
briefly summed up under three heads, as 
follows: 

1. Xo more European Colonies on 
either of the American Con- 
tinents; 
II. The United States will not inter- 
fere in the internal concerns of 
any European power; 
III. " In regard to those continents 
(North and South America) cir- 
cumstances are eminently and 
conspicuously different ; " and if 
any European power attempts at 
any future time to extend its 
political system to any part of 
this hemisphere " for the pur- 
pose of oppressing " the nations 
or " contrnlling in any other 
manner their destiny." the 
United States will interfere. 

Tlie message was most cordially re- 
i-rived hy the people of the United States, 
and its positions undoubtedly won im- 
mediate approval. The effect in England 
was quite as marked as here at home. 
( 'anning. though not at all in accord with 
tbe part of the doctrine restricting the 
rights of the European governments to 
colonize on the western hemisphere, was 
so much relieved by th(> effects of the pro- 
nouncement on the IToly Alliance that for 
the time, and publicly, he heartily ap- 
jiroved the whole message. The great 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONROE DOCTRINE — 1895. 511 



Brougham exultingly declared that " the 
question with regard to South America 
is now disposed of, or nearly so, for an 
event has recently happened than which 
no event has dispensed greater joy, exulta- 
tion, and gratitude over all the freemen of 
Europe; that event, which is decisive of 
the subject in respect of South America, 
is the message of the President of the 
United States to Congress." The English 
press, too, gave the message most compli- 
mentary attention and sympathetic criti- 
cism. In his volume of essays entitled 
" With the Eathers," Professor McMaster 
has reproduced several leading editorial 
notices bearing upon the matter and in- 
fluence of President !Monroe"s address, 
from which we quote briefly. Under date 
of December 24, 1823, the editor of the 
London Courier said : " The si"ieech of the 
President of the United States is, in all 
its bearings, a document of more than 
usual importance. . . . The question 
of the independence and recognition of 
the South American States may now be 
considered at rest. Great Britain has, as 
\^-e liave repeatedly shown, acknowledged 
their independence, de facto; and the 
T'nited States, their nearest neighbors, 
have not only acknowledged it, but have 
given a bold and manly notice to the con- 
tinental powers that they shall treat ' any 
interposition with a view of oppressing or 
controlling them in any matmer as a man- 
ifestation of an unfriendly disposition 
toward themselves, and as dangerous to 
their peace and safety;' in other words, 
they shall view it as affording them just 
ground for war. After so clear and ex- 
plicit a warning, there is not one of the 
continental powers, we suppose, that will 
risk a war with the United States. . . . 
Thus, then, we repeat that the question 
may be considered to be set at rest ; we 
shall hear no more of a Congress to settle 
tlie fate of the South American States." 
On the same date the editor of the Lon- 
don Moi-ning Chronicle said: "The 
American papers received yesterday eon- 
tain the accounts of the opening of Con- 
jvress and the message of the President of 
the United States. The commuuication 



of the chief office-bearer of the great Re- 
public to the Legislature at this critical 
period, — when the ambition of Kings, not 
satisfied with the calamity which it has 
occasioned in Europe, threatens to re- 
kindle the flames of war throughout the 
western hemisphere — was looked forward 
to with the utmost anxiety. It is worthy 
of the occasion and of the people destined 
to occupy so large a s^iace in the future 
history of the world. Wluit a contrast he- 
twcen ilie manly plainness of this state 
paper and the Mnchiavelism and hypoc- 
risy of Hie declaration of the manifestoes 
of the Governments of this part of the 
world! . . . The siicech of the Presi- 
dent of the United States, so full of wis- 
dom and just ideas, has, however, had 
more effect on the opinions of the leaders 
in the national securities than the abun- 
dance of money or the changed policy of 
Eranee, for in it they see a sufficient guar- 
antee for the maintenance of the freedom 
of the American Continent." 

Under the date of Januai-y 3, 1824, the 
editor of the Liverpool Advertiser re- 
ferred in the following graceful and ap- 
preciative language not only to the Presi- 
dent's political attitude, but to the general 
conditions in the country as set forth in 
the message: "By one short passage in 
it is set at rest, we dare presume, what- 
ever may have been in agitation by the 
Continental Allies in reference to the late 
Spanish possessions in America. There 
will be no attempt made, it may be con- 
fidently affirmed, to interfere with th(> 
present condition of those countries when 
it is known that such interference woul<l 
be viewed by the United States as a just 
cause of war, on her part, with any power 
attempting such interference. 

"In regard to the power, prosperity and 
resources of the nation herself, also, the 
language of the speech is very interest- 
ing; her revenue, it is affirmed, will on the 
first of the year exceed her expenditures 
by not less than nine million dollars. ITer 
population is estimated at ten millions, 
and every branch of industry, every 
source of 'revenue, wealth, and jiower is 
flourishing. 



31: 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



" While in licr ijower aud resouret's, as 
they are illustrated in this speech, the na- 
tion of the United States exhibits the 
vigor of ripe years, slie, in tliose senti- 
ments of active humanity seems, to our 
tiiouglit, to preserve the fresh feeling of 
youth, and not to be wholly engrossed, as 
older States arc, in the pursuit or sup- 
port of purely selfish interests. And we 
have thus a pleasure from contemplating 
her less as that metaphysical, insentient 
thing, a State, than as an actual human 
and feeling being." 

The editor of the Paris Etoile, the min- 
isterial organ of the French government, 
however, did not receive the President's 
words so graciously. " Mr. Monroe," he 
said, " who is not a sovereign, who lias 
himself told us that he is only the iirst 
delegate of the people, has taken in his 
message the tone of a powerful monarch 
whose armies and fleets are ready to go 
forth on the first signal. He does more; 
he prescribes to the potentates of Europe 
the conduct they are to pursue in certain 
circumstances if they do not wish to incur 
his displeasure. Such is the prohibition 
which he issues against their ever think- 
ing of any now colonization in the two 
Americas. Mr. Monroe is the temporary 
President of a Republic situated on the 
Eastern Continent of North America. 
This Republic is hminded on- the soulli hi/ 
the possessions of the King of Spain, and 
on the north by those of the King of 
England. Its independence has only been 
acknowledged for forty years; by what 
title, then, are the two Americas to be 
under his innnediate dependence, from 
Hudson's Bay to Cape Horn ? , , . 
It was reserved for Mr. Monroe to show us 
a dictator armed with a right of superior- 
ity over the whole of the new world. Ac- 
cording to the political system he would 
establish it would not be permitted to 
Spain to make the least effort to re-enter 
on the territory which for three centuries 
she has possessed. . . . England would 
require his previous consent, if it suited 
her interest to make any new militarv or 
political establishment either in Canada 
or Nova Scotia. And vet, Mr. Monroe's 



message contains phrases indirectly hostile 
to the policy and ambition of the Great 
Powers of Europe ! " 

To this snarling criticism a most spir- 
ited rejoinder came from an unex- 
pected source, — Tlie London Times, whose 
editor on January 16, 1824, handled the 
editorial position of the The Etoile with 
great earnestness, as well as witli a char- 
acteristic logic and sarcasm. " A direct 
attempt is made," he said, '' by the Etoile 
to sever the Chief Magistrate of a power- 
ful and enlightened nation from the body 
of a state which he represents. ' Not a 
sovereign ! ' No, but he is the acknowl- 
edged — the elected head aud organ of a 
great sovereign jieople — one whose ele\'a- 
tion cost his country neither a drop of 
blood nor a widow's tear, nor the beg- 
gary or banishment, the persecution or 
corruption, of a single human being 
among- ten millions of men. . . . He 
calls ifr. Monroe a ' temporary presi- 
dent ; ' but is the power he exercises a 
temporary power? It is, on the contrary, 
a prerogative which never dies, let who 
will be its trustee for the moment; and 
which, as Mr. Monroe has on this occasion 
(nnployed it, has its sanction in the heart 
of evcr.v citizen among those millions who 
confided it to his hands. Will the Etoile 
venture to match the durability of any 
despotic throne in Europe with that of 
the President's chair in North America ? 
If so, we tell him that he is likely to lose 
his wager." 

As has been previously intimated, 
Mr. Adams, when Canning first pro- 
posed, through Mr. Rush, luiited ac- 
tion by Great Britain and the United 
States upon the questions which con- 
stitute the Monroe Doctrine, suspected 
the sincerity of the British premier, 
believing that he had in view the great 
increase of English influence in af- 
fairs of the American Continents, as a 
result of principles enunciated and risks 
assumed by the TTnited States alone. 
Hence his detennined attitude not " to 
come in as a cock-boat in the wake of the 
British man-of-war;" an attitude whose 
wisdom Canning's subsequent position 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE — MONROE DOCTRINE — 1895. 513 



emphatically affirmetl. On December 17, 
1824, tlie Prime Minister wrote: "Span- 
ish America is free; and if we do not mis- 
manage our matters sadly, she is English. 
and novus saeclonim nascifur ordo." Also 
in 1825, shortly after the British g-ovorn- 
ment had recognized the independence of 
Mexico, Canning declared that " the great 
danger of the time — a danger which the 
jiolicy of the European system would have 
fostered — was a division of the world into 
Eurox)ean and American, republican and 
monarchical ; a league of wornout govern- 
ments on the one hand and of youthful 
and stirring nations, with the United 
States at their head, on the other. We 
slip in hetween, and plant ourselves in 
Mexico. The United States have gotten 
the start of us in vain, and we link once 
more America to Europe." 

The position taken by the young nation 
of the United States in proclaiming such 
a doctrine under circumstances then ex- 
isting, is, we think, without parallel in 
histoi-y. Perhaps the situation itself was 
equally unparalleled. As the unforeseen 
result of European political movements, 
within a very few years it had come about 
that every people of the western hemi- 
sphere had been ranged on the side of 
representative government as opposed to 
absolutism ; and wise statesmanship fore- 
."^aw the infinite possibilities which the 
situation offered for the culture and de- 
velopment of popular rights and privileges 
unhampered by constant friction witli the 
]irejudices and reactionary thought and 
influences of despotic institutions. But 
that a nation so weak physically, and oc- 
cupying or controlling so insignificant a 
part of the great territorN' set apart, should 
have the temerity to defy all the peoples 
of the Old World, backed by great and 
trained armies, all of whom had tasted of 
lhc fruits of colonization in the western 
hemisphere and were hungry for more 
plunder; that this young knight whose 
virgin sword had hardly yet been fleshed 
should cry " stand back ! " and " hands 
off ! " to the world's most experienced 
connnanders and statesmen verges so 
closely vipon the confines of the sublime 
33 



and the ridiculous that one hardly knows 
in which category to place it, even though 
seventy years of a more or less strenuous 
application of the jarinciples of the Mon- 
roe Doctrine has proved that it was an act 
of such exalted statesmanship as to stamp 




GEORGE CANNING. 

its real origin as divine rather than 
human. One student of the causes that 
led to the formulation of the doctrine, 
and of the condition and character of the 
people that led to its avowal, will see only 
David, " a youth, ruddy and of a fair 
countenance,'' strong in the realization of 
the great truth that " One with God is a 
majority," defying the insolent and 
mighty Philistine and all the enemies of 
the living God ; while another, less rev- 
erent, perhaps, may rather see Don 
Quixote, inspired with all the noble sen- 
timents of chivalry, as, mounted upon his 
faithful Rosinante, with .spear in place, 
he goes forth to defy every form of error, 
and valiantly enters the lists to redress 
all wrong and injustice. Certain it is 
that for more than seventy years after its 
promulgation a place somewhere between 
these two extremes wa.s given to the Mon- 
roe Doctrine by all who, for any reason, 
were brought into intimate relation with 



5U 



FRO:Sl COLOXY TO WOliLD POWEE. 



its prc'cc'iits. As amiounced, the doctrine 
was simply a dictum of one man, and of 
one, tlimifili I'vesident of the United 
States, so far as that oi)inion was con- 
cerned, possessed of no more power to en- 
force its proposals than any ordinary citi- 
zen. This position was fully realized by 
all men connected with public affairs, and 
an effort was at once made to f;ivc to the 
Doctrine an un(iuestioned standiufr by 
having' its jirineiplcs embodied in a Joint 
Kesolution of the House and Senate. 
Henry Clay was then at the zenith of his 
jinwer, and was speaker of the House. 
He undertook the leadership in the move- 
niiiit. But it was not far from a presi- 
dential campaign, with many prominent 
and earnest aspirants for presidential 
honors in the field. Clay was one of the 
most conspicuous; and his rivals. — 
Adams, Jackson, Crawford, Calhoun, and 
their friends, — did not propose to let their 
great antagonist gain political cajiital by 
securing the enactment of any measures 
that would exalt the ilonroe ilictum to the 




JAMES K. POLK. 

higher status nf a Xationnl policy, ac- 
cepted and indorsed by the National Leg- 
islature, lender such conditions Clay 
could secure so little support for his 
measure that ho was forced to table it. 
It has often been charged that as a result 



of this experience Clay abandoned his 
support of Monroe's policy. But events 
that occurred only the next year prove the 
fallacy of this charge. John Quincy 
Ailams became President in 1825, and im- 
mediately appointed Clay as his Secretary 
of State. Very early in the Administra- 
tion's course rumors became current that 
France was planning to seize Cuba and 
Porto Pico as, in some sense, a return for 
her services in restoring the monarchy in 
Spain. Clay immediately instructed the 
American Minister to France to investi- 
gate the matter and to make clear to the 
French Government " that we would not 
consent to the occupation of those 
islands by any other European Power 
than Spain, under any circumstances 
whatever." 

As a general proposition it may be said 
that for seventy j'ears the Monroe Doc- 
trine existed as a basic theory for the 
relations of the United States with f<jr- 
eign powers, but to be used when, and 
to what extent, individual conditions 
might demand. At different times the 
same statesmen took different views of its 
scope and purpose. Polk, while a member 
of Congress from Tennessee, in a mem- 
orable speech delivered in 1826, said : 
" When the message of the late President 
of the United States was communciated 
to Congress in 1823, it ivas viewed, as it 
sliinild have been, as the mere expression 
of opinion of the executive, submitted to 
the consideration and deliberation of Con- 
gress, and designed probably to produce 
an effect upon the councils of the Holy 
Alliance, in relation to their supposed in- 
tention to interfere in the war between 
Spain and her former Colonies. That 
effect it probably had an agency in pro- 
ducing, and if so, it has performed its 
office. The President has no power to bind 
the Nation bi/ suclt a pledc;e." But when 
later Polk had been elected President by 
the party whose slogan was " The whole 
of Oregon, or none; fifty-four forty or 
fight," and the troubles with England 
over the Oregon boundary assumed a 
very serious aspect, the President confi- 
dentlv called forth all the dormant 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONROE DOCTRINE— 1895. 515 



powers of the Monroe Doctrine, and de- 
clared to the English government that 
" in the existing circumstances of the 
world, the present is deemed a proper oc- 
casion to reiterate and reaffirm the prin- 
ciple avowed by Mr. Monroe, and to state 
my cordial concurrence in its wisdom and 
sound policy. E.xisting rights of every 
European nation should be respected, but 
it is due alike to our safety and our in- 
terest that the efficient protection of our 
laws should be extended over our whole 
territory, and that it should be distinctly 
announced to the world as our settled 
policy that no future European colony or 
dominion shall, with our consent, be 
))lanted on any part of the North Ameri- 
can Continent." Polk further applied the 
Doctrine in its fullest force to the case 
of Yucatan. There a war had broken out 
between the Indians and tlie whites, who, 
in desperate straits, appealed to England, 
Spain, and the United States for aid, of- 
fering in return the full sovereignty of 
the peninsula. In 1848 the President said 
in his message to Congress: "While it is 
not my purpose to recommend the adop- 
tion of any measure with a view to the 
acquisition of the ' dominion and sover- 
eignty ' over Yucatan, yet, according to 
our established policy, we could not con- 
sent to a transfer of this ' dominion and 
sovereignty' to either Spain, Great 
Britain, or any other European power. 
In the language of President Monroe, in 
his message of December, 1823, 'we should 
consider any attempt on their part to ex- 
tend their system to any portion of this 
hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and 
safety.' " 

For forty years after Mexico had 
achieved independence her social and po- 
litical affairs were in the most chaotic 
condition. Since the acknowledgment of 
lier independence in 1821, there had not 
been a month's peace. Thirty-six different 
governments had been set up and over- 
thrown within thirty-three years. So 
disperate had conditions then become that 
France, England, and Spain decided upon 
armed interference. Unfortunately the 
American people were just then, 1860, too 



nuirh occupied with their own affairs to 
follow closely those of their neighbors. As 
is well known the Allies landed at Vera 
Cruz; but it becoming evident that it was 
Napoleon's purpose to establish a French 
Empire in Mexico, England and Spain in- 
dignantly withdrew from the undertaking. 
To the general public the apparently un- 
opposed invasion of Mexico seemed the 
death-blow to the Monroe Doctrine. As 
a writer in the London Times, in 1862, 
said : " Napoleon has done a real service 
to the world in extinguishing the Monroe 
Doctrine." And a writer in a leading 
Review said : " The occupation of Mexico 
is the extinction of the Monroe Doctrine. 
That doctrine, it must be owned, is both 
absurd and arrogant in theory and prac- 
tice." But again it soon became evident 
that the principle was neither dead nor 
forgotten, only dormant. Even during 
the terrible stress and strain of our civil 
war. Secretary of State Seward repeatedly 
called the attention of the French govern- 
ment to the fact that the people of the 
T'^nited States would not recognize any 
government in Mexico which was not the 
free choice of the people of Mexico. All 
jirotests were unavailing, however, until 
in the summer of 1865, General Sheridan 
with fifty thousand veteran troops took up 
a position on the Rio Grande to enforce 
by arms, if necessary, for the first time 
the principles of the Monroe Doctrine. 
Concuri-cntly with this demonstration of 
force, the French government was again 
and finally notified that the people of 
every State on the American Continent 
have a right to a Republican government 
if they choose, and that any attempt by a 
foreign power to prevent the enjoyment 
of such institutions is, in its effect, an- 
tagonistic to the free and popular govern- 
ment existing in the United States." As 
Napoleon read these despatches in the 
light reflected from fifty thousand bayo- 
nets glistening in the Southern sun, a 
new view of the situation dawned upon 
him, and the French troops were with- 
drawn from Mexico in 1866, the Emperor 
leaving his unfortunate tool, Maximilian, 
to his wretched fate. 



316 



FKOM COLOKY TO WOKLl) POWER. 



In 1870, President Grant somewhat en- 
larged the popular view of the Doctrine 
lliough not, perhaps, its inherent prin- 
ciples, when in his message to Congress on 
May 28, 1870, relating to San Domingo, 
he said : " The Doctrine promulgated by 
President Monroe has been adhered to by 
all political parties, and I now deem it 
proper lo assert the equalhj important prin- 
ciple that hereafter no territory on this 
Continent sliall he regarded as suhject of 
transfer to a European power." And the 
place and force given to the Doctrine dur- 
ing the days following our civil war can, 
l^erhaps, be shown in no way better than 
by quoting the statement of Secretary' of 
State Fish, under date of July 14, 1870. 
He says : " The United States stand sol- 
emnly committed by repeated declara- 
tions and repeated acts to this doctrine 
and its application to the affairs of 
tins Continent. In his message to 
the two Houses of Congress at the 
commencement of the present session, the 
President, following the teachings of all 
our history, said that ' the existing de- 
pendencies are no longer regarded as sub- 
ject to transfer from one European power 
tri another. When the present relation of 
colonies ceases, they are to become inde- 
pendent powers, exercising the right of 
choice and of self-control in the deter- 
mination of their future condition and 
relation with other powers.' This policy 
is not a policy of aggression ; but it op- 
poses the creation of European dominion 
on American soil, or its transfer to other 
European powers, and it tools hopefuUi/ 
to the time when, hy the voluntari/ de- 
parture of European governments from 
this Continent and the adjaceitt islands, 
America shall he wholly American." 

Not a little disturbance in political 
circles in the United States followed the 
proposal by a French company to dig an 
Isthmian canal to connect the Atlantic 
and Pacific oceans. Eepresentativcs Burn- 
side in 1870, and Crapo in 1880, in- 
troduced resolutions in the House, declar- 
ing that the American people adhered to 
the Monroe Doctrine, and could only view 
the purpose of the Powers to build a canal 



across the Isthmus of Panama as an evi- 
dence of an unfriendly disposition toward 
the United States. This application of 
the Doctrine to commercial undertakings 
was novel, and seemed very far-fetched. 
As Mr. Blaine showed clearly, however, 
it was not to the digging of the canal 
that such objections could be raised; but 
capital so interested must look for pro- 
tection to one or more of the great Power.s 
of the world, and this country could never 
allow any European power to extend such 
protection. 

The first reference to the Monroe 
Doctrine in party platforms seems to be 
that which the Democratic Convention 
that nominated Buchanan for the presi- 
dency, at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 18.56, in- 
serted in its platform, in the following 
form : " Resolved, That our geographi- 
cal and political position with reference 
to the other states of this continent, no 
less than the interest of our commerce 
and the development of our growing 
power, requires that we should hold as 
sacred the principles involved in the 
Monroe Doctrine; their bearing and im- 
port admit of no misconstruction ; they 
should be applied with unbending rigid- 
ity." The next reference of this char- 
acter was made by the Republican Con- 
vention which convened at Baltimore in 
1S(U, and renominated President Lin- 
coln. Maximilian was then nominally 
Emperor of Mexico, supported by French 
arms. The Convention adopted the fol- 
lowing: ''Resolved, That we approve the 
position taken by the government that 
the people of the United States can never 
regard with indifference the attempt of 
any European power to overthrow by 
forc-e, or to supplant by fraud, the insti- 
tution of any republican government on 
the western hemisphere ; and that they 
will view with extreme jealousy, as 
menacing to the peace and independence 
of their own country, the efforts of any 
such power to obtain new footholds for 
monarchical governments, sustained b.y 
foreign military force, in near proximity 
to the United States." 

Neither party seems to have thought 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDAKY DISPUTE— MONEOE DOCTEINE — 1895. 517 



that the Doctrine needed further indorse- 
ment until 1896, after a Democratic 
president had somewhat cleared the at- 
mosphere by his vigorous action in the 
Venezuela boundary case. Then the 
Republican convention inserted the fol- 
lowing plank in its party platform, which 
is not without interest in view of the 
events that were so soon to follow : " We 
reassert the Monroe Doctrine in its full 
extent, and we reaffirm the right of the 
United States to give the Doctrine effect 
by responding to the appeal of any 
American states for friendly intervention, 
in case of European encroachment. We 
have not interfered and shall not inter- 
fere with the existing possessions of any 
European power in this hemisphere, but 
these possessions must not on any pre- 
text be extended. We hopefully look for- 
ward to the eventual withilrawal of the 
European powers from this hemisphere, 
and to the ultimate union of all the 
English-speaking part of the continent by 
the free consent of its inhabitants." On 
the other hand the Democratic party at 
its convention of the same year simply 
modestly asserted that " The Monroe 
Doctrine, as originally declared and in- 
terpreted by succeeding presidents, is a 
permanent part of the foreign policy of 
the United States, and must at all times 
be maintained." 

But before another presidential election 
was due, great changes had occurred. 
The Monroe Doctrine consists of two 
equally important and equally distinct 
IJarts, — non-interference on the part of 
the United States in any old-world 
affairs or politics, and a similar non-in- 
terference of the old-world powers in the 
affairs of the American continents. If 
either feature haid been more urgently or 
strenuously maintained than the other, 
from the da.ys of Washington and Jeffer- 
son to those of Lincoln. Grant, and Cleve- 
land, it was the position of non-inter- 
ference, non-entanglemenf, in old-world 
affairs. But in the period between 180() 
and 1900 the Republican administration 
became elaborately entangled in such old- 
world affairs, notwithstanding the em- 



phatic declaration in its platform of 1896 
that it would not do so. Consequently 
we are not surprised at the unostentatious 
tribute paid to the Monroe Doctrine in 
the party's platform of 1900, where 
under the shadow of the plank relating 
to the South African war is worked in 
the following ringing pledge of loyalty : 
" We assert our steadfast adherence to 
the policy announced in the .Monroe 
Doctrine." 

But by far the most important event 
tending to fix the status of the Monroe 
Doctrine was the position taken by Presi- 
dent Cleveland in 1895 regarding the 
Venezuela Boundary controversy. It is 




GUOVEH CLLVLLANU. 



unquestionably true that the English na- 
tion has long had a most unsavory repu- 
tation as to territorial acquisition, the 
national lust for more lands too often 
blunting the honor and warping the con- 
science of the people as to the conditions 
under which expansion is achieved. In 
1821 a motion was introduced in the 
House of Representatives of the United 
States looking toward the establishment 
of a settlement on the Columbia river. 
Canning, who was then the British minis- 
ter to the United States, in an interview 
with Mr. Adams, our Secretary of State, 
protested against any such action, where- 



518 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



upon, Mr. Adams challenffed any claim 
of England to any part of the shores of 
the Pacific. "I do not know," said he, 
" what you claim nor what you do not 
claim. You claim India; you claim 
Africa ; you claim — " "A piece of the 
moon, perhaps," interrupted Canning-. 
" No," said Adams, " I have not heard 
that you claim exclusively any part of 
the moon ; but there is not a spot on this 
habitable globe that I could ajfirm you 
do not claim ; and there is none which you 
may not claim with as much color of 
right as you can have to the Columbia 
river or its mouth." Mr. Adams knew 
his antagonist and spoke for a powerful 
nation ; Venezuela had no Adams, and 
was not the United States. About 1814, 
as a result of one of the many readjust- 
ments of national lines and possessions 
which grew out of the Napoleonic wars, 
England acquired title from Holland to 
territory described in the treaty as " the 
Cape of Good Hope, and the establish- 
ments of Demarara, Essequibo, and Ber- 
bice." No limits nor bounds were men- 
tioned, nor (lops it appear that any defi- 
nite boundaries had ever been set to " the 
establishments of Demarara, Essequibo, 
and Berbice," which have since been 
known as British Guiana. Venezuela 
declared her independence of Spain in 
1810, and a few years later united with 
two other of Spain's revolted colonies to 
form the Colombian Federal Union, 
which was recognized by the United 
States in 1822. By the dissolution of 
this Union in 1836, Venezuela again be- 
came a separate and independent repub- 
lic, being promjitly recognized as such by 
the United States, and other powers, 
though Spain delayed her recognition 
until 1845, when she ceded to Venezuela 
by the treaty the same territory which as 
an independent republic Venezuela had 
owned and possessed since 1810. But 
neither in the treaty nor in any other 
documents are the boundaries described 
othei-wise, or more explicitly, than " as 
being the same as those which marked 
the ancient vice-royalty and captaincy- 
general of New Granada and Venezuela 



in the year 1810." As the ill-defined 
territory of British Guiana adjoined on 
the west the equally undetermined countiy 
of Venezuela, it will be readily seen 
that the situation was rich in possibili- 
ties for quarrels and misunderstandings, 
as well as for the gradual encroachment 
of the stronger upon the territory claimed 
by the weaker power. 

In 1835 the British government com- 
missioned a young man, Robert Schom- 
burgk, to explore the strip of country ob- 
tained from Holland. He completed his 
survey in 1839, and took the ground in 
his report that, as Great Britain owned 
the Essequibo river, she was entitled to all 
the territory drained by its tributaries. 
He accorilingly drew a line around the 
sources of the rivers which enter the 
Essequibo from the west, and urged Great 
Britain to claim the drainage basin of 
that river. This she did, and in 1840 sent 
Schomburgk to mark out on the ground 
the line he had traced on paper. This 
course of Great Britain, and the mark- 
ings and boundary signs of Schomburgk, 
aroused the Venezuelans and, in 1841, a 
protest was made to the British govern- 
ment by the Venezuelan minister. This 
was the beginning of the boundary dis- 
putes between the two governments 
which were continued until 1895. with 
only an occasional cessation. It is, of 
course, impossible here to enter into the 
details of this long drawn out discussion, 
during which England constantly evaded 
or refused all of Venezuela's urgent re- 
quests for arbitration, while all the time 
allowing and encouraging British settlers 
to take up lands within the disputed zone; 
until in 1881, Lord Granville, the British 
foreign secretary, made the astounding re- 
ply to one of the requests of the Vene- 
zuelan minister, that in the course of five 
and thirty years which had elapsed since 
Alx'rdeen drew the line so many settlers 
had gone into the disputed country under 
tlie belief that it belonged to Great 
Britain, it was now impossible to deprivo 
them " of the benefits of British rule." 
Lord Granville then proposed a new line 
far to the west of those laid down by 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDAEY DISPUTE— MONKOE DOCTRINE — 1895. 519 



Schomburgk and Aberdeen. When one 
considers that, as the various despatches 
and notes of the Ministers show, Lord 
Granville's closed land was the very land 
which, in 1850, Great Britain admitted 
was in dispute, and which slifi solemnly 
declared and pledged her word she did 
not intend " to occupy or encroach 
upon ; " the course of the British govern- 
ment becomes clearly one of persistent 
aggression of a powerful state against 
the rights of one too weak to enforce its 
protests, with the evident anticipation 
that Venezuela would be goaded to some 
overt act to protect her rights, when the 
whole country would naturally become 
the prey of the powerful aggressor. It 
should be borne in mind that the area 
which was now under dispute, but which 
Great Britain claimed arbitrarily, was 
no insignificant area, but covered 109,- 
000 square miles, — a territory thirteen 
times larger than the State of Massa- 
chusetts. More than that, the latest ag- 
gressions of the English included the 
mouth of the Orinoco river, which they 
Iiad begun to fortify. This, one of the 
largest rivers of the world, is the natural 
eonnnercial highway of Venezuela, it-s 
general course being from west to east, 
and the whole of it lying within what 
had hitherto been the undisputed terri- 
tory of Venezuela. With its mouth in 
the control of a hostile power, Venezuela 
naturally became helpless and all possi- 
bility of growth or development was at 
once destroyed. It is easy to see, there- 
fore, that the questions at issue between 
the two countries, while merely side 
issues of no serious moment to England, 
involved the very life of the people of 
Venezuela. Einally, gold having been 
discovered in parts of the disimted terri- 
tory, with the result that more English 
settlers were constantly going intd the 
country. Lord Salisbui-j' bluntly asserted 
the absolute right of Great Britain to all 
the territory within the Schomburgk line, 
graciously consenting to arbitrate as to 
the country west of it, regarding the 
ownership of which there had heretofore 
been no suggestion of a question. Vene- 



zuela, however, persisted in her position 
that all or none should be arbitrated ; and 
as Great Britain began to fortify the ter- 
ritory included within the agreement of 
1850, Venezuela broke oS all diplomatic 
relations with Great Britain in 1887. 

As early as 1876 the government of 
Venezuela had laid its ease before the 
government at Washing-ton, and there- 
after, from time to time, sought advice 
and aid from the State Department of 
the United States, " the most powerful 
and the oldest of the Republics of the 
new continent, and called on to lend to 
others its powerful moral support in dis- 
putes with European Nations." Repeat- 
edl.v our representative at the Court of 
St. -Tames had expressed to the British 
g-overnment the interest of the United 
States in Venezuela's petitions, and 
repeatedly arbitration had been urged by 
our ministers ; and iinallj', previous to the 
rupture between the two countries, Mr. 
Bayard, our Minister to Great Britain, 
formally tendered to the English govern- 
ment, on February 8, 1887, the good offices 
of the United States to i^romote an amica- 
ble settlement of the pending controversy, 
and otfered our arbitration, if acceptable 
to both parties. A few days later. Lord 
Salisbury, on behalf of Great Britain, re- 
plied that the attitude which had been 
taken by the President of the Venezu- 
elan Republic precluded her Majesty's 
government from submitting the ques- 
tion at that time to arbitration. 

In his message to Congress on Decem- 
ber 3, 1894, the President reviewed the 
whole situation and fully advised Con- 
gress as to what steps had been taken, 
stating further : " I shall renew the 
efforts heretofore made to bring about a 
restoration of diplomatic relations be- 
tween the disputants and to induce a 
reference to arbitration, — a resort which 
Great Britain so conspicuously favors in 
princijole and respects in practice, and 
which is earnestly sought by her weaker 
adversary." And on February 22, 1895, 
a joint resolution was passed by both 
Houses of Congress earnestly recom- 
mending to both parties in interest the 



520 



FKO.M COLONY TO WOKLD I'OWLi;. 



ri'csident's suggestion ''that Oreat Bi-ita!n 
and Venezuela refer their dispute as to 
boundaries to friendly arbitration." 

In a lecture delivered at Princeton 
University upon the Venezuelan boundary 
controversy, and now published with 
other essays under the title of "Presi- 
dential Problems," President Cleveland 
has eiven his view of the situation at 




LORD SALISBIKY. 

that time. " Durinu- a jn-ridd of more 
than fourteen years,"' he says, " our 
government, assuming the character of a 
mutual and disinterested friend of Imth 
countries had, with vaiying assiduity, 
tendered its good offices to bring- about 
a pacific and amicable settlement of this 
boundary controversy, only to be repelled 
with more or less civility by Great 
Britain. We had seen her pretensions in 
the disputed regions wideai and extend 
in such manner and upon such pretexts 
as seemed to constitute an actual or 
threatened violation of a doctrine which 
our nation long ago established, declar- 
ing that the American continents are not 



to be considered subjects for future colon- 
ization by any European power 
England ha<l finally and unmistakably de- 
clared that all the territoi-y embraced 
within the Schomburgk line was indis- 
putably hers. Venezuela presented a 
claim to territory within the same limits. 
whi<-h could not be said to lack strong 
support. England had absolutely refused 
to permit Venezuela's claim to be tested 
by arbitration; and Venezuela was utterly 
powerless to resist I)y force England's self- 
pronounced decree of ownership. If this 
decree was not justified by facts, and it 
should be enforced against the protest 
and insistence of Venezuela and should 
result in the possession and colonization 
of Venezuelan territory by Great Britain, 
it seemed quite plain that the American 
iloctrine which denies to European powers 
the colonization of any part of the 
American continent would be violated. 
Recreancy to a principle so fundamen- 
tally American as the Monroe Doctrine 
on the part of those charged with the ad- 
ministration of our government, was. of 
course, out of the question. Inasmuch, 
therefore, as all our efforts to avoid its 
assertion had miscarried, there was nofh- 
ing loft for us to do consistently with 
national honor but to take the place of 
Venezuela in the controversy, so far as 
that was necessary, in vindication of our 
American doctrine ... In the advanced 
condition of the dispute, sympathy with 
Venezuela and solicitude for her dis- 
tressed conditions could no longer con- 
stitute the motive power of our conduct, 
but these were to give way to the duty 
and obligation of protecting our own 
national rights." 

Interesting as they are, and novel in 
diplomatic intercourse, it is impossible 
in this place to consider in detail the 
documents that passed between the rep- 
resentatives of the United States and of 
(treat Britain relative to the situation. 
All this matter can be found in President 
Cleveland's work referred to above, and 
in works treating of the diplomatic re- 
lations of the United States. Suffice it 
to say that Secretary of State Olney pre- 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDAKY DISPUTE— MONEOE DOCTKIXE — 1805. 521 



pared a most exliaustive and learned pres- 
entation of tlie ease of the United 
States, whieli was submitted to the 
government of Great Britain. Of this 
state paper Mr. Cleveland says : " The 
Monroe Doctrine may be abandoned ; we 
may forfeit it by taking our lot with 
nations that expand by following un- 
American ways; we may outgrow it, as we 
seem to be outgrowing other things we 
once valued; or it may forever stand as 
a guaranty of protection and safety in 
our enjoyment of free institutions; but 
in no event will this American principle 
ever be better defined, better defended, or 
more bravely asserted than was done by 
Mr. Olney in this despatch." But in 
Lord Salisbury, Mr. Olney had a foeman 
worthy of his steel, and as men they were 
much alike. Not distinctly intellectual 
nor personally attractive, Salisbury was 
cool, hard-headed, and intensely Britiah. 
and knew the diplomatic history of his 
country as few of his contemporaries 
knew it; and his reply to Mr. Olney's 
despatch opened up the weak points of 
the American position, if they were weak, 
and analyzed as they had not been ana- 
lyzed before the imderlying principles of 
the Monroe Doctrine. " But the circum- 
stances with which President Monroe was 
dealing," said he, " and those to which 
the present American government is ad- 
dressing itself have very few features in 
common. Great Britain is imposing no 
'system' upon Venezuela, and is nut 
concerning herself in anyway with the 
nature of the political institutions under 
which the Venezuelans may prefer to live. 
But the British Empire and the Republic 
of Venezuela are neighbors, and they have 
differed for some time past, and continue 
to differ, as to the line by which their 
dominions are separated. It is a con- 
troversy with which the United States 
have no apparent concern . . . The dis- 
puted frontier of Venezuela has nothing to 
do with any of the questions dealt with by 
President Monroe." And again referring 
to the Monroe Doctrine he says : " It must 
always be mentioned with respect on ac- 
count of the distinguished statesman to 



whom it is due, and the great nation who 
have generally adopted it. But interiia- 
fional law is founded on the general con- 
sent of nations; and no statesman, how- 
ever eminent, and no nation, however 
powerful, are competent to insert into the 
code of inteimational law a novel prin- 
ciple which was never recognized before, 
and which has not since been accepted 
by the government of any other country. 
The United States have a right, like any 
other nation, to interpose in any contro- 
versy by which their own interests are 
affected; and they are the judge whether 
those interests are touched, and in what 
measure they should be sustained. But 
their rights are in no way streng-tliencd 
or extended by the fact that the contro- 
versy affects some territory which is 
called American." 




RICHARD OLXEV. 

On December 17. Is'Jo, Mr. Olney's 
despatch and Loril Salisbury's reply were 
submitted to Congress, accompanied by a 
message from the President, whose em- 
phatic and peremptory character startled 
the world, and seriously tried the faith 
and loyalty of Mr. Cleveland's staunchest 
Friends. EefeiTing to the Monroe Doc- 
trine the President said: "Without at- 



522 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



tempting extendeJ argument in reply to 
these (Lord Salisbury's) positions, it may 
not be amiss to suggest that the doctrine 
upon which we stand is strong- and 
sound, because its enforcement is impor- 
tant to our peace and safety as a nation, 
anil is essential to the integrity of our 
free institutions, and the tranquil main- 
tenance of our distinctive form of 
government. It U'cts inlcndpd in apply 
io errr/j sfage of our natiunal life, and 
cannot hecome ol/sohle trhile our Hrpuh- 
lic I'ndurff. If the linlaiice of jiower is 
justly a cause for jealous anxiety among 
the governments of the old world and a 
subject for our absolute noninterference, 
none the less is the observance of the 
Monroe Doctrine of vital concern to our 
people and government." Considering 
then the absolute refusal of the English 
govenimeut to arbitrate the questions at 
issue, the President suggested that there 
was but one course open to the govern- 
ment of the United States, and that was 
to determine for itself what the true line 
of division between Venezuela and British 
(iuiana should be, and then to act in ac- 
cordance with such definite knowledge; 
and to accomplish that end he advised the 
appointment of a commission, which 
should proceed to determine for the 
guidance of the American nation just 
wliat the right.s of the two antagonized 
countries were. " When such rejiort is 
made and accepted," he said, " it will, in 
my opinion, be the duti/ of the Unilfd 
States to resist hi/ ereri/ means in its 
power, as a willful aggression upon its 
rights and interests, the appropriation hii 
Great Britain of au/i lands or the exer- 
cise of governmenhil jurisdiction- over 
any territori/, wliicli, after investigation, 
we liitre delerniined of right helongs to 
Venezuela. In making these recommen- 
dations, I am falhi alive to the respon- 
sihility incurred, and keenly realize all 
the consequences that may follow. I am, 
nevertheless, finn in my conviction that 
■v\'hile it is a grievous thing to contem- 
jilate the two great English-speaking peo- 
ples of the world as being othenvise than 
friendlj' competitors in the onward march 



of civilization, and strenuous and worthy 
rivals in all the arts of peace, there is 
no calamity which a great nation can in- 
vito which equals that which follows a 
supine submission to wrong and in- 
justice, and the consequent loss of 
national self-respect and honor, beneath 
which are shielded and defended a x>eo- 
ple's safety and greatness." 

The recommendations of the President 
were acted upon with remarkable unan- 
imity and promptitude in Congress, a bill 
authorizing the appointment of tlie pro- 
posed commission and an appropriation 
of one hundred thousand dollars for the 
necessary expenses, being passed by the 
House on the day after the receipt of the 
message and by the Senate three days 
later. On January 1st follow'ing the 
President appointed these commissioners 
to act under the law : Associate Justice, 
D. J. Brewer, of the United States Su- 
preme Court ; R. H. Alvey, Ch. Justice 
of the Court of Appeals of the District 
of Columbia; Andrew D. White, Ex- 
United States Minister to Germany aiid 
to Russia ; D. C. Oilman, Presi<lent of 
Johns Hopkins University; and Hon. F. 
R. Coudert of New York, one of the 
highest authorities on Roman law. But 
the sentiment of the best Englishmen had 
been aroused and influences were brought 
to bear that caused the government of 
Great Britain to reconsider its position 
with the result that the atmosphere of 
the British foreigii office daily became 
more mellow, and arbitration constantly 
became more and more imminent. On 
February 27, 1S9G, in a note to Lord 
Salisbury, after speaking of arbitration 
as seeming to be " almost unanimously 
desired by both the United States and 
Great Britain," our Ambassador to Eng- 
land proposed an entrance forthwith upon 
negotiations at Washington to effect this 
purpose. On March 3d, Lord Salisbury 
replied concurring in the suggestion of 
the U^nited States government, and em- 
powering Sir Julian Pauncefote " to dis- 
cuss the question either with the repre- 
sentative of Venezuela or with the 
government of the United States, acting 



VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY DISPUTE— MONKOE DOCTRINE— 1895. 523 



as the friend of Venezuela." In the 
negotiations that followed England 
abandoned the position that the territory 
within the Schomburgk line should not 
be questioned, only insisting that, what- 
ever the award, English settlers long in 
occupancy of the disputed territory 
should have their rights scrupulously con- 
sidered. To meet these claims it was 
agi'eed that adverse holdings or prescrip- 
tion during a period of fifty years should 
make a good title. By the Provisional 
Treaty between Great Britain and Vene- 
zuela of February, 1897, it had been 
agreed that the Court of Arbitration 
should consist of five members, — two to 
be named by and act on behalf of Great 
Britain; two to act on behalf of Vene- 
zuela, one of whom was to be named by 
the President of Venezuela and the other 
by the Justices of the Supreme Court of 
the United States; while the fifth, who 
should act as the president of the court, 
should be named by the other four, or in 
default of their action or agreement, by 
King Oscar of Sweden and Norway. The 
arbitrators named by England were Lord 
Chief Justice Russell and Sir Richard 
Collins, one of the Justices of her Maj- 
esty's Supreme Court of Judicature ; on 
behalf of Venezuela, the president of that 
country named Chief Justice Fuller, of 
tjie Supreme Court of the United States, 
wliile the Justices of that Court selected 
the lion. D. J. Brewer; and these distin- 
guished jurists elected as the fifth mem- 
lier .of the court and its presiding officer, 
lion. Frederic de iilartens. Privy Coun- 
cillor and Permanent Member of the 
Council of ilinistry of Foreign Affairs 
of Russia. By the third article of the 
Treaty establishing the Tribunal and its 
powers, it was provided : " The Tribunal 
shall investigate and ascertain the extent 
of the territories belonging to, or which 
might lawfully lie claimed by, the United 
Netherlands, or by the Kingdom of Spain, 
respectively, at the time of the acquisi- 
tion by Great Britain of the Colony of 
British Guiana, and shall determine the 
boundarj'-line between the Colony of 



British Guiana and the United States of 
Venezuela." 

By the final article of the Treaty " The 
High Contracting Parties " engaged " to 



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Plioto. Copyright 190" h\i J. E. Piirdij, Buslon. 
MELVILLE W. KfLLEK. 



consider tlie result of the proceedings of 
the Tribunal of Arbitration as a full, per- 
fect, and final settlement of all questions 
referred to the arbitrators." The Tri- 
bunal began its sittings at Paris, oi 
.lune 1.5, 1899, and its decision, which was 
said to have been unanimous, was an- 
nounced on October 3, 1899. This ver- 
dict was largely in the nature of a com- 
promise, but was most emphatically 
favorable to Venezuela, when that 
country's interests were viewed in the 
light of the claims of Great Britain. A 
large proportion of the territoi-y within 
the famous Schomliurgk line, which Lord 
Salisbury had claimed absolutely and re- 
fused to arbitrate, was restored to Vene- 
zuela ; while the complete control of the 
Orinoco river was secured to that countr.v 
as well as important rights in the Ama- 
kuru and Barima rivers, whose naviga- 



524: 



iKOM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



tiou Groat Britain haj claiiiK'J to control 
absolutely. 

Thus ended what threatened to be one 
of the most deplorable politiral eompliea- 
tions of the century with peace and some 
honor, at least, for all parties. By a bold 
and determined adherence to a long- main- 
tained sentiment of natiimal i)olicy, the 
United States was able to check the ag- 
ji'ressions of a powerful nation on the 
]-is'hts of a weaker, which had for years 
appealed to our government for its aid 
in its defenseless position. But while 
doing a merciful and just act a great 
Ijrineiple of national policy was so firmly 
established that it is hardly probable it 
will ever be seriously questioned again by 
any European Power. In his recent ad- 
dress (July, 1908) before the Naval War 
College at Newport, E. I., President 
Eoosevelt, in his enthusiasm over his 
favorite theme of a greater, and yet 
greater navy, declared that the Monroe 
Doctrine never received the recognition of 
any great Powers until we began building 
our great navy of battleships. As a 
matter of fact, however, before the keel 
of the first of our modern warships had 
lic^n laid the fact that the Monroe Doc- 
trine stands as the cardinal principle of 
the American foreign policy and as such 
must be respected in spirit and in letter 
had, after serious and hostile delibera- 
tion, been recognized and respected by the 
nation of all others of the world the most 
able to dispute its power and standing. 
Moreover since the memorable Venezuelan 
case many other and strong indorsements 
of the effectiveness of the Doctrine have 
Ijcen adtled to those already conceded. 
Not the least of these was the virtual 
acceptance of the standing of the Monroe 
Doctrine and its position as what must 
be recognized as an " unwritten law " of 
nations, was the final agreement of all 
the nations represented at the first Hague 
Conference that the representatives of 
the United States government should be 



allowed to sign cai/h of the Conventions 
arrived at with the following proviso: 
" Nothing contained in this convention 
shall be so construed as to require the 
United States of An)crica to depart from 
its traditional policy of not intruding 
upon, interfering with, or entangling 
itself in the political questions or policy 
or internal administration of any foreif^ii 
state, nor shall anything contained in 
the said Convention be construed to im- 
ply a relinquishment by the T'nited 
States of America of its traditional at- 
titude toward purely American ques- 
tions." And it was more than an inter- 
national courtesy tliat led Germany, in 
1901, when she proposed to use forcible 
means to collect the claims of some of 
her subjects against Venezuela, first to 
inform the government of the United 
States, through her Ambassador at 
Washington, of her purpose to take such 
action, but that the " German Government 
had no purpose or intention to make even 
the smallest acquisition of territory on 
the South American Continent, or the 
islands adjacent." 

Therefore, notwithstanding Lord Salis- 
bury's dictum that International Law is 
founded on the general consent of na- 
tions, and no statesman however emi- 
nent, and no nation however, powerful are 
competent to insert into its code a novel 
principle " which ^vas never recognized 
before, and which has not since been ac- 
cepted by the government of any other 
country;" we are prone to believe that 
the verdict of history will be that this 
"novel larinciple." the Monroe Doctrine, 
worked over and out by John Quincy 
Adams, voiced by President ilonroe, was, 
after seventy years of a doubtful mean- 
ing and existence, given real life and an 
unquestioned position as an unwritten 
principle of international law by the 
honest, forceful, and clear-sighted states- 
manship of Grover Cleveland. 



XLvn. 

THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII - 1898. 



Sandwich Islands Unknown When Anierieau Independence Declared. — Discovery by Captain 
Cook, 177S. — His Experience Witn Natives. — Descriptions of Islands. — Highest Volcanoes 
in World. — Motable Eruptions. — Princess Kapiolani Defies Pele, Goddess of Volcanoes. — 
Tliree Periods of Hawaiian History. — Origin of Native People. — Pliysical Characteristics. 
— -Their Religion and Superstition. — The Tabu. — -Pastimes of People. — Native Poetry. — 
Vancouver's Inlluence. — Introduction of Rum. — Kamehameha I. — Conquers Other Chiefs. 
— Establislied Central Ciovernment. — Overtlirow of Idolatry l)y People. — Arrival of Mis- 
sionaries. — Intense Interest of People in Education. — Continuous Interference of Foreign 
Powers. — The "New Kaahumanu."— Formation of Written Language. — First Constitu- 
tion. — Independence Recognized by United States, France, and England. — Comparison of 
Census Statisti--s. — Steady Cirowth of American Party. — Statement of Liliuokalani. — 
Early Movements Toward Annexation. — Hostilit.v of English. — First Treaty With United 
States. — Kalakaua. — ^ Crisis on Accession of Liliuokalani. — E.stablishment of Provisi<uial 
Government. — Negotiations with Government of United States. — The Joint Resolution of 
Congress. — Final Cession to United States. 



Some unsuspected isle in far-off seas." — BuoWNlNG. 




T is an interesting fact that when, in 1898, the Hawaiian 
islands were annexed to the United States territory was 
added to the national domain whose very existence was un- 
known at the time the Declaration of Independence was 
made, and the people of the thirteen original states began 
their struggle for a separate political existence. Moreover 
it seems well-nigh incredible that for more than two 
hundred years a great number of navigators should have 
cruised between the west coast of America and the east 
coast of Asia, and yet never have sighted so extensive 
and prominent a group of islands; for they were no low- 
lying lands which might easily be passed by unless one ran very close to their 
shores, but were conspicuously marked by some of the loftiest mountains of the 
western hemisphere, which were visible for many miles in every direction. Yet there 
seems to be no trustworthy evidence that until tlie last quarter of the eighteenth 
century they were ever visited or even sighted. 

One of the earliest traditions of the people of Hawaii relates that sometime between 
the years 1525 and 1530 a small vessel was wrecked on the coast of one of the islands. 
Only the captain and his sister reached the shore in safety, when thej' knelt for a long- 
time in prayer, and were found in this attitude by the natives, who received them 
kindly and ministered to all their wants. According to the Spanish historians about 
that time Cortez. the conqueror of Mexico, fitted out several exploring expeditions, 
one of which, consisting of three vessels under the command ol Alvarado de Saavedra, 



526 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



sailed frnm Lacatula for the Moluccas, 
October ;>1, 15:^7. Wlien the S(iiiailrijn 
was about five thousaml miles frnm jiort 
the vessels were separated by a fierce 
storm, and the two smaller ones were 
never heard from. As most of the severe 
pales of that resion come from the south- 
west, which would drive a disabled vessel 
directly toward Hawaii, and as the Span- 
iards were the only white peoplr navif^a- 
tinp the Pacific at that period, it has come 
to be believed that the small vessel 
wrecked on the Kona coast was one of 
the missing vessels of Saavedra's fleet. 
According to the same tradition the cap- 
tain and his sister settled among the na- 
tives, and their descendants were among 
the leading chief's of later days, and have 
been marked even down to recent times 
by their different racial characteristics. 
There is evidence, too, that a Spanish 
navigator, Jean Galtano, visited the is- 
lands about thirty years later, though no 
distinct record of the event has been 
found. In the year 174.3 the British ship 




CAPTAIN COOK. 

iif war, "Centurion," under command of 
Lord Anson, cruised in the southern 
Pacific on the lookout fur Spanish gal- 
leons; and in the account of his "Voy- 



ages'' it is cited as a "remarkable" fact 
" that by the concurrent testimony of all 
Spanish navigators, there is not one port 
nor even a tolerable road as yet found 
out between the Philippine islands and 
the coast of California: so that from the 
time the Manila ship first loses sight of 
land she never lets go her anchor till 
she arrives on the coast of California." 
It is evident, therefore, that none of 
these islands were known to the navi- 
gators of the sixteenth, seventeenth, 
and eighteenth centuries; and so were 
truly discovered by Captain Cook. 
lie was then making the third of 
his remarkable voyages, having sailed 
from Bolabola, one of the Society is- 
lands, December 8, 1777, in an effort to 
find a northern passage between the At- 
lantic and Pacific oceans. On Sunday, 
•Tanuary IS, 1778, he reached the island 
of O.ahu, and then visited other islands 
of the group. The simple natives, who 
had never seen a white man nor any such 
vessels, were thrown into a state of the 
greatest consternation and perplexity; 
and in their excitement and fear crowded 
the heights above the shore to watch 
eveiw movement of the strange visitors. 
The majority of the people regarded Cap- 
tain Cook as the incarnation of their ab- 
sent god, Lono, whose return was ex- 
pected as a result of an ancient prophecy, 
while the crews of his two vessels were 
looked upon as supernatural beings. Mes- 
sengers were sent to the other islands to 
inform the chiefs of the arrival of these 
strangers, who were thus described : " The 
men are white; their skin is loose and 
folding; their heads are angular; fire and 
smoke issue from their mouths; they 
have openings in the sides of their bodies 
into which they thrust their hands and 
draw out iron, beads, nails, and other 
treasures." From this description it is 
evident that the natives, who knew noth- 
ing of clothes, regarded those worn by the 
Englishmen as their skin, which was 
" loose and folding; " and that when they 
put their hands into the pockets of their 
clothes, the natives thought they actually 
thrust them into "the sides of their 



THE ANNEXATION OE HAWAII. 



527 



bodies." Ou Eebruaiy 1, 1778, Lt. Gore 
and twenty men landed, taking- on shore 
three goats, a boar, and a sow pig of 
English lireed, as well as seeds of melons, 
pumpkins, and onions. As the weather 
was very stormy they were obliged to 
remain on shore two nights, and were 
most hospitably entertained by the na- 
tive.?. On February 3, Cook with his two 
vessels continued his voyage to the coast 
of Alaska, Bering straits, and the Arc- 
tic ocean, until stopped by the ice fields, 
when he returned to winter in the islands 
he had discovered, arriving November 
26th. Again he was received as a god. 
Sacrifices were oflfered to him, and he 
and his followers were loaded with gifts, 
many of which were of great value, they 
giving only some trinkets in return. As 
there were no metals on the island any 
scraps of iron, old nails, or the common- 
est tools were eagerly sought after. The 
distinctive marks of rank among the 
chiefs, and the insignia of royalty, were 
most costly feather cloaks. Their ground- 
work was a fine netting of native hemp, 
to which small and very delicate feathers 
of a bright yellow color were attached so 
as to overlay each other and form a soft 
and smooth surface. These choice yellow 
feathers were taken from somewhat rare 
birds that have one little tuft of the 
feathers under each wing, which gives 
some idea of the value that must have 
been represented in such cloaks. That 
worn by the great king Kamehameha I. 
is said to have busied nine generations 
of kings in its making. Five of these al- 
most priceless garments were presented to 
Captain Cook at one time, for which, in 
return, he graciously presented the gen- 
erous donor with a " linen shirt and a 
cutlass." After a few weeks, however, 
the natives began to realize that the Eng- 
lishmen wore very human, and that they 
were cari-ying a heavy burden; while with 
the Anglo-Saxon's usual contempt for an 
inferior race, Cook and his men grossly 
abused the confidence and friendship of 
the people. As matters were assuming a 
Berious aspect, the English determined to 
get a chief on board one of the vessels. 



and hold him as a hostage. But the sus- 
picions of the natives had been aroused, 
and the attempt to abduct the chief led to 
a serious quarrel, during which Captain 
Cook was stabbed in the back by one of 
tlie men, who used a large iron knife 
which one of the Englishmen had 
brought in. Captain Cook's followers 
then opened fire on the natives and in the 
skirmish seventeen of them were killed, 
including five chiefs. After this en- 
counter, which had resulted in the loss 
of their commander, the British left the 
islands, February 25, 1779, sailing for the 
Arctic ocean. 

The Sandwich islands as they were 
named by Captain Cook in honor of 
his patron the Earl of Sandwich, then 
First Lord of the British Admiralty; or 
the Hawaiian islands as they were called 
by the natives after the largest of the 
group and are now officially known, lie 
at the present " cross-roads " of all Pa- 
cific ocean travel and commerce. They 
are about 2,100 miles from San Fran- 
cisco, 2,300 from Seattle or Victoria, 
2,500 from Manila, 4,650 from Panama 
and the proposed canal, and 6,-100 from 
Cape Horn. All steamers, of which there 
are now several lines from San Francisco 
to Japan, China. Australia, and the Phil- 
ippines, as well as the English lines from 
Vancouver and Victoria to Australia and 
New Zealand, make regular stops at 
Honolulu. There are seven inhabited, 
and six or eight small, uninhabited is- 
lands in the group. The largest is 
Hawaii, which is also the most easterly, 
and is ninety miles in length by seventy 
in breadth. The islands all lie Just within 
the Tropics, between latitudes 18° and 
23° north. They extend from Hawaii in 
a northwesterly direction for a distance 
of about 3S0 miles in the following order, 
which is very nearly, also, their order in 
size: Hawaii, Maui, Molokai, Oahu, — on 
the south side of which is situated the 
capital city, Honolulu, — Kaui, Niihau, 
and the small island of Lanai, lying just 
south of Molokai and west of Maui. 

All these islands are of volcanic or 
coral formation, and present a great 



528 



FROM COLONY TO WOliLU POWKIL 



variety of physical conditions, as of 
climate, soil, etc. On Hawaii are the two 
highest island mountains in the world, — 
jMauna Loa, near the centre <it' the island, 
rising- to the heis'ht of 13,7li.'> t'ect ahove 
the sea, and Manna Kea, almut twenty 
miles north of IMauna Lna. with an alti- 
tuile of lo,S05 feet; wliile Mauna Loa 
and Kilauea, ahout twenty miles east, 
are the larg-est active volcanoes on the 
!ili>y)e. Ocean soundin.ns made around 
till' island reveal a depth of frt)in seven- 



down the sides of the mountain, usually 
at about eleven thousand feet above sea 
level, and play like a fountain to a height 
of from two hundred to one thousand 
feet. At the same time streams of lava 
pour through huge fissures, merging into 
a river of fire from a mile to two and a 
half miles wide, which flows towards the 
sea. Frequently the flow is rapid, the 
stream reaching a velocity of ten miles 
an hour, at other times it spreads out 
into great lakes, making little progress for 




I'lHTER OF KILAl'EA VOLOANO. 



teen to twenty thousand fi'ct within four 
miles of the shore. This would mean 
that, if the bed of the ocean could be laid 
bare, one would see Mauna Loa rising to 
a height of over thirty thousand feet. All 
the islands are, in fact, but the tops or 
table lands of a submerged range of vol- 
canic mountains. There have been six or 
seven eruptions of ilauna Loa during 
the last century, the most notable ones be- 
ing those of lS,"i.5, ISSO. and 1885. They 
have all been of a similar character, and 
have usually occurred without any pre- 
monitions of earthquakes or subterra- 
neous noises, — as quietly as the moon rises. 
Lights are first seen on the summit, 
which steadily increase mitil the whole 
country becomes illuminated, so that it 
has been possible to read a book at night 
at a distance of several miles from the 
volcano. Then fires burst forth lower 



days. These streams, of course, destroy 
everything in their path. In 1,880 the 
flow continued for nine months, and the 
stream stopjx'd a half mile only from the 
beautiful town of Ililo. In 1885 the dur- 
ation of the flow was fifteen months, but 
its course was fortunately toward the 
ocean. In 1887 a stream of molten lava 
broke through a fissure in the mountain 
about seven thousand feet above sea- 
level, and reached the ocean, twenty 
miles distant, in three days. Lut the 
most frightful and awe-inspiring of all 
known volcanoes is Kilauea, which all 
scientists and most travelers visit, though 
its crater is reached with difficulty. It is 
really a foot-hill of Mauna Loa, and has 
an altitude of only about four thousand 
feet. A hotel has been built close to the 
edge of the crater from which most of 
the horrors and phenomena of the region 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



529 



can be seen. One can look down into 
the great crater, whicli is nine miles in 
circumference and six hundred feet deep, 
stretching- out like a great plateau with 
perpendicular walls. " The floor of this 
vast pit," says a distinguished traveler, 
" is covered with black lava hills in 
gigantic forms and irregular shaiies, piled 
up in endless confusion, while the level 
portion is crossed by many cracks and 
tissures, from which jets of hot steam 
and sulphuric vapors are constantly aris- 
ing." But the most remarkable feature 
of this Inferno is the ever active lake of 
molten lava, about three miles distant 
from the entrance to the crater at the 
hotel. To reach this one descends about 
three hundred feet from the floor of the 
crater into an inner pit. and so may come 
near enough to the burning mass to stir 
it with a stick. The same writer quoted 
above says : " In this great bed we saw 
a volume of liquid fire, like molten iron, 
moving to and fro, surging and hissing 
like a sea in a storm. Conducted by the 
guide I went across a thin shell of lava 
liurning the soles of the feet, and over 
crevices through which the livid fire 
ci:)uld be seen only a few inches down, 
until I came to the edge of the cone- 
shaped wall that confined the liquid mass 
of some twenty acres or more. The heat 
was intense, as tlic lake of fire, boiling 
like a cauldron, covered in places with a 
hard crust separated by great lanes of 
fire, surged and rolled its heavy surf 
against its enclosing walls. The whole 
surface was constantly changing, foun- 
tains were playing at many points, and 
liqtiid tongues of fire would leap up as 
the congealed surfaces would meet with a 
crash, and new lanes form, sometimes 
opening clear across the lake. As day- 
light faded away the walls of the pit be- 
gan to glow with the reflection of the vol- 
canic fires, and the heavy gases hmig in 
clouds like reflectors in the star-lit sky. 
As the darkness deepened, the light from 
the lava grew brighter, while the jets and 
surges of molten fire continued without 
intermission, fountains of liquid fire 
shooting up thirty feet. The peculiar 
34 



sullen or angry roar of the fiery surf was 
distinctly heard, sometimes like the noise 
of cannon or rattling fire of musketry." 
In the whole interior of the crater, the at- 
mosphere is filled with myriads of thread- 
like filaments of lava resembling twisted 
hair, the products of volcanic fires, — a 
product similar to blown glass. This is 
known as " Pele's hair," Pele being the 
goddess of the volcano and its fires. 

Like most of the early peoples, or jieo- 
ple in a semi-savage state, the Ilawaiians 
had a special god or goddess who was 
identified with every force of nature; and 
this goddess of the subterraneous fires 
was worshiped with a reverence and awe 
proportioned to her supposed powers for 
evil, as manifested in the frightful and 
destructive eruptions of Mauna Loa and 
Kilatioa, with which the natives were 
only too familiar. The abode of the god- 
dess was in the lake of fire in Kilauea's 
crater, and certain berries that grew near 
the crater were sacred to her. To break 
the force of their superstitious beliefs 
was the first effort of the missionaries to 
the people ; and to aid in this work, one 
of the noblest acts of heroism anywhere 
recoriled was performed by the Princess 
Kapiolani after her conversion to Christ- 
ianity. Although tradition says that her 
previous life had been marked by ex- 
cesses of intemperance and licentiousness 
she was one of the first to renounce the 
old gods and idols, and yield to the puri- 
fying and elevating influences of the Gos- 
pel of Christ, thus greatly aiding the 
missionaries in their work not only by 
the influence of her high rank but by the 
more potent force of her changed life. 
To demonstrate to her people that their 
old gods had no power, either for good 
or for evil, she determined to attack one 
of the most deep-seated of their super- 
stitions and fears. Accordingly public 
announcement was made in December, 
1824. that she would go to the very abode 
of the goddess Pele, there eat her sacred 
berries, and openly defy her. The more 
deeijl.v to interest the people in her act and 
the better to advertise her purpose, and 
in the face of the most strenuous opposi- 



ooO 



PEOM COLOXY TO WORLD POWEE. 



tion of her husband and friends, she jour- 
neyed on foot from Keakikekua on the 
west coast more than half way aromid 
the island, a distance of about one hun- 
dred and twenty miles. After reaching 
Kilauea she si>ent the night with friends 
just outside the crater. The next morn- 
ing slie and her company of about eighty 
persons descended into the crater and ap- 
proached the burning lake. There, in full 
view of its terrifying activity, she ate the 
sacred berries and threw stones into the 
lake of fire, saying: "Jehovah is my 
God. lie kindles these fires. I fear not 
Pele. If I perish by her anger then you 
may fear Pelo; but if I trust in Jehovah 
and lie preserves me when breaking her 
tabus, then you must fear and servo Ilim 
alone.'' " Tlion," says the historian, 
" they united in singing a hymn of praise 
to the true God, and knelt in adoration 
to the Creator and Governor of the Uni- 
verse." To an intelligent person of this 
civilized age and country, the act of this 
heroic woman does not seem remarkable. 
But when one considers that from her 
earliest chilhood, until within two years 
of the time of her act, she had been 
taught and had firmly believed that with 
this Pole lay the power not only of smit- 
ing her with instant death, but also of 
spreading death and destruction among 
her people as a punishment of her im- 
pious act; and when one also considers 
that the defiance was made amid jihysical 
surroundings that seemed the very " jaws 
of hell," and were calculated to suggest 
diabolical power and presence even to 
people who had outgrown all superstition 
— even Luther threw his iid<stand at the 
devil, — one can but marvel at her faith 
in her newly found God, which inspired 
her with such superhuman courage and 
love. Hers was certainly as it has been 
called " one of the greatest acts of moral 
courage ever performed." IQ^or did her 
zeal diminish ; but throughout the re- 
maining seventeen years of her life she 
labored earnestly for the moral uplifting 
of her people. And at her death, in 1841, 
it was said of her: " This nation has lost 
one of its brightest ornaments. She was 



confessedly the most Christian, the most 
civilized in her manners, and the most 
thoroughly read in the Bible of all the 
chiefs this nation ever had. The hand 
of God is to be seen in the consistent life 
for twenty years of this child of a de- 
graded paganism." 

The history of the Hawaiian people 
divides itself naturally into three dis- 
tinct and well defined periods. 1st. From 
the earliest reliable records or traditions 
to the discovery of the islands by Captain 
Cook, in 1778. 2d. From the discovery 
by Captain Cook to the advent of the 
missionaries in 1S20, which is known as 
the "Period of Conquest,'' and includes 
the most notable reign of Hawaiian his- 
tory, — that of Kamehamcha the Great, 
wlio sul)dued all the other chiefs of the 
islands, and united the people under one 
wise and strong ruler. This centraliza- 
tion of ijower, together with the abolition 
of idolatry and the (ahn si/sfem, which 
took place early in his son's reign, pre- 
pared the way for the introduction of 
Cliristianity. .3d. From 1820 to the an- 
nexation of the islands to the LTnited 
States. 

As a multitude of works have been 
written which cover the second and third 
periods, and which are, therefore, more 
familiar in tlie general reader, we shall 
use the limited space which the plan of 
this work allows to especially illustrate 
the character of the people during the 
first period and the conditions then exist- 
ing, of which it is much more difficult to 
obtain any reliable and detailed account, 
— merely giving a general outline, or 
rapid survey, of the events and move- 
ments of the second and third periods. 

Some fourteen or fifteen centuries ago 
there was, it is believed, a migration of 
people from the East Indian Archipelago 
into the Pacific ocean, the first point of 
settlement having been the island of 
Savaii, in the Samoan group. From this 
central point these people were gradually 
dispersed over all the islands of the east- 
ern Pacific, . from New Zealand to 
Hawaii ; and for a long time they have 
been classed as one race, — the Polynesian. 



THE ANNEXATION OE HAWAII. 



531 



Quite recently these people have been 
called by ethnologists Sawaioris, a com- 
pound word made up of the first, middle, 
and last syllables of Sa-moa, Ha-wai-i, 
and Ma-on; and it is by this name that 
they are now most commonly designated. 
The earliest mig-ration has generally been 
placed at about the fifth century after 
Christ ; but when the settlements of the 
other islands followed there is no con- 
sensus of opinion. It is practically cer- 
tain, however, that the people whom Cap- 
tain Cook foimd at Hawaii belonged to 
this race, and had a very ancient lineage. 
All that transpired in their histoi-y dur- 
ing the intervening centuries is simply a 
matter of conjecture, or legendary, 
though there are many evidences that a 
more or less frequent intercourse was 
kept up by the Hawaiians with the 
fatherland of Samoa and with Tahiti, so 
that the people became skillful and dar- 
ing navigators. As a people the Sawai- 
oris have common characteristics, phys- 
ically the Hawaiian not differing ma- 
terially from his brothers of Samoa, or 
the Maoris of New Zealand. All author- 
ities agree that they were an exception- 
ally large and well-developed people, the 
average height of the men being placed 
at five feet and nine or ten inches; and a 
skeleton has been found in a catacomb 
at Wainiea, which is six feet seven and 
three-quarters inches in length. In his 
great work on the " Human Species," 
de Quatrefages, in a table giving the 
stature of different races of men, shows 
that the natives of Samoa and Tonga are 
the largest people in the world. They 
are generally described as of a brown 
color, with straight black hair and very- 
little beard ; their features are fairly 
regular, eyes invariably black, lips of 
medium thickness, noses short and wide 
at the base, with foreheads high, but 
rather narrow. The native Hawaiians 
presented marked contrasts of character, 
possessing great strength and boldness, 
yet being indolent and servile. Every 
act of their lives was hedged about by 
religious observances and ceremonials, 
yet they were cannibals and licentious 



beyond almost any other known people. 
Chastity and common morality were 
practically unknown among them; yet 
their history presents not infrequent in- 
stances of an affectionate and generous 
disposition, capable of making great sac- 
rifices for the good of others. Their re- 
ligion was such as to degrade and corrupt 
a people rather than elevate them; and 
the fact that so many attractive and 
amiable qualities survived its debasing 
and vicious influences, is the best evi- 
dence of a naturally better character as 
their birth-right. 

In their social life there were three 
distinct and fixed ranks, or castes, — the 
nobility, the religious orders, and the 
conunon people. The King had absolute 
power over the lives, services, and prop- 
erty of all his subjects. The chiefs 
served, when the King so desired, as a 
sort of advisory council; and these as- 
semblies furnished the occasion for the 
most powerful displays of native elo- 
quence which was always greatly appre- 
ciated by the people. The kingly ofiice 
was hereditary in the royal family, 
though the sovereign coulil name his suc- 
cessor; and in default of heirs, the chiefs 
chose the king from among- those of 
highest rank. Each island had its king; 
and the chiefs were the head-men of dis- 
tricts, and his innnediate vassals. In 
theory, and generally in practice, the 
King was the owner of all the land, which 
he subdivided among the chiefs, and they 
again among their followers and the peo- 
ple, who were mere tenants at will. The 
person of the King and his chiefs was 
sacred, and they were held in the highest 
reverence. As a native historian has 
said : " It was death for a common man 
to remain standing at the mention of the 
King's name in song or when the King's 
food, drinking water, or clothing was 
carried past; to put on any article of 
dress belonging to him; to enter his en- 
closure without permission ; or even to 
cross his shadow, or that of his house. If 
he entered the dreadful presence of the 
sovereign he must crawl, prone on the 
ground, and leave it in the same man- 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



iier."' This reverence for the kingly of- 
fice became a most important factor in 
the introduction of Christianity, as the 
chiefs were among- the firet converts, and 
the people were easily led tu follow them, 
at least so far as form was concerned. 

The early religion presents a very in- 
teresting but very complex subject for 
study. As lias been said, it affected prac- 
tically every act of the lives of the peo- 
ple. There was first among the gods, 
" Essential and uncreated,'' a trinity, — 
Kaue, Ku, and Lono. " Kaue was held 
superior to the others, and was benevolent 
in his character; Ku was the essence of 
darkness and cruelty ; while Lono was 
more closely associated with the human." 
Of lesser divinities the number was 
legion. Earth, Seas, and Air were full of 
them. They were present in all the 
phenomena of nature; the families had 
their tutelary gods, — a kind of ancestor 
worship; and every trade or occupation, 
even the thieves and gamblers, had a spe- 
cial deity. Human sacrifices were of- 
fered on special occasions, such as the 
dedication of a temple, the launching of 
a war canoe, the building of a chief's 
house, or the sickness of a King or Queen. 
Of the religious customs, that which most 
directly affected the people was the 
Tahu, which served every conceivable 
purpose. A piece of land was tahited, and 
it was a capital offense to enter it; one 
having a debt against another could have 
his house tahued, and no one could leave 
or enter it until the debt was paid, and 
the tahu lifted. There were regular fahu 
seasons, sacred to the gods, when every 
fire or light on the island, or in a par- 
ticular district, must be extinguished; no 
canoe could be launched : no one could 
bathe, and no individual, exceist the 
priests, must be seen on the streets, or out 
of doors: even the dog must not bark, nor 
the pig squeak, nor the cock crow, lest 
the tahu should be broken, and fail to ac- 
complish its purpose. The temples and 
idols and the persons of the principal 
chiefs were always fahu, — that is, sacred, 
and not to be touched. The fahu ruled 
the famil.v. too, and was largely responsi- 



ble for the destruction of anything re- 
sembling family life. It was tahu for 
any woman, even the highest, to eat with 
any man, or to eat of food prepared in 
the same oven, or to partake at any time 
of pork, bananas, cocoanut, turtle, and 
certain kinds of fish ; and one author has 
found evidence that this tahu extended to 
fowls, and every animal ever sacrificed, — 
except in eases of special indulgence. 
As hogs and fowls were the only animals 
on the islands, and cereals were un- 
known, the diet allowed to women must 
have Iwen extremely meagre. When the 
Princess Kapiolani. whose later heroic de- 
fiance of the goddess Pele has already 
been mentioned, was a girl, she and a 
companion rebelled against this fahu, and 
determined to eat a banana, one of the 
most eonnnon fruits on the islands. They 
rushed into the water, concealing the 
banana in their hands, and ate it when 
some distance from the shore. Unfor- 
tunately a priest chanced to see them and 
their act, and the young- girls were con- 
demned therefor to degradation of rank, 
aii<l pei'petual poverty and celibacy. In- 
fluence, however, was apparently brought 
to bear on the priest, who suggested an 
expiatory sacrifice. A young boy, a 
favorite page of Kapiolani's. was seized 
and strangled ; whereupon the sentence 
upon the offenders themselves was an- 
nulled. 

That conjugal love was comparativel.y 
weak among the Hawaiians may be 
easily inferred from what has already 
been said. Other evidences of it may be 
found in the frequency of divorce, as the 
tenure of the marriage relation depended 
entirel.y upon the will of the husband; 
and in the practice of infanticide, which 
was everywhere prevalent. This was 
usuall.v accomplished by burying the little 
babe alive; and one of the best authori- 
ties on Hawaiian customs estimates that 
two-thirds of the offspring of the com- 
mon people were destroyed in this man- 
ner. As it was more commonly the female 
babes that were so disposed of, there was 
always a great excess of males in the 
population. Considering all these con- 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



Jitions and the additional effects of the 
lieat of the tropics and the fact that little, 
and often no clothing was worn by either 
sex, it is hardly surprising that chastity, 
as it is regarded among civilized peoples, 
had but little foot-hold among the 
natives. In this connection, however, 
it may be observed that one of the high- 
est authorities on anthropology (Waitz) 
remarks that the absence of clothing 
among native people is not in itself a 
mark of innnodesty; nor is its adoption 
due to a sense of shame, but rather to the 
need of protection or the desire for orna- 
mentation; a truth which is illustrated 
by the story, recorded by the Rev. Dr. 
Anderson, of the Hawaiian who, having 
been rebuked by a missionary for appear- 
ing in his house nearly naked, added to 
his slight attire on his next visit a pair 
of stockings and a hat. 

And yet with all these dark and ugly 
pliases of their lives and customs there is 
abundant evidence that there wore many 
of the people whose characters exhibited 
bi-ight glimmerings of " sweetness and 
light," and who were in all respects be- 
yond the confines of savagery. We are told 
that many were very brave, and thought 
little of self-sacrifice for others, where 
duty or family honor were concerned ; 
and it would be difficult to find a nobler 
illustration of this than the following 
anecdote offers: "Some lads belonging to 
two villages fell out, and began stone 
throwing. One of them, who was the son 
nf a chief, was struck and, it was feared, 
killed. As soon as this was known to the 
young men of his village they armed 
tliemselves in order to go to the other vil- 
lage to seek reparation according to the 
custom of the times, by killing some one 
of the family of the boy who had thrown 
the stone. A report that they were com- 
ing preceded them, and a young man, a 
i-ousin of the boy, in order to prevent a 
fight, quietly walked out of the village to 
meet the avengers of blood. When he 
met them he calmly said, ' You are com- 
ing to avenge your brother. I am brother 
to the boy who killed him. Do not go 
farther. Kill me and be avenged so that 



our villages may remain at peace.' His 
conduct somewhat disconcerted the 
avenging party; and by the timely ar- 
rival of a Christian teacher matters were 
settled without bloodshed." The Ha- 
waiiaus, when not restrained by their 
tahu, were a light-hearted and generally 
joyous people, as most children of the sun 
and the sea are. They entered into all 
sports, of which they had many, with 
genuine enthusiasm. On all the islands 
there were occasional markets and fairs 
for the purpose of trade, as well as to dis- 
cuss national affairs; wliile an annual 
festival, the Makahiki, was held in the 
autumn of each year. At these meetings 
games and contests were given an im- 
portant place. Boxing, foot-racing, bowl- 
ing, wrestling, surf-bathing, a species of 
tobogganing, throwing and catching the 
spoar, the shooting of mice with bow and 
arrow, and checkers were all freely in- 
dulged in; while the children played 
" cat's cradle," walked on stilts, spun 
tops, and were fond of kite-flying. More- 
over Vancouver, who visited the islands 
three times, 1792-93-94, says that he wit- 
nessed a sort of drama or operatic per- 
formance in several acts, describing in- 
cidents in the lives of members of the 
royal family, which was " supported with 
a wonderful degree of vivacity and 
spirit." Dancing was a favorite pastime, 
and also held an important place in their 
religious rites. Unfortunately many of 
these dances were such as to degrade the 
people, the worst of them being the las- 
civious and infamous hula hula dance, 
which has put a stigma on the Hawaiian 
name throughout the civilized world. 

The people were also deeply interested 
in oratorical efforts and have been called 
natural orators and politicians. The hus- 
band of Kapiolani, after the islands had 
all been brought under one rule by Kame- 
hameha I., attained great celebrity as the 
" National " orator. Their legends and 
historical tales were handed down from 
generation to generation by professional 
singers and stoiy-tellers who were at- 
tached to the retinue of the leading 
chiefs. As among nearly all primitive peo- 



334: 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



liles the Hawaiian bards were highly es- 
tfoined and reverenced, and the people's 
love of poetry and song found expression 
through them. The native poetry, of 
wliieh they were passionately fond, had 
no rhyme or meter, but the poems con- 
sisted of short musical sentences or lines, 
divided into bars or measures with par- 
ti<'ular attention to the accent and cadence 
(if the final words. Much of their poetry 
was of a dreamy, half minor tone and 
ciivered every expression of feeling, from 
the religious chants and prayers, and love 
songs, to dirges and lamentations for the 
dead. As an illustration of their poetry, 
we give a passage from a poem in 
memoiy of Chief Keeaumoku, the father- 
in-law of the great Kamehameha, which 
has been preserved by one of the mis- 
sionaries : 

Auwc, auwe, ua mate tuu alii, 
Ua mate tuu hatu, tuu hoa, 
Tuu hoa i ta wa o ta wi 
Tuu hoa i paa ta aina 
Tuu hoa i tuu ilihune 
Tuu hoa i ta ua me ta matani 
Tuu hoa i ta wela o ta la, 
Tuu hoa i ta auu o ta mauna, 
Tuu hoa i ta ino 
Tuu hoa i ta malie 
Tuu hoa i na tai ewalu 
Auwe, auwc, ua hola tuu hoa, 
Aohe e hoi mai ! 

Alas, alas, dead is my chief. 

Dead is m.v lord and my friend; 

My friend in the season of famine 

My friend in the time of drought 

My friend in my poverty. 

My friend in the rain and the wind, 

My friend in the heat and the sun. 

My friend in the cold from the mountain, 

My friend in the storm 

My friend in the calm, 

]\ry friend in the eight seas. 

Alas, alas, gone is my friend. 

And no more will return. 

"During the second i>eriod of their his- 
tory, the Hawaiian Islands came to be well 
known to navigators, and through them 
to the countries from which they came. 
Karly in the period, too, the islands be- 



came the rendezvous of the great whaling 
fleets, so that there were often several 
foreign vessels in their ports at the same 
time. Frequently some of the sailors de- 
serted, or were puiiiosely left on the is- 
lands, so that there gradually grew uyt a 
foreign element among the people of the 
roughest and most dissolute character. 
For several years after Captain Cook set 
sail there were no visitors. During the 
years 1786-9 several English and French ' 
captains arrived and traded with the na- 
tives, without unpleasant incidents. But 
in 1789 Captain Metcalf, an American, 
came into port with two vessels. He be- 
gan at once to quarrel with the people, 
and it was not many days before one of 
his boats was stolen. To retaliate, he in- 
duced a great number of the natives to 
come out to his ship with supplies, which 
he proposed to buy. But no sooner had 
he massed them on one side of the vessel 
than he opened a broadside from his 
guns, siiil\ing the canoes, and killing 
more than one hundred natives. The sur- 
vivoi-s then seized his smaller vessel, 
which was commanded by his son, and 
massaci'ed everyone on board excepting 
the mate, Isaac Davis, whose life was 
spared. The boatswain, John Young, 
happening to be on shore, was detained. 
Captain ]\Ietcalf soon left the islands. 
But Davis and Young remained among 
the peojile, and being both possessed 
of strong and clean characters, soon 
achieved positions of ijifluence. Both 
became chiefs, and were close and trusted 
advisers of Kamehameha during his wars 
of conquest, and in the settlement of his 
kingdom. In 1792 Captain George Van- 
couver arrived at Hawaii. Remembering 
their recent experiences, the natives re- 
ceived him coldly, and with well-marked 
suspicion. His coming has, however, 
been held to mark an era in the develop- 
ment of the country. He soon gained 
the confidence of chiefs and people alike, 
and made determined and continued ef- 
forts to restore peace among the warring- 
leaders, to rid the people of many of their 
superstitions, and in evei-y way to en- 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



635 



lighten and elevate them. Between 1792- 
95 Vancouver made three successive 
visits, being received each time with in- 
creased favor. Of his last visit a native 
writer says: "Vancouver and his men 
were regarded as the guests of the nation, 
and treated with unbounded hospitality. 
He gave the King much valuable advice 
in regard to his intercourse with for- 
eigners, the management of his kingdom, 
the discipline of his troops, etc. He also 
told him of the one true God, Creator 
and Governor of all mankind; that their 
tahu system was wrong; and that he 
would ask the King of England to send 
him a teacher of the true religion." It 
weuld certainly have been fortunate for 
the Hawaiians had the Englishman Van- 
couver preceded the Englishman Cook 
and the American Metcalf! One of 
Vancouver's greatest benefactions was 
a liberal gift of sheep and cattle. Up to 
this time the only animals on the islands 
were native hogs, dogs, and mice, with 
some fowls, — all of which seem to have 
been brought in at the time of the first 
migration. There were even no wild 
animals, nor serpents, nor any creeping 
things, save one species of lizard. When 
A'^ancouver presented his sheep and cattle, 
he wisely had them tabued for ten years, 
so that they should have time to propa- 
gate; and also stipulated that at the end 
01 the period the women as well as the 
men should be privileged to eat them. 

About 1800, rum began to be shipped 
into the islands with results that beggar 
description. About the same time, too, 
some " Botany Bay " convicts who had 
come off a vessel introduced the " art of 
distilling," and it was not many months 
before nearly every chief had his still. 
Drunkenness became chronic and the con- 
dition of the people was deplorable. Even 
Karaehameha became an excessive drinker, 
but was led to reform through the in- 
fluence of John Young, and became a total 
abstainer. But the vice became so fas- 
tened upon the people that they lapsed 
into a bestial condition : and as it was the 
aim of the white savages who had settled 
among them to keep them so, Kame- 



hameha was able to do but little to resist 
the ravages of disease, made more horrible 
and deadly by the grossest intemperance. 
Universal experience has demonstrated 
that the so-called civilized wliite man, 
when he gives rein to his passions, is liable 
to become more debased, brutal, and sav- 
age than any real savages in their natural 
state; and with their motto "There is no 
God west of Cape Horn," the majority of 
the seamen of those daj's flung all moral 
restraints to the winds and became animals 
rather than men. A native Hawaiian was 
well within the bounds of truth when he 
wrote : " While there have been no ser- 
pents or tigers in these islands, there 
have been human brutes, worse than ser- 
pents and tigers, that have greatly de- 
stroyed the people." Captain Cook esti- 
mated the population of the islands at 
400,000 in 1778 ; but so great was the mor- 
tality during this second, — which may be 




CAPTAIN VANCOUVER 

called a transition, — period, that in 1830 
the population had fallen to 130,000. 

But the dawn of a better day was near. 
After about twenty years of almost con- 
stant fighting Kamehameha I. had sub- 
dued all the other chiefs, and comparative 



536 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



peace reigned throughout the islands. 
While still a nominal supporter of the 
national religion he had privately recog- 
nized the futility of its forms and 
ceremonies, and the evils of the sacrificial 
rites. Rumor had rer-ched the islands 




KING KAMKHAMEHA I. 

of the new religion which was being 
preached in the Society islands; hut 
being unable to learn more of it the 
King died in 1S19 in the faith of 
his ancestors, which he also charged 
his son and successor Liholiho, or 
Kamehanieha IT., to maintain. The 
rough old warrior was eighty-two years of 
age at the time of his death. He had 
done a great work among his people, and 
had unconsciously laid the foundation for 
a better and more comprehensive one. 
Down to the nineteenth century a more 
or less continuous strife had existed be- 
tween the chiefs of the diflFerent islands. 
Kamehanieha became the true " Father of 
his Country" by consolidating the group 
tinder one government, putting an end to 
feudal anarchy and the long series of petty 
wars, and thus making straight the way 
for the introduction of modern civilization 
and the Christian religion. His widow 



Kaahumanu, who was possessed of a char- 
acter hardly less marked and determined, 
was associated by the dying king with his 
son in the equal control of the government, 
as Liholiho had few of the virtues of his 
father, was weak in character and disso- 
lute, and unduly subject to priestly in- 
fluence. No sooner had the ex-Queen as- 
sumed power than she determined to 
break the iahii, so far, particularly, as it 
restricted the social privileges. At first 
the King offered a nominal resistance 
though he permitted his younger brother 
to eat at a banquet with his mother and 
other women, the first time that the 
sexes had ever partaken of a meal to- 
gether. Kaahumanu also brought all her 
influence to bear upon the young King to 
]iersuade him to renounce idolatry and 
abandon the native religion, with the re- 
sult that, returning from one of the other 
islands, the native historian relates "he 
found a great feast prepared, at which he 
sat down with a large company of chiefs 
of both sexes, and openly feasted with 
them, while a multitude of common peo- 
ple looked on with mingled fear and curi- 
osity to see what judgments would follow 
so impious an act. As they saw no harm 
ensue they raised a joyful shout, ' The 
fnhiis are at an end and the gods are a lie.' 
The effect of it was like that of displacing 
the keystone of an arch. The whole struc- 
ture both of idol-worship and of the fahiis 
fell at once into ruins. The high-priest 
himself set the example of setting fire to 
the idols and their sanctuaries." For a 
time the adherents of the old religion in 
other parts of the kingdom resisted the 
new movement for freedom, a chief of one 
cif the islands openly rebelling against the 
crown. A decisive battle was fought 
aliout December 20, ISIO, when the rebel- 
lious forces were entirely overthrown, and 
iiliposition to the reform movement was 
at an end. Then followed a brief period 
during which, as one has said, " Hawaii 
presented to the world the strange spec- 
tacle of a nation without a religion." 

During the early part of the nineteenth 
centui-y New England whalers were more 
or less constantly in different Hawaiian 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



bin 



harbors and occasionally native youths 
shipped with them on their return trips. 
In this way several had come into Amer- 
ican and especially New England towns. 
One of these, Humehunie, son of a king 
of one of the islands, enlisted in the 
American navy and served through the 
war of 1812, as well as the war with 
Algiers, returning later to the islands with 
the first missionaries, whom he greatly 
aided in many ways besides acting as one 
of their intei"preters. One of these Ha- 
waiian youth was found one morning in 
1809 on the steps of one of the New 
Haven churches, hungry and lonely. He 
was kindly cared for and became one of 
the inspiring causes of the first mission 
to the Sandwich Islands. In 1817, the 
" Foreign Mission School " was established 
at Cornwall, Conn., to furnish instruction 
to young men from heathen lands. Five 
young Hawaiians were among the earliest 
students. Through them the Missionary 
Society became interested in their land 
and people; and on October 23, 1819, two 
clergymen and five laymen with their 
wives, and three of the Hawaiian students 
from the Cornwall school, embarked at 
Boston on the brig Thaddeus for the is- 
lands. On ilarch 31, 1820, they arrived 
off Kohala, one of the minor divisions of 
the island of Hawaii. A boat was at once 
sent ashore under the first officer to learn 
the condition of the country. On his re- 
turn he reported: " Liholiho is King; the 
tahus are abolished; the idols are burned; 
the temples are destroyed. There has 
been war, but now there is peace." This 
was welcome news to the missionaries, who 
were ignorant of any of the recent re- 
ligious or political changes. Continuing 
their course they arrived at Kailua, where 
the King was then residing, April 4th ; 
and the Captain with Mr. Bingham and 
Mr. Thurston of the missionaries, with an 
interpreter, at once called on the King to 
explain the purpose of their visit, and to 
secure permission to reside in the country. 
On the second day following, the King 
with his family dined on board the 
Thaddeus ; and after a week's delay per- 
mission was granted them to remain on 



the islands one year, two of them at 
Kailua and the others at Honolulu. It 
afterward became known that the most 
potent influence with the King was the 
advice of John Young', the castaway whom 
Captain Metcalf had left behind in 1770. 
iloreover the most powerful argument 
Young- used with the King was that the 
missionaries preached the same religion 
which Captain Vancouver had told them 
about years before, and of whose principles 
he had promised to send them a teacher. 
The Hawaiians had not forgotten their 
friendly visitors any more than they had 
those ^\'ho had brought misei-y upon them 
and planted among them the seeds of 
licentiousness and hate. 

The reception of the missionaries was 
generally cordial, and gradually they 
gained the confidence of the natives. 
From the start the greater number of their 
pupils were the chiefs and their attend- 
ants and families, and the wives and chil- 
dren of foreigners. At first they could 
only teach in English. They labored so 
earnestly, however, to master the native 
language and to reduce it to writing, that 
they were soon able to make it the medium 
of their instruction. Kaahumanu at first 
treated the missionaries with contempt. 
But her alert mind soon became interested 
in the arts of reading and writing, which 
led to her consideration of the teachings 
of the foreigners, with the result that her 
heart and conscience were both touched, 
and she accepted the Christian religion. 
vSo great was the change in her character 
and manner that the natives ever 
after called her the "New Kaahumanu." 
During the remainder of her life she 
ilid all in her power to aid the mis- 
sionaries, urging her jDeople to embrace 
their teachings and to learn to read 
and write. Just before her death in 
1S32, the first printed copy of the New 
Testament in the Hawaiian language was 
placed in her hands, which she received 
with reverent thankfulness and joy. 

The childlike confidence of the people 
in foreigTiers who came to the islands and 
manifested an interest in the natives is 
one of their most interesting cliaracteris- 



d<JD 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



ties.' Vancouver's name was held in rev- 
erence for years after he had departed. A 
like trust was placed in the newly arrived 
missionaries as soon as they had made it 
clear that their mission was one of love. 
In 1825, the British frig-ate Blonde, com- 
manded by Lord Byron, a cousin of the 
poet, reached tlie islands bearing the re- 
mains of the King and Queen, who had 
died while on a visit to England. After 
till? funeral services had been held, a 
national council of chiefs was convened 
to determine the succession to the crown, 
and to settle other important affairs of 
government. Lord Byron had already 
shown so kindly an interest in the people 
that he was invited to attend the council, 
greatly and wisely aiding- the chiefs in 
their deliberations. lie unqualifiedly in- 
dorsed the objects and labors of the Amer- 
ican missionaries, and suggested many 
changes in their customs and the adoption 
of new laws. 

But the course of the missionaries was 
not altogether a smooth one. By the time 
of their arrival there had grown up a con- 
siderable colony of foreign residents, al- 
most without exeejition of the lowest and 
most depraved character. They did not 
themselves propose to submit to any laws 
restraining their licentious practices and 
they constantly incited the lower orders of 
the natives to resist. Many times the 
lives of the missionaries were threatened 
;iiiil on two or three occasions they were 
driven from their homes. Unfortunately 
the English consul, Charlton, sided with 
the disorderly element and was constantly 
stirring up strife. In 1826 the United 
States armed Schooner Dolphin, under the 
command of Lieutenant Percival, arrived 
at the islands, and took sides with the 
disorderly seamen and foreigners. Lieu- 
tenant Percival joined hands with Charl- 
ton and his followers and demanded the 
immediate repeal of the laws against vice. 
Later his men attacked the mission prem- 
ises, and Mr. Bingham barely escaped 
with his life through the assistance of 
natives. Lieutenant Percival then waited 
upon the chiefs and again demanded the 
repeal of the laws obnoxious to the dis- 



solute elements. Intimidated by his 
threats the governor of Honolulu gave as- 
sent to the violation of the law, whereupon 
it is said " a shout of triumph rang 
through the shipping." The Dolphin re- 
mained in port two months longer; and 
the same authority declares "that the per- 
nicious influence exerted by its crew dur- 
ing that time cannot be described." It 
is some relief to the American people 
to know that Lieutenant Percival was 
brought before a Court of Inquiry at the 
Charlestown Navy Yard upon his return 
and that most of the thirty-six charges 
against him were sustained. About this 
time several memorials were presented to 
the President of the United States by the 
shipowners of Nantucket, complaining of 
the frequent mutinies and desertions of 
their crews, and declaring that there wag 
danger that the " Sandwich Islands would 
become a nest of pirates and murderers." 
These memorials stated that nearly one 
hundred whale-ships visited the islands 
every year, and that thirty were fre- 
quently in the port of Honolulu at one 
time. As a result of these representations 
the sloop of war Peacock, Captain Jones, 
was sent to the islands to investigate con- 
ditions, arriving at Honolulu in October, 
1S20. where she remained for about three 
months. During this time a great coun- 
cil of chiefs was convoked by the Queen 
Regent, at which Captain Jones and the 
British Consul were present. Charlton 
denied the right of the chiefs to make any 
treaties or agreements with foreign 
powers, claiming that they were subjects 
of Great Britain. Proving that Charl- 
ton's own commission as consul recog- 
nized the independence of the islands. 
Captain Jones and the council soon agreed 
to the terms of a commercial treaty with 
the United States, the first the Hawaiian 
government had ever made with any for- 
eign power. In October the missionaries 
from all the islands met together and drew 
up and published a circular briefly review- 
ing the course they had pursued and 
challenging an investigation. The chal- 
lenge was accepted. A public meeting 
was held at the governor's house, over 



THE ANNEXATION OE HAWAII. 



539 



whic-li Captain Jones presided. Tlie op- 
position was as usual headed by Cliarltou. 
After the circular was read the oppiosition 
was invited to present charges and sup- 
port them by reasonable and credible tes- 
timony. As they declined to do this the 
meeting was adjourned and the proceed- 
ings dropped. In his report upon this 
meeting. Captain Jones wrote that "not 
one jot or tittle, not one iota, derogatory 
to their characters as men, or as ministers 
of the Gospel of the strictest order, could 
be made to appear against the mission- 
aries by the united eilorts of all who con- 
spired against them." 

But the barbarous seamen soon over- 
reached themselves. The earliest offender 
against the new rules which the mission- 
aries had instigated was a Captain Buckle 
of the ship Daniel, of London. Return- 
ing to the islands in 1827 he learned that 
a full report of his and his crew's out- 
rages in 1825 had been published in the 
United States, and ho proceeded to execute 
vengeance on the missionary at Lahaina, 
Mr. Richards. The latter was, however, 
hidden away by the natives and soon 
taken to another island. The violent 
threats and riotous conduct of the Daniel's 
crew aroused the chiefs to action. AU 
were summoned to attend a council at 
Honolulu, where it was decided that the 
nii>:sionaries should be protected at all 
hazards. The fort was immediately 
strengthened and preparations made to 
offer armed resistance to any who 
should attempt to do violence to the mis- 
sionaries or to make their will the law 
in the islands. And under the inspiration 
of their indignation, on December 8, 1827, 
the first written laws were drafted and 
published against murder, theft, adultery, 
rum selling, and gambling. This vigorous 
action seems to have put an end to the 
outrageous and riotous conduct of visit- 
ing seamen, and no more outbreaks of a 
similar character are recorded. 

Notwithstanding this organized oppo- 
sition which appealed to all that was base 
in the native character, the work of the 
missionaries now progressed more steadily 
and aggressively, with the hearty sym- 



pathy of nearly all the chiefs and the 
better class of the people. In 182'J, an 
immense thatched house of worship was 
erected at Honolulu, capable of seating 
, four thousand people. It was opened on 
July 3, the King taking a prominent part 
in the dedicatory services. About the 
same time, too, additional laws were 
passed further restricting theft, gambling, 
and drunkenness, as well as establishing 
rules affecting marriage and the observ- 
ance of the Sabbath. All the measures 
received the usual opposition, Charlton 
and his followers formally protesting that 
as foreign residents they were not amen- 
able to the laws or courts of the countiy. 
This position was effectually met by a 
proclamation from the government, ad- 
dressed to the foreign element, giving em- 
phatic notice that the laws of the land 
would be enforced equally against natives 
and foreigners. 

Material for a more pleasant chapter in 
the history of the relations between the 
United States and the islands was pro- 
vided by the visit of the American sloop 
of war Titicennes, Captain Finch, which 
arrived in October of this same year. 
Captain Finch bore presents to the King 
and more prominent chiefs, as well as a 
letter from the Secretary of the Navy 
eongratulating them on their " rapid prog- 
ress in acquiring a knowledge of letters 
and of the true religion." The letter 
further contained the following important 
assured recognition of the island govern- 
ment: "Our citizens who violate your 
laws or interfere with your regulations 
violate at the same time their duty to 
their own government and country, and 
merit censure and iJunishment. We have 
heard with pain that this has sometimes 
been the case, and we have sought to know 
and to punish those who are guilty." 
This declaration greatly strengthened the 
position and courage of the chiefs in their 
contest with the rebellious foreign element 
of the population. Captain Finch, too, 
took great pains to advise the rulers upon 
the principles of civilized government and 
institutions, and especially to inform them 
a-i to their rights and duties as an inde- 



540 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



liL"ii(leiit nation. Coming at a most criti- 
cal juncture in their national affairs, when 
the forces of anarchy and evil were most 
active, this visit of the representatives of 
the United States government served a 
most useful purpose, and was a potent ally 
of the chiefs and the missionaries in their 
efforts for civil and moral improvement. 
In 1830 the ased and devoted Kaahu- 
manu made a final tour of all the islands, 
g^reatly strengthening the purpose of the 
chiefs and the missionaries and their fol- 
lowers to establish a stable, civilized 
government, throughout the kingdom. 
During the later years of her life this re- 
markable woman labored unceasingly to 
encourage every movement looking toward 
the enlightenment and moral uplifting 
of her people, and stood like a great wall 
against which all the tides of lawlessness 
and evil beat in vain. In her earlier life 
as licentious and idolatrous as she after- 
wards became chaste and Christian her ex- 
ample was well-nigh as potent an influence 
for good as was the preaching of the mis- 
sionaries. Soon after the arrival of the 
latter they had devote<l their most serious 
attention to the work of developing the 
spoken language of the iwople into a writ- 
ten one. An alphabet of twelve letters 
was decided upon, — the five vowels, a, e, i, 
o, u, and the consonants h, k, 1, m, n, p. 
and w. The vowels have the same sounds 
as in the Latin languages, or particularly 
the Italian. In the written language every 
word and evei-y syllable must end in a 
vowel, and two consonants can never come 
together, — a vowel must always intervene. 
The accent of more than five-sixths of all 
the words is on the jienult. Having de- 
termined the form of the written language 
the printing press was in order. The first 
one was sot up in 1822, and early in that 
year the first impressions of eight pages of 
a Hawaiian spelling book were made. The 
novelty of the proceeding greatly inter- 
ested the chiefs and they were very recep- 
tive of all the instructions of the mission- 
aries as to the supreme value of the arts 
of reading and writing. As has been said 
the chiefs and their dependents became 
their first pupils, and the desire to acquire 



the simple rudiments of knowledge became 
widespread. Within two years more than 
two thousand people had learned to read 
and write. A peculiar system of schools 
spread over the islands. Each chief sent 
the most proficient scholars among his 
immediate followers to different parts of 
his province as teachers, calling upon all 
his subjects to attend school. As a native 
historian says : " The eagerness of the 
people to acquire the new and wonderful 
arts of reading and writing was intense, 
and at length almost the whole population 
went to school. The time of school was 
from one to two hours in the afternoon, 
and the pupils were called together by the 
blowing of a conch-shell." In 1832 it was 
estimated that about twenty-five thousand 
of the people could read, and a large 
proportion of these could also write. In 
that year common schools began to be 
opened for the children, most of the pupils 
down to that time having been adults. The 
steady growth, too, of a really Christian 
ideal of character throughout the islands, 
especially away from the evil influences of 
the important ports, was marked ; and it 
is undoubtedly true that the history of 
missions records no other so rapid and 
intelligent advance of a people from semi- 
barbarism and degradation along the road 
leading to civilization and a reformed 
social and civil life, as the Hawaiian peo- 
ple made during the decade following the 
arrival of the good brig Thaddeus. And 
in every one of these mo%'ements the good 
Queen Kaahumanu became an inspiring 
force, giving the encouragement of her 
visits to schools and missions in different 
localities, while earnestly and constantly 
apixaling to her people to abandon all 
idolatrous customs and superstitious prac- 
tices and come out into the sweet light of 
a moral life and trust in one only God and 
Father. As mentioned above, her last days 
were cheered by the possession of tlie first 
copy of the New Testament in the Ha- 
waiian language, enabling her to read the 
Gospel in her own tongue and not depend 
upon the verbal translation of the 
teachers. 

Evidences of the advance of the people 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



541 



ill civilization now followed each other in 
rapid succession. In 1831 the Lahainaluna 
Seminary was founded under the care of 
the Eev. Lorren Andrews. The scholars 
supported themselves in part by cultivat- 
ing a tract of land granted by the chiefs 
to the school. A printing press and book 
bindery were set up here, where many text- 
books were printed. In 1832 the first 
census of the islands was taken, showing 
a population of 130.313, disclosing a most 
astounding mortality, if Captain Cook's 
estimate of 400,000 population in 1778 
was in any degree accurate. The first 
newspaper printed on the islands of the 
Pacific was issued in February of 1834 
from the press at Lahainaluna, which was 
followed in October of the same year by 
one published at Honolulu. The first 
paper published in the English language, 
the Sandwich Islands Gazette, made its 
appearance in 1836. A girls' boarding 
school was opened at Wailuka in 1837, 
and a manual-labor school for boys was 
established the same year at Ililo. 

For a long time the system of land 
tenures worked against the interests of 
foreign investors and planters. Absolute 
ownership of land was unknown among 
the Hawaiian people. A life estate was 
the longest that could be held, and land 
could not be bought or sold like other 
property. Foreigners could only obtain 
permission to occupy practically at the 
pleasure of the chiefs or King ; and at the 
departure or death of tenants the land 
reverted to the crown. The first lease of 
land for a sugar plantation was made to 
Ladd & Co., in 1835 ; and the initial step 
was taken in the establishment of indus- 
tries and foreign interests that made the 
ultimate annexation to the United States 
a certainty. The same year a silk plan- 
tation was started, and cotton began to be 
raised and manufactured, a stone cotton 
factory being built at Kailua. 

The decade between 182.5 and 1835 was 
characterized, however, by many political 
disturbances and much friction with the 
representatives of the English and French 
governments. The chief grounds for 
French interference grew out of the 



treament of some French priests who came 
to the islands in 1827. A small chapel was 
built and a few converts were gathered in. 
The priests from the start received the 
encouragement of Charlton and his asso- 
ciate opponents of the reform movements, 
who anticipated that in the spread of the 
Catholic cause they would secure a power- 
ful political instrument. From the be- 
ginning, however, the priests were opposed 
by the chiefs, who saw in the Catholic 
service a worship of images which por- 
tended the restoration of idolati-j'. The 
Queen, Kaahumanu, in particular, opposed 
the new religion ; and b,y her orders the 
governor of Oahu (Honolulu) published 
an order forbidding the natives to at- 
tend upon the Catholic worship. Finding 
that the faith was gaining a foothold in 
Honolulu, the Queen ordered the priests 
to cease propagating their teachings, also 
commanding the natives to give up their 
crucifixes, and threatening all with severe 
punishment who should persist in using 
them. As the priests persisted in their 
ministrations a council of the high chiefs 
was called. The result was a formal order 
that the priests should leave the islands 
within three months. As they still re- 
fused to yield, and none of the foreign 
vessels were disposed to take them at the 
request of the government, the chiefs 
built a vessel of their own, at a cost of 
four thousand dollars, in which they de- 
ported the priests to the California coast, 
where they joined the Franciscan mis- 
sions. This experience led to a most 
hostile visit from the French frigate 
Artemise in 1839, when her commander. 
Captain Laplace, demanded and forced 
from the government most humiliating 
concessions. These, however, proved of iuj 
lasting influence. Even at the urgent re- 
quest of the American missionaries re- 
ligious toleration soon became established, 
and more peaceful political conditions 
followed. 

Their continued trovibles with the com- 
manders of war vessels of different 
nationalities, however, led the chiefs to 
seek instruction in the principles of gov- 
ernment and law. A letter was sent to 



542 



FKOM COLOXr TO WOKLD POWER. 



the United States' government asking 
tliat a legal adviser and instructor in tlie 
science of government be sent to the 
Inlands. But as nothing came of this 
request one of the missionaries, Mr. 
TJichanls, was chosen as their adviser in 
Is.'iS. He "was released from his connec- 
tion with the mission, and entered upon 
his new duties the following- year, deliver- 
ing lectures in the native language upon 
tlie principles of government and law, and 
assisting in the preparation of a consti- 
tution. The first draft of this document 
was made in ISOO. and was accompanied 




H '^ ^'^-^^<^.!r4i/)^p^p: 



REV. TITrS COAN, D.D. 

b.v a Bill of Rights, which the uativo 
people have regarded as their Magna 
Car'n. Il contained tlie fuilowing im- 
portant clause guaranteeing a security 
hitherto unknown in the Islands: "Pro- 
tection is liereby assured to the persons 
of all the people, together with their 
lands, their building lots, and all their 
jiroiierty, while they conform to the laws 
of the kingdom; and nothing whatever 
shall be taken from any individual ex- 
cept by express provision of the laws." 
Religious liberty was jilcdgcd in these 
words: "All men of every religion shall 



be protected in worshiping Jehovah and 
serving Him according to their own vm- 
derstanding." This fundamental law also 
created a legislative body of fifteen hered- 
itary nobles and seven representatives, the 
latter to be elected by the people. These 
legislators sat as one body and met 
annuall.v. They were empowered to ap- 
point four judges who, with the King 
and premier, should constitute the Su- 
preme Court of the kingdom. The first 
attention of the legislative body was 
given to the laws of the land. Old laws 
were revised and new ones added, and the 
completed collection was published in 
1S42. They established a uniform system 
of taxation, abolishing local and arbitrary 
assessments. During the same year a 
treasury board was created, consisting of 
four persons, with Dr. Judd, of the mis- 
sionary forces, as chairman. A regular 
system of keeping accounts was instituted, 
of collection of taxes, and fixed salaries 
were determined for the goverimient 
officials, with the result that the credit 
of the nation was soon established, and 
the most pressing debts were paid off. 
That these laws were impartially admin- 
istered, at least during the earlier days, is 
proved by the public execution of one of 
the high chiefs in 1840 for causing the 
death of his wife by poison. 

Educational matters continued to re- 
ceive careful consideration. In 1841 the 
first general school laws were enacted. 
Aliout the same time a school for the 
especial education of young chiefs was 
founded. This was later known as the 
Ro.val school, because its pupils were 
exclusively children or youth whose claims 
to the throne were acknowledged. In 
1843 a school was founded at Punahou 
by the American Mission, which has de- 
veloped into the present chartered College 
of Oahu. It was also a period of especial 
religious activity. What has been laiown 
as the " Great Revival " occurred during 
the years 1838-9. This movement ex- 
tended over all the islands and affected 
tlie bulk of the peoiile. More than five 
thousand people were admitted to the 



THE AXXEXATION OF HAWAII. 



543 



Protestant churches in 1839, and ten 
thousand the following year. The work 
was especially fruitful in results on the 
island of Hawaii, where the Kev. Titus 
Coan was the leader and tireless worker. 
In two years upwards of seven thousand 
people were added to his church in Hilo. 
The complete establishment of religious 
toleration, too, led to the revival of the 
Catholic mission. In May, 1840, the 
Bishop of Nilopolis, Rev. L. D. Maigret, 
and two priests arrived from Valparaiso 
and the erection of a Cathedral was at 
once commenced, a considerable number 
of converts soon being enrolled. The fol- 
lowing year the bishop returned to France 
to secure further aid, and in 1842 sailed 
for the islands accomisaniod by seven 
priests, seven catechists, nine lay brothers, 
and ten nuns. Their ship also bore a 
large supply of crosses, church ornaments, 
and a cargo of goods for the mission. Un- 
fortunately she foundered off Cape Horn 
and all on board were lost. 

A permanent form of government hav- 
ing now been established, and a good de- 
gree of financial credit, recognition by the 
leading foreign powers was eagerly 
sought. As has been suggested the King 
and people had for years been subject to 
the insolence and the conflicting demands 
and bullying of the representatives of 
different nations as they came to the 
islands in their respective war vessels. 
There was no Hawaiian army or navy. 
Foreign officers were, therefore, able to 
exact the most humiliating concessions 
from the chiefs, threatening to bombard 
the towns if immediate recognition of 
their demands was not granted. The 
worst offenders were the French, with the 
I']nglish as close seconds. But happily 
nearly all the absurd demands of these 
naval officers were later repudiated by 
their governments, though long after 
great distress and injury had been in- 
flicted upon the long-suffering people. A 
definite recognition of the independence 
of the nation by these powers could alone 
save the islanders from further insults of 
a similar character; and to secui-e such 
recognition an embassy was despatched in 



1843. During the previous year repre- 
sentatives of the government had visited 
Washington, and after several interviews 
with Daniel Webster, then Secretary of 
State, had received from him a letter de- 
claring " as the sense of the government 
I if the United States that the government 
of the Sandwich Islands ought to be re- 
spected; that no power ought to take pos- 
session of the islands, either as a con- 
ciuest or for the purpose of colonization; 
and that no power ought to seek for any 
undue control over the existing govern- 
ment, or any exclusive privilege or pref- 
erences in matters of commerce." Having 
this assurance of the position of the 
government of the United States, the en- 
voys of 1843 went directly to Europe, via 
^lexico. After wearisome delays they 
were able to secure a joint declaration 
from France and Englan<l which declared 
that " Her Majesty, the Queen of the 
United Kingdom of Great Britain and 
Ireland, and His Majesty, the King of 
the French, taking into consideration the 
existence in the Sandwich Islands of a 
government capable of providing for the 
regularity of its relations with foreign 
nations, have thought it right to engage 
reciprocally to consider the Sandwich 
Islands as an independent state, and 
never to take possession either directly or 
under the form of a protectorate, or under 
any other form, of any part of the terri- 
tory of which they are composed." Re- 
turning from Europe with this agreement 
the envoys visited Washington ; and on 
July 6, 1844, received from J. C. Calhoun, 
then Secretary of State, a despatch in- 
forming them that the President regarded 
the statement of Mr. Webster and the 
appointment of a commissioner to the 
islands " as a full recognition on the part 
of the United States of the independence 
of the Hawaiian Government." AVith 
these important assurances of the future 
respect of the most important foreign 
governments the Hawaiian nation seemed 
fairly to have entered upon its career as 
one of the group of independent states of 
the world. It had, however, many times 
during the next few years to realize that 



5U 



FKOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



the very weak powers have few rights 
that the strong will recognize if they in 
any way conflict with the apparent inter- 
ests of the latter; and every two or three 
years envoys had to be sent to the great 
states to clear up false situations or seek 
a remedy for abuses of their jiowers. 

A constant source of weakness of the 
native government was the absence of a 
well-informed legal adviser, familiar with 
international law. In 1844 a Mr. Eicord, 
a lawyer who Lad recently arrived from 
Oregon, was made Attorney-General. 
But it was not until 1S46 that any suit- 
able legal adviser was secui'ed. In that 
ye;ir the brig Uciinj, from Xowbury- 
port, arrived having on board fifteen 
passengers bound for Oregon. Among 
them was a talented young lawyer, Mr. 
W. L. Lee, who bcjre the very strong en- 
dorsements of such eminent teachers of 
law and jurists as Professor Greenleaf 
and Judge Story. He was prevailed upon 
to remain in the islands and to accept the 
position of Chief Justice of the Supremo 
Court, which he held until his death. As 
a native historian puts it. " to say that 
he was ' the right man in the right place ' 
gives but a faint idea of his eminent ser- 
vices to the country. He organized the 
Courts of Justice, and so conducted the 
highest tribunal that it soon acquired 
universal confidence and respect, and in- 
stead of being a source of weakness, be- 
came the strongest pillar of the govern- 
ment." One of the measures to which 
Chief Justice Lee gave his attention was 
the drafting of a new Constitution. This 
was nominally done by three commission- 
ers, one representing the King, one the 
nobles, and Mr. Lee acting for the 
representatives. This instrument was 
adopted June 14, 1S52. and signed by the 
King. As it has formed the basis of all 
subsequent Constitutions, its principal 
provisions become of interest. Under it 
a legislature was established to consist of 
two separate bodies, — thirty nobles, se- 
lected by the King, and twenty-four 
representatives to be elected by universal 
suffrage. A privy council separate from 
the house of nobles was instituted. The 



courts were organized practically as they 
have since existed, and consisted of a Su- 
preme Court composed of a chief justice 
and two associate justices, four circuit 
courts, and a petty judge for each dis- 
trict. Its liberal provisions placed the 
King. Kamehameha III., high in the favor 
of the people; and it was regarded by all 
as a marked advance upon the Consti- 
tution of 1840. 

The census taken in 1850 revealed the 
further shocking mortality among the 
jieople. As noted above, the census of 
18:52 gave a total population on all the 
islands of 130.313. A second, taken four 
years later, gave a total count of only 
108,579, a loss of 21,734 in four years. 
The census of 1850 showed that the num- 
ber of inhabitants had fallen to 84,165, re- 
vealing a still further decrease of 24,414 
in fourteen years. The latter census also 
gave the number of foreign residents at 
that time as 1,962. Immigration to the 
islands began to be encouraged in the 
" seventies," owing to a shortage of labor 
for the sugar plantations. A commission 
was sent to the Azores to interest the Por- 
tuguese in the subject, and to China and 
Japan. As early as 1865 a first colony 
came from China, numbering about five 
hundred. In 1878 the pioneer company 
of Portuguese arrived, numbering about 
two hundred; and in 1885 five hundred 
Japanese were brought in. How rapidly 
this foreign element increased and the 
native decreased the census of 1890 makes 
manifest. This gave the total population 
as 58.714 males, 31,276 females, a total 
of 89,990. Of this number there were 
natives and half-castes 21,449 males and 
19,173 females, in all 40,622. There 
were, however, 8,602 Portuguese, 15,301 
Chinese, and 12,360 Japanese included in 
the count, — a number which has since 
been materially increased. Nothing 
could better illustrate the decisive change 
in the character of the population of the 
islands than a comparison of these figures. 
In 1850 the proportion of the native peo- 
ple to foreigners was 82,203 to 1,962; in 
1890 it was 40,622 to 49,368. The census 
of 1896 showed a material increase of the 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



545 



total population which then reached 109,- 
020 ; but the natives numbered only 39,504 
while the foreigners were 69,516, — 61,214 
of whom were Portuguese (15,191), Jap- 
anese (24,407), and Chinese (21,616). 
From these figures it will readily be seen 
that the Hawaiian question had, before 
the acute stage of the question of annexa- 
tion was reached, materially changed its 
character. The native ijoijulation had al- 
ready become a comparatively small 
minority, and was year by year being more 
and more submerged by the rapidly in- 
creasing body of foreign residents. 

Our space does not admit of any de- 
tailed account of the political changes 
that intervened between the establishment 
of constitutional government and the 
recognition of the independence of the 
Hawaiian nation by tlie great Powers of 
the world, and the period of the supremacy 
of the question of annexation to the 
United States. Notwithstanding the as- 
surances of respect for the Island Govern- 
ment which France and Great Britain had 
given, they continued to disturb its peace- 
ful administration and to badger and 
harass its people in many ways. So ag- 
gressive were these attentions, and so 
threatening the attitude of the French 
government in particular, that Kame- 
hameha III. secretly executed a formal 
cession of the Islands to the United 
States, which he placed in the hands of 
its representatives to be used if the 
French government attempted to enforce 
its alleged claims. But from the middle 
of the century to its close the independent 
power and influence of the native rulers 
and people were constantly weakening 
and authority was passing to the foreign 
residents. In view of the waning vitality 
and vigor of the native race this was in- 
evitable and undoubtedly for the best. 
But many have looked, and will continue 
to look, upon the gradual crowding out of 
this kindly people by those whom they had 
hospitably received as guests, with feel- 
ings of deep regret. This transfer of 
political and financial supremacy must, 
therefore, offer two distinctly antagonistic 
points of view ; and while believing that 
35 



the annexation of Hawaii to the United 
States was the only logical and humane 
course, it is but fair that the other side 
of the question should be stated. As this 
was done clearly and concisely by the ex- 
Queen Liliuokalani in her book entitled 
" Hawaii's Story by Hawaii's Queen," her 
words will be used. " For many years," 
she wrote, " our sovereigns had welcomed 
the advice of, and given full representa- 
tions in their government and councils to, 
American residents who had cast in their 
lot with our people, and established in- 
dustries on the Islands. As they became 
wealthy, and acquired titles to lands 
through the simplicity of our people and 
their ignorance of values and of the new 
land laws, their greed and their love 
of power proportionately increased; and 
schemes for ag'grandizing themselves still 
further, or for avoiding the obligations 
which they had incurred to us, began to 
occupy their minds. So the mercantile 
element, as embodied in the Chamber of 
Commerce, the sugar planters, and the 
proprietors of the ' missionaiy " stores, 
formed a distinct political party, called 
the 'down-town ' party, whose purpose was 
to minimize or entirely subvert other 
interests, and especially the prerogatives 
of the crown, which, based upon ancient 
custom aiid the authority of the island 
chiefs, were the sole guaranty of our 
nationality. Although settled among us, 
and drawing their wealth from our re- 
sources, they were alien to us in their 
customs and ideas respecting government, 
and desired ahove all things the extension 
of their power, and to carry out their own 
special plans of advancement, and to 
secure their oivn personal henefli . . . 
Kalakaua valued the commercial and in- 
dustrial prosperity of his Kingdom highly. 
He sought honestly to secure it for every 
class of people, alien or native, in his 
dominions, making it second only to the 
advancement of morals and education. 
If he believed in the divine right of 
King's, and the distinctions of hereditary 
nobility, it was not alone from the preju- 
dices of birth and native custom, but be- 
cause he was able to perceive that even 



546 



FKOM COLO^'Y TO WOELD POWER. 



the most enlightcneJ nations of the earth 
have not as yet been able to replace them 
with a ruling class equally able, patri(]tic, 
or disinterested. I say this with all 
reverence for the fonn of government and 
the social order existing in the United 
States, whose workings have, for more 
than a century, excited the interest of the 
world; not the interest of common peo- 
jde only, but of nobles, rulers, and kings. 
Kalakaua's highest and most earnest de- 
sire was to be a true sovereign!, the chief 
servant of a happy, prosperous, and 
progressive people . . . He freely gave 
his personal efforts to the securing of a 
reciprocity treaty with the United States, 
and sought the co-operation of that great 
and powerful nation, because he was per- 
suaded it would enrich, or benefit, not 
one class, but, in a greater or less degree, 
all his subjects." 

It is a trite saying that however humble 
it may be, home is still the dearest jslace 
to us on the whole broad earth. The 
Hawaiian people had seen the descendants 
of the missionaries who had come to the 
Islands settling' among them as lawyers, 
bankers, and business men, until by an 
unconscious and hardly noted develop- 
ment a very .small minority of the po]nila- 
tion had attracted to itself the greater por- 
tion of the wealtli of the kingdom, ami a 
predominant influence in all its affairs. 
Most of these men were aliens, as the 
Queen complained, and had not become 
[■itizens of the country where there in- 
fluence was sn dominant. At the time of 
annexation these American residents 
numbered less than seventeen hundred. 
It is hardly surprising, therefore, that 
when the native rulers bcuan to realize 
the true situation they should have be- 
come restive, and endeavored to offer 
some organized resistance to the power 
that was so rapidly supplanting them. 
TTad the native race retained any of its 
ancient hardihood and vigor this resist- 
ance might have been as successful as it 
would have been reasonable. But a people 
that was so rapidly disappearing and had 
become physically so enervated could only 
submit to the inevitable. In fact, wlieu 



the United States annexed Hawaii it 
added so much more to the territory of 
the country. But it can hardly be said 
that it was the Hawaiian people who 
were added to the population ; it was a 
motley aggregation of Hawaiian, Portu- 
guese, Chinese, Japanese, and other 
foreigners, of which the natives formed 
a rather small and constantly decreasing 
minority. 

As one reads the history of the Islands 
the surprising fact is not that annexation 
was accomplished, but that it was so long 
delayed. For more than a half century it 
had been in the air, and American and 
Hawaiian leaders had given the matter 
serious consideration. As far back as 
1849, referring to the most recent French 
assault upon the independence of Hawaii, 
Secretary of State J. W. Clayton, in a 
letter to the American minister at Paris, 
voiced the official sentiment of the United 
States government regarding the Islands. 
" The Department will be slow," he wrote, 
" to believe that the French have any in- 
tention to adopt, with reference to the 
Sandwich Islands, the same policy which 
they have pursued in reference to 
Tahiti. If, however, in your judgment it 
should be warranted by circumstances, 
you may take a ]iroper opportunity to 
intimate to the minister for foreign 
affairs of France that the situation 
(if the Sandwich Islands, in respect 
to our possessions on the Pacific, and 
the bonds commercial and of other 
descriptions between them and the United 
States, are such that we could never, with 
indifference, allow them to pass under the 
dominion or exclusive control of any other 
powcT." Nothing resulted from these 
negotiations, however, and French aggres- 
sions became more intolerable. Two or 
throe war vessels of that nation were in 
the harbor all the time, and threats were 
made that the city would be bombarded 
unless certain guai'antees were delivered 
to the Admiral representing the French 
government. So little informed, however, 
was the American representative at the 
Islands of the position of his home govern- 
ment that on ]\rnrch 11, 18.51, he wrote 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



547 



Daniel Webster, who had become Secre- 
tary of State, advising him of the state of 
affairs, and asking how far he might go 
ill protecting tlio American flag if it 
should be raised by the local government. 
The King had then become so weary of 
the French insolence that he executed the 
secret cession of the Islands to the 
United States, which he placed in the 
hands of the American Minister, advising 
him at the' same time that if the French 
war ships opened fire the United States 
flag would be raised above the Hawaiian 
on all the government buildings, and 
the secret cession should become opera- 
tive. The Minister asked whether in such 
event the American war vessel in port 
could not be called upon to interfere " to 
protect American property, which is to be 
found on hath sides of every street in 
town and all along the wharves." In 
closing his letter he says : " The natives 
look upon them (the French) as enemies; 
and if they come again on a like errand, 
we shall be again appealed to for protec- 
tion, and the subject of annexation will 
come up again with added force." Reply- 
ing to our Minister's inquiries Mr. Web- 
ster privately urged uison him extreme 
caution, and instructed liim to return to 
the King the document the latter had 
placed in his hands. The Secretary's 
official communication stated clearly and 
precisely the position of his government. 
Among other things, he said: "It is too 
plain to be denied or doubted that de- 
mands were made uiwn the Hawaiian 
government by the French commissioner 
wholly inconsistent with its character as 
an independent state, — demands which, if 
submitted to in this case, would be sure 
to be followed by other demands equally 
derogatory, not only from the same quar- 
ter, but probably also from other States, 
and this could onl.y end in rendering the 
Islands and their government a prey to 
tlie stronger commercial nations of the 
world. It cannot be expected that the 
r/overnment of the United iStates could 
loolc on a course of things leading to such 
(I result with indifference. The Hawaiian 
Inlands are ten times nearer to the United 



Slates than to any of the powers of 
Euroi^e. Five-sixths of all their com- 
mercial intercourse is with the United 
States; and these considerations, together 
with others of a more general character, 
have fixed the course wdiich the govern- 
ment of the United States will pursue in 
regard to them. The annunciation of 
this policy will not sui-prise the govern- 
ments of Europe, nor be thought to be un- 
reasonable by the nations of the civilized 
world; and that policy is that while the 
government of the United States, itself 
faithful to its original assurance, scru- 
pulously regards the independence of the 
Hawaiian Islands, it can never consent 
to see those Islands taken possession of by 
either of the great commercial powers of 
Europe, nor can it consent that demands, 
manifestly unjust and derogatory and in- 
consistent with a bona, fide independence, 
shall be enforced against that govern- 
ment . . . The Navy Department will 
receive instructions to place and to keep 
the naval armament of the United States 
in the Pacific ocean in such a state of 
strength and preparation as shall be 
requisite for the preservation of tlie honor 
and dignity of the United States and tlie 
safety of the government of the Hawaiian 
Islands." 

Copies of this letter were placed in the 
hands of the French Minister at Wash- 
ington and of the American Minister at 
Paris; and our Minister was instructed to 
present a copy of it to the French Minis- 
ter at Honolulu. These words, whose 
meaning could not be misunderstood, 
served to check the aggressive movements 
of foreign powers, and to establish a posi- 
tion regarding the Islands which was not 
changed until actual annexation took 
place. In 1855, however, Kamehamema 
IV. eame to the throne, and the following 
year married Emma Eooke, a grand- 
daughter of the John Young- whom 
Captain Metcalf had left behind him in 
the last century, and who had been so in- 
fluential an adviser of Kamehameha I. The 
Queen, when a child, had been adopted 
by Doctor Rooke, an English physician, 
with the result that all her svinnathies 



5-tS 



I'liOM COLO:Nr to WOltLU i'OWEK. 



were with the British and unfavorable to 
American interests. Under her intiuence 
the King associated but little with Ameri- 
cans, but chose all his friends from the 
English settlers. " The King is strongly 
predisposed in favor of the British in 
preference to Americans or those of any 
other nationality," wrote Minister Mc- 
Bride to Secretary Seward, in 1SC3. 
" English policy, English etiquette, and 
English grandeur seem to captivate and 
control him. His familiar associates are 
Englishmen; and where an office becomes 
vacated by death, resignation, or other- 
wise, it is filled by the appointment of an 
Englishman ... It is plainly to be 
seen that the British government places 
a high estimate on the future value of 
the islands, believing, no doubt, that the 
Pacific and other railroads will be built, 
and that these islands will become very 
important as a ' halfway house ' between 
Euroj^e and America on one side, and 
China and Japan on the other . . . The 
American interests greatly predominate 
here over all others combined, and not less 
than four-fifths of the commerce con- 
nected with these islands is American. 
The English have no commerce here 
Worthy of the name, and but one or two 
retail stores; the Germans about the same 
amount of business as the English." Mr. 
McBride expressed the great fear of 
American interests that the " British rule 
should become dominant," in which case 
"American interests would be crushed out 
with eagerness and despatch." For some 
time, therefore, the British flag rather 
than the French was the danger signal. 
Queen Emma was active in the establish- 
ment 01 the English Church in the 
islan<ls. The King had already trans- 
lated the English Book of Common 
Prayer into the Hawaiian language, and 
in 1862 they welcomed Bishop Staley and 
other English clergy to the Kingdom, who 
soon after received the King and Queen 
into the communion of that church. But 
whatever evils these pro-English and anti- 
American movements might portend, the 
situation was wholly changed by the death 
of the King in 1863. Kamchameha V., his 



elder brother and successor, was of a far 
different character, and held with con- 
siderable success a middle course between 
the two leading factions. He was re- 
actionary in his politics, refusing to rec- 
ognijic the Constitution of 1852. He 
called a convention, however, in 186-i to 
draft a new constitution which proved to 
be generally acceptable and was con- 
tinued ill force mitil 1887. In 1867 a 
representative of the government was 
sent to Washington to negotiate a reci- 
procity treaty between the United States 
and Hawaii. Such a treaty was com- 
pleted and approved by the President 
and Cabinet but was defeated in the Sen- 
ate. It afterwards became known that 
the opposition to the treaty in the Senate 
was based chiefly upon the belief that it 
would interfere with the progress of the 
annexation movement. The King dying 
in 1872, the dynasty of the Kamehamehas 
was at an end, he being the last direct 
male descendant of the first and great 
King of the Islands. Passing the brief 
reign of one year of Lunalilo, the suc- 
cession to the throne rested between 
Queen Emma, the widow of Kame- 
hameha IV., and David Kalakaua. Imme- 
diately the strongest antipathies were 
aroused, the English rallying to the sup- 
port of the Queen, while the Americans 
supported the cause of Kalakaua. When 
the Legislature, specially convened, jiro- 
ceeded to election, the followers of Emma, 
believing Kalakaua's election predeter- 
mined, resolved themselves into a riotous 
mob, surrounded the Court House, broke 
in the doors, etc. The representatives 
were savagely beaten with clubs, one 
dying as the result of his injuries. The 
police being unable to control the mob, 
and the few native trooiJS being unreli- 
able, for the first time a force was asked 
for from a foreign vessel to put down the 
i-ii>t, and preserve peace. At the request 
i)f the government a force of one hundred 
and fifty armed men was landed from 
tlie United States war vessels Tuscarora 
and Portsmoiifh, which were luckily in 
the harbor. Order was soon restored, but 
hardly before a force of British marines 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



549 



was landed, without request of the author- 
ities, from the British war ship Tcnedos. 
After the dispersion of the mob the elec- 
tion proceeded, with the result that Kala- 
kaua won by a vote of 39 to 6. Shortly 
after, the American Minister, Mr. H. A. 
Pierce, who had long been an American 
merchant in Honolulu, called upon Queen 
Emma, advised her that Kalakaua had 
been elected and recognized by the rep- 
resentatives of foreign nations, and urged 
her to make the same recognition, and 
urge her followers to accept the situation 
without further disorder. Tliis she at 
once did, with the result that the factious 
soon became harmonized and less friction 
existed than for several years. Kalakaua 
proved, however, too friendly to the 
United States, and when, in 1874, he de- 
cided to visit this country vigorous pro- 
tests were offered by the French and Eng- 
lish Ministers. The direct result of that 
visit of several weeks was the execution 
of a reciprocity treaty between the two 
countries, which went into effect Septem- 
ber 9, 1875. The British government at 
once protested that the part of the treaty 
granting- certain exclusive commercial 
privileges to the United States was in 
contravention of the Anglo-Hawaiian 
treaty of 1852, which contained the 
" most favored nation " clause. This 
contention continued many years, and the 
consideration of the case by Mr. Blaine, 
as Secretary of State, in 1881, hardly al- 
layed the excitement. In a despatch to 
the American Minister at Honolulu, after 
setting forth in detail the situation of af- 
fairs then existing and showing the im- 
possibility of a grant by the Hawaiian 
government of any of the privileges ex- 
clusively given to the United States by 
the Treaty of 1875, Mr. Blaine said: 
" You will add that, if any other power 
should deem it proper to employ undue 
influence upon the Hawaiian government 
to persuade or compel action in deroga- 
tion of this treaty, the government of the 
United States will not be unobservant of 
its rights and interests, and will he neither 
unirilling nor unprepared to support the 



Hawaiian government in the faithful dis- 
charge of its treaty ohligations." 

This treaty was to continue in force 
seven years. When that time had elapsed. 




KING KALAKAUA. 

negotiations were at once opened for a 
second treaty of like character, which 
were efFective and resulted, in 1884, in 
the renewal of the treaty for another 
period of seven years. Moreover, as a 
part of this convention, the King ceded 
to the United States the exclusive right 
to enter Pearl river in the island of Oahu, 
and establish there a coaling and repair 
station. Again vigorous remonstrance 
was made by the British government, 
based, as before, on the Anglo-Hawaiian 
agreement of 1852. The treaty, however, 
prevailed and remained in force until an- 
nexation became an accomplished fact. 
But in view of the constant friction be- 
tween so antagonistic forces, in such a re- 
stricted area, it did not require great po- 
litical acumen nor a remarkably clear 
prophetic vision to see that an end of 
such constant disturbance of social, politi- 
cal, and business relations must soon be 
reached. Moreover, King Kalakaua had 
not proved a veiy acceptable sovereigii 
from the Hawaiian standpoint. Many of 



550 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEK, 



liis acts were subversive of liberty and he 
was charged witli gi'oss venality in some 
business transactions. Accordingly one 
is not surprised to learn that in 1887 a 
determined revolt against his course was 
instituted bj' a union of the better class 
of citizens, who now began to organize 
systematically to secure better govern- 
ment. A mass meeting of the people was 
called, at which a spirit was manifested 
tiiat awed the King. He at once agreed 
to give his assent to a new constitution. 
When this was drawn, its preamble de- 
clared that " the constitution of this 
kingdom heretofore in force contains 
many provisions subversive of civil 
rights, and incompatible with enlightened 
constitutional government." It was also 
declared to be necessary that a new con- 
stitution should be at once promulgated 
" in order to restore order and tranquillity, 
and the confidence necessary to a further 
maintenance of the present government." 
The terms of the new instrument con- 
tained many liberal provisions and gave 
satisfaction to the majority of the people. 
I.iliuokalani, sister of the King, however, 
who had been named as heir-apparent by 
him. stoutly rebelled against its pro- 
visions. She was decidedly averse to 
liberal ideas and is said to have openly 
upbraided her brother for his failure to 
assert the royal prerogatives. It was her 
wish and purjjose to restore as far as pos- 
silile the ancient absolutism of the sov- 
ereign. Rightly or wrongly she was 
charged with being the inciting cause of 
the rebellion under the lead of Wilcox 
and Boyd which broke out soon after. 
The insurgents seized the palace grounds, 
government buildings, and offices. At once 
the King sent a messenger to the repre- 
sentatives of the foreign governments, 
who attempted to communicate with 
the insurgents and learn their demands. 
Failing in this, and firing being heard in 
the direction of the government build- 
ings, an armed force of marines from the 
United States war ship Adams was at 
once landed. Upon their approach the 
rioters retreated to the King's bungalow, 
which they held through the day. An- 



ticipating further trouble, the contingent 
from the Adams was reinforced; where- 
upon the insurgents decided to surrender. 
Nothing was accomplished by the rebel- 
lion, though it was believed by the for- 
eign residents that the heir-apparent had 
shown her hand, and that they must per- 
fect their organization so as to be ready 
for any other overt acts. In December, 
1890, the King- decided again to visit the 
United States. Upon his arrival in San 
Francisco he was received with due 
honors. Shortly after, however, he was 
stricken with a fatal illness, and died at 
the Ualace Hotel, January 20, 1891. His 
body was returned to Honolulu on the 
United States war ship Chaiiesion. 

With the accession of Liliuokalani the 
decisive crisis in Hawaiian affairs was 
reached, and the beginning of the end of 
the national life. Convinced that the re- 
bellion of 1889 was instigated by the 
Queen her opponents anticipated an early 
rupture of the existing political relations, 
with a positive attempt on the Queen's 
part to return to the old principles of 
absolutism. Nor were they disappointed. 
Though she had taken an oath to support 
the constitution of 1887, she had evi- 
dently done so with a reservation; as she 
soon began to manifest a spirit independ- 
ent of the constitution and savoring 
strongly of personal government. For 
about a year after her accession her re- 
lations with the American party were 
friendly. Then her husband. General 
Dominis, an American, died, and she at 
once began to affiliate with the English 
party, and to be dominated by its influ- 
ence. As she has shown in her "Story of 
Hawaii," the Queen had a rather amus- 
ing love of pomp and display, and dwelt 
in loving admiration upon the conception 
of Kingly state. Courtly etiquette was 
cultivated, and elaborate chess and re- 
galia were demanded. Though the so- 
called National Guard was probably never 
larger numerically than a single company 
of a regiment of the American army, and 
was generally hardly equivalent to a 
" conioral's guard," yet the husband of 
the Queen was Licutenant-General of 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



551 



the army, wore a marshal's sash, and was 
covered with as many orders as would or- 
nament the breast of a Bismarck or Wel- 
lington at a Court reception. 

The Queen's first move was to relieve 
herself of her cabinet, or rather Kala- 
kaua's, which .she had inherited. But 
the little oligarchy which had become 
dominant in the Islands had planned 
wisely when they made their constitution 
of 1SS7. They realized that the King was 
then so alarmed by the disturbance they 
had excited that he would grant prac- 
tically all their demands. They con- 
sequently incorporated in the new con- 
stitution that no act of the King or 
Queen would be valid unless counter- 
signed by the Ministers, who, by the same 
law, could only be removed by impeach- 
ment or death. Then, nominating a min- 
istry of their own for the King, which he 
accepted, the American party had reason 
to consider themselves practically secure. 
Kings might come or Queens might go, 
but they would go on forever. These men 
were not Ilawaiians, they were American 
citizens, chiefly, and were familiar with 
American politics. The others were not. 
Consequently when the Queen, looking 
upon her ministers as in some degree, at 
least, personal to herself, undertook to es- 
tablish a cabinet of her own choosing to 
take the place of the late King's, she 
found herself powerless. The ministers 
refused to resign, and against the 
Queen's power of removal appealed to the 
Supreme Court. But here, strangely, the 
American party were defeated, as the 
Court ruled that Kalakaua's ministry 
ceased to exist with his death, and that 
the Queen was free to appoint a Cabinet 
of her own. But the ministers must be 
approved by the Legislature. This was, 
however, a small body and the leading 
bankers, merchants, and planters who 
composed the opposition party easily con- 
trolled it. List after list of nominations 
were sent in by the Queen and all re- 
jected ; until in sheer despair she ac- 
cepted a list suitable to the dominant 
party. This became widely known as the 
Wilcox-Jones cabinet. Affairs remained 



in this unsatisfactory and unsettled con- 
dition until 1893, when it became evident 
that the Queen was about to promulgate 
a new constitution. It was naturally an- 
ticipated by the American party that its 
terms would hardly favor their interests; 
and, it is said, it was " afterward dis- 
closed " that it woul.d have " placed 
American influence and the property of 
American citizens wholly at the mercy of 
the Queen and her personal adherents." 
It is unfortunate that there are no records 
of events on the Islands after 1890 that 
are not so tinged with partisanship as to 
malce them utterly worthless as history. 
A dozen books ai'e at hand, each one, how- 
ever, written by an American who went 
to the Islands, associated only with Amer- 
icans, was put up at the American Club, 
etc. It is somewhat natural, therefore, 
that the one or two per cent of the popu- 
lation who composed that party were the 
" intelligent," the " patriotic," the " most 
influential " people so constantly referred 
to by these writers, all of whom favored 
the opposition; while their opponents 
were — well, the less said of them the bet- 
ter. As we have said, annexation to the 
United States was a foregone conclusion, 
and had been for years; and considering 
the weakened vitality and virtue of the 
native race it was unquestionably a con- 
summation greatly to be desired. But 
it is hard to read the story of the last dec- 
ade of the nineteenth century in the Is- 
lands, as it is written, without a sensa- 
tion of moral nausea at the thought of so 
much virtue and noble jiatriotism arrayed 
against such cohorts of Satan and dark- 
ness. Happily, as in the fairy tales, 
virtue (and money) vanquished all the 
forces of evil, and the beauty of holiness 
shone resplendent from the legislative 
halls as the anointed took over the gov- 
ernment. This was done early in 1893. 
It was then that the Queen announced 
her intention of abrogating the Constitu- 
tion of 1887 and of establishing a new 
one, which, it is asserted, was dicated by 
herself, and represented her extreme 
views. Though this Constitution was reg- 
ularly drawn and presented to her Min- 



552 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEE. 



istors, copies of it in recent histories are 
wanting. It is alleged, however, that it 
provided that members of the house of 
nobles and council of state should be ap- 
pointed by the sovereign at will ; and that 
all white men, unless married to native 
women, were to be absolutely debarred 
from suffrage. The last provision seems 
so incredible that one hesitates to believe 
that a woman, who in other respects mani- 
fested not a little ability and judgment, 
should ever have considered it. However, 
it was upon this statement of fat-ts that 
the American party decided to act. Mr. 
J. L. Stevens was then Minister from the 
LTnited States to Hawaii, and in his de- 
spatches for more than a year previous he 
had shown that the question of annexa- 
tion was the one closest to his heart, — 
while his whole course was one of most 
hearty sympathy with the revolutionary 
party. The United States war ship 
Boston, was also in the harbor. Great ex- 
citement followed the announcement of 
the QuecMi, und, it is said, " thi' entire 




QUEEN LILIUOKALANI. 



military force of tlie Kingdom paraded the 
streets." This was Saturday, January 14. 
A mass meeting of citizens was called for 
the following Monday. At that meeting 



a " Committee of Public Safety " was ap- 
pointed ; and we are told that the " meet- 
ing adjourned amid great enthusiasm, 
every person present seeming determined 
to resist to the utmost the attempted ag- 
gressions upon their liberties." The dec- 
laration of the Queen of her intention to 
disregard the constitution was claimed to 
be an abdication of her sovereignty. The 
Committee of Public Safety called upon 
the department chiefs to resign, which 
they did, and the archives and govern- 
ment buildings and offices were surren- 
dered to the Conniiittee's representatives. 
A state of anarchy followed, the Queen 
not attempting to use force to oppose the 
Committee's revolutionary course. Claim- 
ing that public and private property was 
endangered, the Committee called upon 
]\Ir. Stevens to land troops from the Bos- 
ton to protect American interests, which 
were, as has been shown, identical with 
the interests of the Committee and those 
whom they represented. Accordingly Mr. 
Stevens requested Captain Wiltze of the 
Boston to send his forces ashore. The 
landing of the troops is said to have pro- 
duced a quieting effect, though no hostile 
force was anywhere in evidence. On the 
following da.y, Tuesday, the chairman of 
the Committee of Public Safety, in the 
presence of a crowd that filled the space 
about the govenunent buildings, form- 
ally proclaime<l the abrogation of the an- 
cient Hawaiian government, and the in- 
stitution of a provisional government 
" for the control and management of pub- 
lic affairs and the protection of the public 
peace," which should exist "until terms of 
union with the United States of Amer- 
ica " should be agreed upon. Upon the 
demand of the Committee the Queen's 
household guards, the police force, and all 
the civil forces surrendered with the ap- 
proval of the Queen. Thus, as is com- 
monly narrated, " the revolution was ac- 
complished without the loss of life, the 
monarchy had fallen, and the first active 
step toward the annexation of the Ha- 
w-aiian Islands to the United States had 
been taken." The Queen expressly stated 
in yielding her various positions that she 



THE AXNEXATIOX OF HAWAII. 



only did so to superior force, not wishing 
to enter into any conflict witli the repre- 
sentatives of the United States govern- 
ment bacl^ed by its military force. At the 
time of abdication she presented a writ- 
ten protest, declaring that she resigned 
the power only temporarily, until her 
rights should be determined by the United 
States government, to whose justice she 
appealed. This protest was received by 
the Committee and indorsed by its of- 
ficers. In it the Queen says: " I yield to 
the superior force of the United States 
of America — until such time as the Gov- 
ernment of the United States shall, upon 
the facts being presented to it, undo the 
action of its representatives, and rein- 
state me in the authority which I claim 
as the constitutional sovereign of the 
Hawaiian Islands." 

Realizing that their action must be put 
before the government at Washington at 
once, the Committee of Safety secured 
the only steamer in the harbor and at 
once despatched a commission from its 
members to proceed to the United States. 
There being no other means of communi- 
cation available at the time the Queen 
requested permission to send a letter to 
President Harrison by the same convey- 
ance, which was refused. She, however, 
despatched such a letter by the first mail. 
In her letter she says : " It is with deep 
regret that I address you ou this oc- 
casion. Some of my subjects, aided by 
aliens, have renounced their loyalty, and 
revolted against the constitutional gov- 
ernment of my Kingdom. They have at- 
tempted to depose me, and establish a 
Provisional Government in direct con- 
flict with the organic law of this King- 
dom. Upon receiving incontestable proof 
that His Excellency the Minister Pleni- 
potentiary of the United States had 
caused troops to be landed for that pur- 
pose, I submitted to force, believing that 
he would not have acted in that manner 
unless by authority of the government 
which he represents. 

" This action on my part was prompted 
by three reasons, the futiliti/ of a conflict 
v;Uh the United States, the desire to 



avoid violence and hloodslied and the de- 
struction of life and property, and the 
certainty whicti I feel that you and your 
government will riglit whatever wrong 
may have been inflicted upon us in the 
premises. In due time a statement of the 
true facts relating to this matter will be 
laid before you, and I live in the hope 
that you will judge uprightly and justly 
between myself and my enemies. This 
appeal is not made for myself personally 
but for my people, who liave hitherto al- 
ways enjoyed the friendship and protec- 
tion of the United States." Referring to 
her request that the vessel carrying the 
commissioners of the Committee of Safety 
might also take her letter to him, she con- 
tinues: "This request has been refused: 
and I now ask you, in justice to myself 
and my people, that no steps be taken by 
the Government of the United States 
until my cause can be heard by you. I 
shall be able to send an envoy about the 
second day of February, as that will be 
the first available opportunity hence; and 
he will reach you with every possible 
haste, that there may be no delay in the 
settlement of this matter." 

Unfortunately the simple woman, 
though a Queen, understood neither the 
exigencies of American politics nor the 
power of the influences opposed to her. 
For more than a year Mr. Stevens had 
been reporting a strong case against the 
Queen and in favor of the insurgent 
party to the State Department at Wash- 
ington ; and only shortly before the out- 
break he had advised in language more 
poetical than just : " The Hawaiian 
pear is now fully ripe and this is the 
golden hour for the United States to 
pluck it." The administration was, there- 
fore, not unprepared for the visit of the 
Hawaiian Commission. A treaty was 
speedily prepared with the Secretary of 
State which received the President's sig- 
nature and was submitted to the Senate 
for approval February 15, 1893. Unfor- 
tunately the Senators considered other 
matters of more importance, as the ses- 
sion was drawing to a close, and the 
Hawaiian business failed of consideration. 



554 



FROM COLOKY TO WORLD POWER. 



President Cleveland succeeded Presi- 
dent Harrison on March 4. His atten- 
tion had been called to the situation by 
the Queen at the same time she wrote 
President Harrison. Very soon after as- 
suming office, as is well known, Mr. Cleve- 
land withdrew the treaty from the Sen- 
ate. Mr. Cleveland's rugged justice has 
rarely been questioned by friend or foe, 
unless in the heat of partisan strife; and 
it is unfortunate that his course regard- 
ing the treaty should have been at once 
attributed to partisanship. It would be 
well for everyone interested in tlie sub- 
ject to read the message to the Senate 
which accompanied the withdrawal of the 
treaty. Its contents can only be sug- 
gested here. " When the present Admin- 
istration," he says, " entered upon its 
duties the Senate had under considera- 
tion a treaty providing for the annexa- 
tion of the Hawaiian Islands to the terri- 
tory of the United States. . . . But 
it appeared from the documents accom- 
panying the treaty when submitted to the 
Senate that the ownership of Hawaii was 
tendered to us by a Provisional Govern- 
ment set up to succeed the Constitutional 
ruler of the Islands who had been de- 
throned, and it did not apijear that such 
provisional government had the sanction 
of either popular revolution or suffrage. 
Two other remarkable features of the 
transaction naturally attracted attention. 
One was the extraordinary haste — not to 
say precipitancy — characterizing all the 
transactions connected with the treaty." 
The President then reviews each step of 
the proceedings at Hawaii, and con- 
tinues : " Thus between the initiation of 
the scheme for a Provisional Govern- 
ment in Hawaii on January 14 and the 
submission to the Senate of the Treaty of 
Annexation concluded with such govern- 
ment, the entire interval was thirty-two 
days, fifteen of which were spent by the 
Hawaiian Commissioners on their jour- 
ney to Washington." 

" In the next place, upon the face of 
the papers submitted with the Treaty it 
clearly appeared that there was open and 
undetermined an issue of fact of the most 



vital importance. The message of the 
President accompanying the treaty de- 
clared that ' the overthrow of the mon- 
archy was not in any way promoted by 
this g-overnment' ; and in a letter to the 
President from the Secretary of State, 
also submitted to the Senate with the 
treaty, the following passage occurs: 'At 
the time the Provisional Government took 
possession of the government buildings 
no troops or officers of the United States 
were present or took part in the proceed- 
ings. No iDublic recognition was accorded 
the Provisional Government by the United 
States Minister luitil after the Queen's 
abdication, and when they were in effec- 
tive possession of the government build- 
ings, the archives, the treasury, the bar- 
racks, the police station, and all the po- 
tential machinery of government.' But a 
protest also accompanied said treaty, 
signed by the Queen and her ministers 
at the time she made way for the Pro- 
visional Government, which explicitly 
stated that she yielded to the superior 
force of the United States, whose Min- 
ister had caused United States troops to 
be landed at Honolulu, and declared that 
he would support the Provisional Govern- 
ment. The truth or falsity of this pro- 
test was surely of the first importance. 
If true, nothing but the concealment of 
its truth could induce our government to 
negotiate with the semblance of a govern- 
ment thus created, nor could a treaty re- 
sulting from the acts stated in the protest 
have been knowingly deemed worthy of 
consideration by the Senate. Yet the 
truth or falsity of the protest had not 
been investigated. I conceived it to be 
my duty, therefore, to withdraw, the 
treaty from the Senate for examination, 
and meanwhile to cause an accurate, full, 
and impartial investigation to be made of 
the facts attending the subversion of the 
constitutional government of Hawaii, and 
the installment in its place of the Pro- 
visional Government. . . . Our coun- 
try was in danger of occupying ihe posi- 
tion, of having actually set up a temporary 
government on foreign soil for the pur- 
pose of acquiring through that agency 



THE ANNEXATION OF HAWAII. 



555 



territory which we had ■wrongfully put in 
its possession. The control of both sides 
of a bargain acquired in such a manner 
is called by a familiar and unpleasant 
name when found in private transactions. 
. . . liiit in the present instance our 
duty does not, in my opinion, end with 
refusing to consummate the questionable 
transaction. It has been the boast of our 
government that it seeks to do justice in 
all things without regard to the strength 
or weakness of those with whom it deals. 
I mistake the American people if they 
favor the odious doctrine that there is no 
such thing as international morality, 
that there is one law for a strong nation, 
and another for a weak one, and that even 
by indirection a strong power may with 
impunity despoil a weak one of its ter- 
ritory." 

As is well known Mr. Cleveland sent a 
special envoy to Hawaii to investigate 
the true state of affairs, and that as a 
result of his investigation the President 
declined to resubmit the treaty to Con- 
gress. Failing of the desired annexation 
111 the United States at that time, the Pro- 
visional Government established the Re- 
public of Hawaii, believing that, with the 
advent of another Republican Admin- 
istration in the United States, annexa- 
tion could be achieved. Accordingly 
when the first Congress of Mr. McKin- 
ley's Administration convened a new 
treaty was submitted, which its adherents 
believed would receive prompt and imme- 
diate action. Unexpectedly, however, a 
strong opposition developed. In another 
chapter of this book (World Power) the 
story of this campaign and the reasons 
for the failure of the treaty have been 
given. Unable to secure the desired re- 
sults in the regular way of treaty, the an- 
nexation party resorted to the measure of 
a Joint Resolution of Congress which was 
passed, and by President McKinley's sig- 
nature became a law, on July 8, 1898. 
Thus ended the long contest ; and the an- 
nexation of the Hawaiian Islands, which 
had been debated and contemplated for 
more than a half century, became an ac- 
complislied fact. 



On Friday, August 12, 1898, the United 
States war ship Philadelphia, under com- 
mand of Admiral Miller, arrived at 
Honolulu, bearing the largest ensign made 
for the purpose at the Mare Island Navy 
Yard, and the ceremony of transferring 




Photo, Copyright 1907 by J. K. Purdy, Boston. 
SANFOKD B. DOLE. 

the territory took place on that date. Be- 
side the chair of President Dole of the 
Hawaiian Republic sat Hon. Harold M. 
Scwall, who had been designated by Pres- 
ident McKinley as Envoy Extraordinary 
to receive the transfer of the Island ter- 
ritory. The certified copy of the Joint 
Resolution of Congress accepting the 
cession of the Islands was delivered to 
President Dole by Mr. Sewall ; and the 
President, in a brief address, delivered to 
Jfinister Sewall the sovereignty of 
Hawaii. After a prayer and the render- 
ing of the Hawaiian national anthem, 
Hawaii Ponoi, by the native band sta- 
tioned in the square below, at a signal the 
Hawaiian flag fell from the staff over the 
Government building, and the flag of the 



550 



FROM. COLOA'Y TO WOKLD POWER. 



United States was raised to its jilace. At 
the same time a similar change of flags 
was made over all public buildings, and 
the national salute thundered from the 
guns of the war vessels in the harbor. Fol- 
lowing the flag raising Minister Sewall 
proclaimed the sovereignty of the United 
States, and the oath of office was admin- 



istered to President Dole and the other 
oliicials by Chief Justice Judd, they hav- 
ing been authorized by President MeKiu- 
ley to continue the administration of the 
affairs of the Islands until a definite form 
of government for them should be deter- 
mined upon by Congress. 



XLvin. 

THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCEvS - 1899-1907. 



Early Arbitration Agreements. — The Jay Treaty. — The Burr-Hamilton Duel. — The Geneva 
Arbitration. — The Czar's First Letter to Sovereign States. — Public Opinion Regarding It. — • 
Second Letter and Programme for Conference. — Description of Holland and The Hague. — - 
Grotius and His Work. — The House in the Wood. — Splendid Courtesy of Queen Wilhelmina 
and The Netherlanders. — First Meeting of Fir.st Conference. — Twenty-six Nations, Twelve 
Hundred Million People Represented. — Character of Delegates and Languages Spoken.^ 
Delegates from the United States. — Routine Work of Delegates. — Social Functions. — De- 
tails of Results Achieved. — Effective Addresses of Leading Delegates. — Permanent Court of 
Arbitration. — Second Conference Demanded by Interparliamentary Union. — President Roose- 
velt's Action. — Final Call of Czar of Russia for Conference to Meet .June 15, 1907. — Delegates 
from United States. — Conditions Attending the Meeting. — Organization and Distribution 
of Work. — Notable Addresses. — Stubborn Fight to Perfect Permanent Court. — Magnificent 
Work of Mr. Choate. — All Provisions Made for Court, but no Judges. — Bitter Opposition 
of .Smaller Nations. — "The World Desires Peace." — The International Prize Court. — 
Achievements of Second Conference. — Opinion of Elihu Root, then Secretary of State. — 
Real Significance of the Conferences. 



" I once heard Mr. Root (Ex-Sec. of State of the United States) say ' there are no international contro- 
versies so serious that they cannot be settled peaceably if both parties really desire peaceable settlement. The 
matters in disoute between nations are nothing; the spirit which deals with them is everything.' This is 
perfectly true.*'— James Bryce. 



N the evolution of political and social life it has been the 
good fortune of the government and people of the United 
States, sometimes ■with clear vision and sometimes uncon- 
sciously, so to change the direction of forces active in a 
period that quite new and often unexpected results have 
been achieved. Thoug'h the Revolutionary War had been 
fought to a successful issue, the Treaty of Peace between 
the United States and Great Britain left many serious 
questions unsettled, which were constant sources of irrita- 
tion to the government and to the people of both countries. 
So acute had the antagonism become during the early years of Washington's admin- 
istration, that it was evident some mutual understanding must be reached, or 
the trial of battle again be made. To avert such a calamity, John Jay, one of 
the most enlightened, intelligent, and experienced statesmen of the period was 
sent to England in 1Y95 to negotiate, if possible, some treaty which should estab- 
lish a basis for the continuance of peaceful relations between the two countries. 
Though he achieved reasonable success, so hostile was the Republican parly, — the 
party of strong French proclivities, — to any negotiations with Great Britain, that 




558 



FEOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWER. 



the reception given Jay and liis treaty 
upon his return to the United States was 
most disheartening. Though dissatisfied 
with its provisions, Washington realized 
that it was the best that could be done 
under existing conditions, and his in- 
fluence was powerful enough to secure its 
aiiproval by the Senate. As the execu- 
tion of the treaty involved an expenditure 
of money, however, which must be voted 
in the first instance in the House, the 
majority of whose members belonged to 
the Republican party, there seemed to be 
little possibility of its being approved. 
The crisis was one of the most desperate 
in the early history of the nation, as on 
the day of the final vote it was found that 
the opponents of the Treaty would have 
a majority of six votes. Then was de- 
livered by Fisher Ames, of Massachusetts, 
what has been declared to be the greatest 
siwech hcai'd in Congress down to the days 
of Daniel Webster. After years of faith- 
ful service to his country, Ames was 
rapidly approaching the end of life, and 
was in such a feeble condition when he 




arose to speak tli.nt hi? weak body and 
voice well-nigh failed him. But inspired 
by the supreme imiiortance of the action 
of his fellow members, upon which he 
firmly believed even the continued exist- 
ence of the nation depended, he spoke with 



such fervor and convincing power that 
the majority hostile to the Treaty was 
overcome, and it was approved by a ma- 
jority of three votes. " For three hours," 
says the historian, " he held the House 
and the gallery in the spell of his burning 
eloquence, and closed with the pathetic 
words : ' Even the minutes I have spent in 
expostulating have their value, because 
they protract the crisis and the short 
period in which alone we may resolve to 
escape it. Yet I have, perhaps, as little 
l^ersonal interest in the event as anyone 
here. There is, I believe, no member who 
will not think his chance to be a witness 
of the consequences greater than mine. 
If. however, the vote should pass to re- 
ject, — even I, slender and almost broken 
as my life is, may outlive the government 
and the constitution of my country.' " 

Tlie highest significance of this treaty 
lies not alone in the fact that it served 
to avert war for the time, and postpone 
for twenty years what was probably an 
inevitable conflict, until the young nation 
was able to wage it successfully; but also 
in the great fact that it was the first 
agreement of this character entered into 
by the United States, and, perhaps, the 
first between any two independent nations, 
which made any provision for the settle- 
ment of political differences by peaceful 
measures, rather than by the arbitrament 
of tlie sword. The Jay Treaty provided, 
among other tilings, for the settlement of 
three of tlie questions at issue beiween the 
two countries hy mixed commissions, a 
form of irihunal which afterward de- 
veloped into tlie temporary arhitration 
Court, which has done so much in recent 
years to preserve and promote the peace 
of the world. Hundreds of treaties had 
been made before this, but their purpose 
had always been to define new relations 
and political or territorial rights, after 
war; but the Jay Treaty, .unconsciously, 
perhaps, to all the parties concerned. 
" blazed a better way," whicli it is to the 
eternal honor of the American government 
it has been well disposed to follow. 
" Peace hath her victories, no less re- 
nowned than war; " and it is these blood- 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEENCES — 1899-1907. 



559 



less victories, all of them the legitimate 
successors of the Jay Treaty, that are de- 
tailed in the pages of the more than two 
hundred arbitration treaties that have 
been negotiated between independent na- 
tions during the past century, as recorded 
by Professor John Bassett Moore, in his 
work entitled " International Arbitra- 
tions." 

Early in the nineteenth century the 
popular conscience began to be aroused as 
to the horrors of both public and private 
war, as well as to realize its futility in the 
settlement of misunderstandings in ac- 
cordance with the principles of justice. 
There was awakening a glimmering con- 
sciousness that " might does not make 
right." The duel between Burr and Ham- 
ilton shocked the better sentiment of the 
American people as no similar event had 
ever done; and the horrible slaughter 
which had been going on throughout 
Europe during the quarter of a century 
prior to 1815, as a result of which it was 
claimed over 6,000,000 had lost their lives, 
aroused in the popular mind a conviction 
that both individual and international 
wars were relics of barbarism, and that en- 
lightened and civilized peoples cou'.d and 
should work out some better method of 
settling disputed questions. One has 
only to read, even superficially, the story 
of the political and social development 
of the last hundred years, and the trend 
of the popular thought as reflected in our 
best literature, to discover the continual 
growth of more humane impulses as to the 
conduct of international strifes, as well as 
the constantly increasing strength of peace 
sentiments and of organizations founded 
to promote its interests; while the duel 
has come to be held in abhorrence, if not 
legally forbidden, in all civilized countries. 
Though the tangible results achieved 
previous to 1870 may seem meagre, yet it 
was everywhere manifest to even the 
casual observer that the Angel of Peace 
was troubling the waters, and that all 
civilized peoples were more and more real- 
izing the sublime fact that there was heal- 
ing in his wings. 

The Treaty of Washington, of 1871. 



however, placed the arbitration of inter- 
national differences on a more secure 
basis, and established principles of in- 
calculable benefit to mankind. The con- 
flict of opinion between Great Britain and 
the United States regarding the Alabama 
Claims had been long continued and 
bitter, and several times war seemed the 
only outcome; but wiser councils prevailed 
eventually, and the representatives of the 
two countries were able to provide for the 
amicable settlement of these most serious 
questions. Of far greater importance, 
however, than the immediate results to 
either jieople of the arbitration proceed- 
ings at Geneva, was the precedent then 
estahlished, which has ever since been 
recognized as of vital importance by the 
statesmen of both countries. As the dis- 
tinguished British statesman and writer, 
John Morley, has said: "The Treaty of 
Washington and the Geneva Arbitration 
stand out as the most notable victory in 
the nineteenth century of the noble art 
of preventive diplomacy, and the most 
significant exhibition in their history of 
self-command in two of the three chief 
democratic powers of the western world." 
With constantly growing unanimity the 
leaders of opinion in both countries have 
made Peace and Arbitration their watch- 
words; and it may be safely asserted that 
such relations have now been reached be- 
tween the two most powerful English- 
speaking peoples of the world that war be- 
tween them is no longer regarded as even 
a ijossibility whatever their differences. 
So dominant had become the spirit of con- 
ciliation in the conduct of international 
affairs that when the Congress of the 
United States, in 1890, adopted a resolu- 
tion " that the President be requested to 
invite from time to time, as fit occasion 
may arise, negotiations with any govern- 
ment with which the United States has or 
may have diplomatic relations, to the end 
that any differences or disputes arising 
between the two governments which can- 
not be adjusted by diplomatic agency may 
be referred to arbitration, and be i>eace- 
fully adjusted by such means," a sympa- 
thetic response came almost immediately 



560 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



from the British House of Commons, in 
the form of a resolution, approving of 
this Act of the Congress of the United 
States, and expressing the " hope that 
Her Majesty's g-overnment will lend their 
ready co-operation to the g-overnment of 
the Ignited States for the accomplishment 
of the object had in view."' Thus had 
these two great and influential nations, 
before the close of the nineteenth century, 
placed themselves on record, oificially, as 
favoring the most complete submission 
of differences between them to peaceful 
arbitration. But notwithstanding these 
signal achievements looking toward the 
reign of Peace on Earth, it appeared as 
if the nineteenth century was to pass into 
history with its latter years darkened by 
the hideous system of militarism. While 
making treaties of arbitration, the great 
Powers had with increased ardor enlarged 
their fighting forces. The military and 
naval budgets of Great Britain were more 
than doubled during the last ten years of 
the century, while those of the United 
States were more than trebled in the same 
jseriod; and under the influence of the 
" Jingo " spirit it was the avowed purpose 
of both nations to continue the same 
policy. Arbitration was magnificent in 
its way and within its limitations; but 
tlie very existence and continuance of the 
great military establishments of all the 
leading powers showed only too clearly 
that its ultimate effectiveness was 
doubted. Restriction and reduction of 
armaments, and a lightening of the ter- 
rible burdens of taxation which the great 
military establishments entailed, were the 
ends sought by the peacemakers; and of 
such tendencies there appeared no signs. 

But it was the darkness that precedes 
the dawn. On the 24th of August, 1898, 
Count Mouravieff, the Russian Foreigii 
Minister, presented to each of the diplo- 
matic representatives at the Court of St. 
Petersburg a lithographic communication, 
wliicli read as follows: "The mainte- 
nance of the general peace and a possible 
reduction of the excessive armaments 
which weigh upon all nations present 
themselves, in the existing condition of 



tlie whole world, as the ideal toward which 
the endeavors of all governments should 
be directed. The humanitarian and mag- 
nanimous ideas of Ilis Majesty the Em- 
peror, my August Master, have been won 
over to this view. In the conviction that 
this lofty aim is in conformity with the 
most essential interests and the legitimate 
views of all the Powers, the Imperial Gov- 
ernment thinks that the present moment 
would be very favorable for seeking, b.v 
means of international discussion, the 
most effectual means of insuring to all 
peoples the benefits of a real and durable 
peac, and, above all, of putting an 
end ',0 the progressive development 
of the present armaments. In the 
course of the last twenty years the long- 
ings I'o:- a general appeasement have 
become especially pronounced in the 
consciences of civilized nations. The 
preservation of Peace has been put for- 
ward as the object of international jjol- 
icy; in its name great states have con- 
cluded between themselves powerful al- 
liances; it is the better to guarantee 
peace that they have developed, in pro- 
portions hitherto unprecedented, their mil- 
itary forces and still continue to increase 
them without shrinking from any sacri- 
fice. All these efforts, nevertheless, have 
not as yet been able to bring about the 
beneficent results of the desired pacifica- 
tion. The financial charges following an 
upward march strike at the public pros- 
perity at its very source. The intellectual 
and physical strength of the nations, labor 
and capital, are for the major part 
diverted from their natural application, 
and unproductively consumed. Hundreds 
of millions are devoted to acquiring terri- 
ble engines of destruction which, though 
to-day regarded as tlie last word of science, 
are destined to-morrow to lose all value in 
consequence of some fresh discovery in 
the same field. National culture, eco- 
nomic progress, and the production of 
wealth are either paralyzed, or cheeked 
in their development. Moreover, in pro- 
portion as the armaments of each power 
increase, so do they less fulfill the object 
which the governments have set before 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1899-1907. 



561 



themselves. Tlie economic crisis, due in 
great part to the system of armaments 
a I'outrance, and tlie continual danger 
which lies in this massing of war ma- 
terial, are transforming the assured peace 
of our days into a crushing burden, which 
the peoples have more and more difficulty 
in bearing. It appears evident, then, that 
if this state of things were jsrolonged, it 
will • inevitably lead to the very cat- 
aclysm which it is desired to avert, and 
the horrors of which make every thinking 
man shudder in advance. To put an end 
fo these incessant armaments and to seek 
the means of warding off the calamities 
which are threatening the whole world, 
such is the supreme duty which is to-day 
imposed on all states. Filled '^^ ith this 
idea His Majesty has been pleased to 
order me to propose to all the govern- 
ments whose representatives are accredited 
to the Imperial Court the meeting of a 
conference which would have to occupy 
itself with this grave problem. This con- 
ference should be, by the help of God, a 
liapjjy presage for the century which is 
about to open. It would converge in one 
powerful focus the efforts of all states 
which are sincerely seeking to make the 
great idea of universal peace triumph 
over the elements of trouble and discord. 
It would at the same time confirm their 
argument by the solemn establishment of 
the principles of justice and right, upon 
which repose the Security of States and 
the Welfare of Peoples." 

No words can convey any idea of the 
astonishment with which this communica- 
tion was received. To many earnest men 
on both Continents who had been working 
and praying for some signs of the advent 
of the " Prince of Peace," it carried joy 
unspeakable and strengthened their high- 
est hopes. To the great majority, how- 
ever, it seemed the proposal of a dreamer, 
and hardly worthy of serious considera- 
tion. In many of the leading journals of 
Europe and America the Czar was im- 
mercifully lampooned, ridiculed, and cari- 
catured. The general sentiment found 
expression in the ancient query, " Can any 
good thing come out of Nazareth ? " and 
3C 



the issuance of such a circular by the most 
autocratic and, in the popular esteem, the 
most heartless and cruel Power of the 
world seemed little short of monumental 
impudence. Nor did a much more favor- 
able opinion obtain in diplomatic circles. 
The American representative at St. 
Petersburg reported to the government at 
Washington that " the general consensus 
of opinion among members of the diplo- 
matic corps now present appears to be 
that the proposition is visionary and 
Utopian, if not partaking of Quixotism. 
Little value is expected to result from the 
Conference, and indeed every diplomatic 
officer with whom I have talked seems to 
regard the proposition with that technical 
skepticism which great measures of re- 
form usually encounter." Happily there 
were wiser heads in the various home gov- 
ernments, and men of broader and more 
sympathetic political vision; and every 
American may take just pride in the fact 
that the United States decided at once to 
accept the proxjosal contained in the Rus- 
sian circular, an<l instructed the Ambas- 
sador at St. Petersburg to do so, orally, 
in the most cordial terms. 

Within a few months so many accept- 
ances had been received by the Russian 
Government that on January 11, 1881), 
a second circular letter was delivered by 
Count Mouravieff to the same diplomatic 
representatives who had received the first, 
acknowledging with a lively appreciation 
the hearty responses from all the Powers, 
and their acceptance of the Czar's pro- 
posal for a Conference. In the same com- 
munication suggestions were offered as to 
topics that might be made the basis for 
discussions, and limits proposed beyond 
which they should not go. 

The remarkable tact that had charac- 
terized every act of the Russian Govern- 
ment thus far, was further manifested 
in the last paragraph of this second cir- 
cular which declared that " His Imperial 
Majesty considers it advisable that the 
Conference should not sit in the capital 
of one of the great jjowers, where so iiaany 
political interests are centred which 
might, perhaps, impede the progress of a 



562 



rEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



work which all the countries of the uni- 
verse are equally interested in." On Feh- 
ruary 9th, Count Mouravieff advised the 
representatives of the invited Powers that 
the Imperial Government had communi- 
cated with the government of Her Maj- 
esty, the Queen of the Netherlands, re- 
garding- the choice of The Hague as the 
eventual seat of the isroposed conference 
and that, the Netherlands government 
having expressed its assent, the repre- 
sentatives were requested to inform their 
governments of this selection. The formal 
invitation of the Netherlands' government 
was sent to the invited Powers on the Tth 
of April, 1899. In this invitation the 
18th of May following was named as the 
date for the opening session of the Con- 
ference. Thus were concluded the some- 
what elaborate preliminaries for the as- 
sembling of the most notable body of men 
that ever came together to consider ques- 
tions of the most vital interest to every 
inhabitant of the globe. As the proposi- 
tion was absolutely unique in its incep- 
tion, there were no precedents to guide 
the Russian Court in its procedure; and 
the manner in which it avoided jealousies 
by limiting its invitations to the Powers 
represented at its Court, and friction and 
undue influence of any nature by the 
selection of The Hague as the meeting 
place, was worthy of the highest admira- 
tion, as well as of the unreserved endorse- 
ment all the Powers gave to the entire 
procedure. As was well said by one of 
the most prominent delegates to the Con- 
ference this was " certainly one of the 
greatest achievements of modern Russian 
diplomacy." 

The Hague is the interesting political 
capital of one of the most interesting and 
peculiar of the European states. Geo- 
graphically, Holland, or, as it is ofBcially 
known. The Netherlands, is one of the 
most insignificant of states, situated on the 
North Sea, and having an extreme length 
from north to south of 164 miles and a 
width from east to west of 110 miles. It 
is literally " made land," the result of the 
combined work of nature and man. As 
the name indicates, the Netherlands are 



low and flat, and form the delta of the 
Rhine, Meuse, and Scheldt rivers. So 
peculiar, too, is the configuration of the 
land, with the great Zuyder Zee cutting 
in from the North Sea to almost its south- 
ern boundary, that well-nigh its entire 
area is sea coast, and a large proportion 
of its towais are sea-ports. Along many 
parts of the coast, and along all the rivers, 
huge dikes have been constructed, thirty 
feet high and seventy feet broad at the 
base, for protection against inundation. 
The whole country, too, is intersected by 
a marvelous system of canals, which are 
to be found everj-where. and which have 
a total length of over 1,600.000 miles. 
These have been cut partly for the purpose 
of communication, but more particularly 
for drainage. One of the most interesting 
of travelers and writers, d'Amicis, has 
given this description of the country : 
" What sort of a country Holland is has 
been told by many in a few words. 
Napoleon said it was an alluvion of 
French rivers — the Rhine, the Meuse, 
and the Scheldt — and with tliis pre- 
text he added it to the empire. One 
writer has defined it as a sort of transi- 
tion between land and sea. Another, 
as an immense crust of earth float- 
ing in the water. Others, as an annex of 
the old continent, the China of Europe, 
the end of the earth and the beginning of 
the ocean, a measureless raft of mud and 
sand : and Phillip II. called it ' the coun- 
try nearest to Hell.' But all agreed upon 
one point, and all expressed it in the same 
words; Holland is a conquest made by 
man over the sea — it is an artificial coun- 
try — the Hollanders made it — it exists be- 
cause the Hollanders preserve it — it will 
vanish whenever the Hollanders abandon 
it." In the Introduction to his " Rise of 
the Dutch Republic," Motley thus speaks 
of this remarkable country : " Geo- 
graphically and ethnologically, the Low 
Countries belong both to Gaul and to Ger- 
many. It is even doubtful to which of 
the two the Batavian island, which is tho 
core of the whole country, was reckoned 
liy tho Romans. Three great rivers- — the 
Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheldt — had 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEENCES — 1899-1907. 



5G3 



deposited their slime for ages ar.iong the 
dunes and sandbanks heaved up by the 
ocean around their moutlis. A delta was 
thus formed habitable at last for man. 
It was by nature a wide morass, in which 
oozy islands and savage forests were in- 
terspersed among lagoons and shallows; 
a district lying partly below the level of 



race, engaged for generations in stub- 
born conflict with the angry elements, 
was unconsciously educating itself for its 
great struggle with the still more savage 
despotism of man. The whole territoi-y 
of the Netherlands was girt with forests. 
The groves of Haarlem and the Hague 
are relics of this ancient forest. The vast 




THE VyVER, OR FISH POND, THE HAGUE. 



the ocean at its higher tides, subject to 
constant overflow from the rivers, and to 
frequent and terrible inundations by the 
sea. . . . Here, within a half-sub- 
merged territory, a race of \''retched 
iethyophagi dwelt upon ' terpen,' or 
mounds, which they had raised, like 
beavers, above the almost fluid soil. Here, 
at a later day, the same race chained the 
tyrant Ocean and his mighty streams 
into subserviency, forcing them to fertil- 
ize, to render commodious, to cover with 
a beneficent network of veins and arteries, 
and to bind by watery highways with the 
farthest ends of the world, a country dis- 
inherited of its rights. A region, outcast 
of ocean and earth, wrested at last from 
both domains their richest treasures. A 



Ilercynian forest, nine days journey in 
breadth, closed in the country on the Ger- 
man side. On the South, the famous 
groves of Ardennes, haunted by faun and 
satyr, embowered the country and sep- 
arated it from Celtic Gaul. Thus inun- 
dated by mighty rivers, quaking beneath 
the level of the ocean, belted about by 
hirsute forests, this lowland, nether land, 
hollow land, or Holland, seemed hardly 
deserving the arms of the all-accom- 
plished Roman." 

But it is physically only that Holland 
is insignificant, few states having played 
a more important part in the history and 
development of modern Europe. All 
readers of Motley's works are familiar 
with the terrible sufferings the Dutch en- 



564 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



dured to protect their civil and religious 
liberties, resisting successfully all the 
powers and arms of Spain, and surviving 
all the tortures of the Inquisition. Later 
the little state became practically the 
leading power in the industrial and com- 
mercial world, and mistress of the seas. 
After the battle of Goodwin Sands, in 
1052, the Dutch Admiral Van Tromp 
paraded the English coast with a broom 
at the masthead of his vessel, proclaiming 
that he had swept the English channel; 
and in 1667 De Euyter sailed up the 
Thames and blockaded London. The sur- 
plus energj' of its people found vent in 
every form of commercial ende.avor and 
maritime conquest. Thriving colonies 
were founded in both the East and West 
Indies, which are still a chief source of 
the wealth of the country. At home their 
manufacturing industries were probably 
more and better developed than those of 
any other state; and many a housewife 




HUGO GROTIUS 

still calls certain kinds of linens " Hol- 
lands." Kor were the achievements of 
this remarkable people less distinguished 
in literature, art, philosophy, and religion. 
For well-nigh a century Holland was the 
tolerant and peaceful haven in which " the 
persecuted for righteousness' snke " of 
other countries found refuge. From few, 



if any, other cities of the world have 
there gone forth such potent influences 
for the enlightenment of the whole earth, 
and for the humanizing and uplifting of 
its people, as from the little city of Delft, 
four miles east of The Hague. Here was 
born in 1583 the great Grotins, more 
than any other one man the father of all 
the tendencies that look toward " peace 
among men," the great apostle of tolera- 
tion when it was a well-nigh unknown 
virtue, and the author of the great work 
which is the basis of the entire system 
of modern international law. Of Grotius 
and his work Hon Andrew D. White has 
said: "This debt (of gratitude) is that 
.which, in common with the whole world, 
we owe to one of whom all civilized lands 
are justly proud, — the poet, the scholar, 
the historian, the statesman, the diplomat, 
the jurist, the author of the treatise 
De Jwre Belli ac Pacts. Of all works 
not claiming divine inspiration that book, 
written by a man proscribed and hated 
both for his polities and his religion, has 
l")roved the greatest blessing to humanity. 
More than any other it has prevented un- 
merited suffering, misery, and sorrow; 
more than any other it has ennobled the 
military profession ; more than any other 
it has promoted the blessings of peace and 
diminished the horrors of war.'' From 
this same little city of Delft, too, in 1620. 
sailed the " Mayflower," bearing the im- 
mortal Pilgrim Fathers to plant in the 
new world the seeds of religion and jjoliti- 
cal liberty. What more fitting place could 
have been found, where else an historical 
atmosphere so congenial, for the assem- 
bling of the first International Peace 
Congress, the " first conference of the 
whole world," the sole object of whose 
existence was the uplifting of the people 
of every clime and race, and the opening 
of the doors that the Prince of Peace 
might come in. 

The Hague, though far outstripped by 
Amsterdam and Eotterdam in commercial 
importance, is the most beautiful of the 
cities of the Netherlands. It has been de- 
scribed as "unlike other Dutch cities, — 
more like a French city strayed over into 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEENCES — 1899-1907. 



565 



Holland." Its broad streets are lined 
Avith trees, and there are many open 
spaces and parks. The centre of the city, 
where are the most historic buildings, is 
by the Vyver, or " fish pond," a lake of 
considerable size and beauty. Along the 
sides extend the principal streets and the 
fashionable promenades. The city was 
originally the hereditary seat of the 
Counts of Holland, and its Dutch name 
" Graven Hage," or " en Haag," signifies 
the Count's enclosure or hedge. Since 
the latter part of the sixteenth century 
it has been the political centre of the 
country, and there the nobles, the for- 
eign ambassadors, and all the important 
officials of the realm have resided. In 
walking through its streets signs of wealth 
and fashion are everywhere visible. The 
two chief points of interest are the Art 
Gallery, which has been called the " Jewel 
of The Hague," and the famous " House 
in the Wood." The art gallery has about 
four hundred and fifty canvases, many of 
which are of the highest merit with, of 
course, a large representation of the 
Dutch masters. It is particularly rich in 
Eembrandts and includes his best known 
painting the " Lesson in Anatomy." An- 
other of the famous works is Paul Pot- 
ter's " Bull,"— " that Bull which," says 
d'Amicis, " at the time when there was a 
mania for classifying pictures in a sort of 
hierarchy of celebrity, hung in the gallery 
of the Louvre side by side with the 
' Transfigairation ' of Raphael, the ' St. 
Peter Martyr ' of Titian, and the ' Com- 
munion of St. Jerome' of Domenicho; 
that Bull for which England would 
give a million francs, and with which 
Holland would not part for double that 
sum." The " House in the Wood " is sit- 
uated about a mile east of the city, in the 
beautiful park known as the " Bosch." 
This is the summer palace of the Dutch 
royal family, and was built in 1047 in 
memory of Prince Frederick Henry of 
Orange, by his wife. Uniting tjie quali- 
ties of beauty and simplicity in its ex- 
terior, the palace in its interior presents 
a series of magnificently ornamented 
rooms, the finest of which is the Orange 



Zaal, — the ballroom, which was most elab- 
orately decorated by Jordaens and other 
pupils of Rubens. This room has now 
become historic as the assembling place 
of the first International Peace Confer- 
ence. 

In ]S9S, while the negotiations de- 
scribed above preliminary to the calling of 




Photograph Underiiwod & Undcrzvood, N. Y. 
QUEEN WILHELMINA. 

the conference were pending, the interest 
of the whole world was for a time centred 
in The Hague because of the comini;- of 
age of the young and beautiful Queen, 
Wilhelmina. Born in 1880, she became 
legally the Queen on the death of her 
father in 1890, but could not ascend to 
the throne until she had reached her legal 
maturity. During the years of the 
regency of her mother, Queen Emma, 
many accounts appeared in the magazines 
and papers describing the beauty of char- 
acter and person of the young Queen and 
her democratic, human, and lovable traits. 
When, therefore, she assumed the author- 
ity as well as title of Queen and was en- 
throned with great splendor and rejoicing 
in 1898, there was a spontaneous outburst 



566 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEE. 



of affection and good will from the people 
(if all nations; and it was certainly a 
liappy omen that one of the earliest duties 
and privileges of her official life was to 
invite the delegates to the Peace Confer- 
ence to become the honored guests of her 
government and later to receive them 
with a graciousness and sweetness that 
charmed even the hardest hearted and 
coolest headed of the world's diplomats; 
and lier dei^p interest in the movement 
wa.s manifested when she placed at the 
disposal of the Conference, for its meet- 
ing filace, the most beautiful room of her 
favorite palace, the great Orange Zaal. 

" On Thursday, the 18th of May," says 
Mr. F. W. Holls, a delegate from the 
United States and the historian of the 
Conference, " the beautiful Netherlands 
capital, The Hague, presented a stirring 
and picturesque spectacle. From all the 
public buildings, the principal hotels, the 
various embassies and legations, and also 
from many private houses, especially in 
the neighborhood of the public S(]uare.s, 
the flags of nearly all civilized countries 
were thrown to the winds. The delegates 
of twenty-five powers had arrived to at- 
tend tlie opening of what has since been 
known as the International Peace Confer- 
ence. It was a iserfeet spring day, and it 
had been chosen for this interesting eere- 
monj' because it was the birthday of the 
Emperor of Russia." At two o'clock in 
the afternoon the delegates assembled for 
their first meeting, and it was found that 
four rows of concentric, semi-circular 
tables, covered with green baize, had been 
provided, affording just one hundred 
seats, — the exact number of delegates ex- 
pected. These had been assigned to the 
respective states in alphabetical order, 
the French language being used, and the 
United States having been classed as 
Amerique shared with Germany (Alle- 
magne) the seats of honor along the 
centre of the room, and directly in front 
of the president's chair. Upon investiga- 
tion it was found that every delegate was 
present at the first meeting. There was 
no room for spectators or for journalists, 
except in a narrow gallerj- in the cupola, 



to which a few invited guests were ad- 
mitted on the opening and closing days 
of the Conference. At all other times all 
besides members were rigidly excluded, 
and visitors were not jiermitted even to 
inspect the palace during the sessions of 
the conference or any of its committees. 
Every guarantee was thus given for com- 
plete privacy and freedom of delibera- 
tions. 

That this was indeed an assembly rep- 
resenting the world, a few facts selected 
from an array of statistics brought to- 
gether by Dr. Trueblood, in his interest- 
ing volume on " The Federation of the 
World," will abundantly demonstrate. 
Twenty-four independent and two semi- 
independent nations were present by their 
delegates, — all the European nations, 
twenty in number, two from North Amer- 
ica, and four from Asia. The twenty-six 
nations represented, with their depend- 
encies, have a population of over twelve 
hundred millions of people, or more 
than four-fifths of the population of 
the globe. Territorially, close to five- 
sixths of the earth's surface was rep- 
resented. The whole of Europe, the 
wliole of North America, practically 
the whole of Asia, most of Africa, 
and of the islands of the sea par- 
ticipated by direct or indirect rejiresenta- 
tion, in this unique gathering. Only 
South and Central America and a few 
small sections of territory had no share 
in it. Moreover no such array of tongues 
ever came together since the differentia- 
tion of human speech began. Though 
French was the official language of the 
deliberation of the Conference, the dele- 
gates spoke, as their native tongues, no 
less than twenty different languages. At 
the Hague one might have heard English, 
French, German, Spanish, Russian, Ital- 
ian, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, 
Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, 
Greek, Turkish, Roumanian, Bulgarian, 
Servian, Hungarian, Polish, Prussian, 
Siamese, and possibly Arabic. The men 
of which the Conference was composed, 
too, were among the most eminent public 
men of the time. More than thirty were 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEEN CES — 1S99-1907 



367 



actual ambassadors or ministers pleniiio- 
tentiary of their governments to foreign 
courts, the men who constitute the most 
powerful political tie binding the nations 
together. Among the delegates also were 
the eminent educators from both hemi- 
spheres, distinguished students and ex- 
pounders of international law, capable 
and experienced jurists, eminent cabinet 
officers, senators and representatives, and 
military and naval experts of the first 
rank. This bodj- of public men might 
doubtless have been duplicated in ability, 
experience and fitness, but it could not 
probably have been surpassed by an equal 
number from among living statesmen and 
publicists. 

The following distinguished gentlemen 
were named by the President to represent 
the United States at the Conference: 
Hon. Andrew D. White, Ambassador to 
Germany, elected President of the dele- 
gation; Hon. Seth Low, President of 
Columbia University; G. F. W. Holls, of 
New York, an eminent lawyer, and later 
the historian of the Conference; Captain 
A. S. Mahan of the United States Navy; 
and Captain W. Crozier of the Army. 

The first meeting of the Conference 
was called to order by the Minister of 
Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, W. 
H. de Beaufort, who welcomed the dele- 
gates most cordially in behalf of his gov- 
ernment, expressing the conviction that 
" the day of the meeting of this Confer- 
ence will, beyond doubt, be one of the 
days which will mark the history of the 
century which is about to close;" and in 
conclusion he expressed the desire that 
the Presidency of the Assembly should 
be conferred upon his Excellency M. 
de Staal, the Ambassador of Russia, il. 
de Staal accepted the ofiice in a very 
graceful address in which he declared that 
he " could not consider the election which 
has been conferred upon me otherwise than 
as a result of my being a plenipotentiary 
of the Emperor, my Master, — the August 
Initiator of the idea of this Conference." 
Following his address of acceptance the 
President proposed to send to Her Ma- 
jesty, the Queen, " whose grateful guests 



we are," this message: "Assembled fur 
the first time in this beautiful ' House in 
the Wood ' the members of the Confer- 
ence hasten to place their best wishes at 
the feet of your Majesty, begging the 
acceptance of the homage of their 
gratitude for the hospitality which you. 
Madam, have so graciously deigned to of- 
fer them." At the second session of the 
Conference the President had the pleasure 
of reading to the delegates the Queen's 
reply in these words : " In thanking your 
Excellency, as well as the members of the 
Peace Conference, for the sentiment ex- 
pressed in your telegram. I take this oc- 
casion, with great pleasure, to repeat my 
welcome to my counti-y. I wish most sin- 
cerely that, with the aid of God, the work 
of the Conference may realize the gen- 
erous idea of your August Sovereign." 
In his second letter to the Powers the 




Photo. Copyrighted 1903 Itij J. E. Purdy, Boston. 
.iNDUEW D. WHITE. 

Emperor had suggested eight subjects 
which he deemed of such a character that 
they could be discussed without exciting 
individual national animosities. The first 



5G8 



FEOM COLOXY TO WORLD POWEE. 



four naturally g-rouped themselves under 
the general head of military afiairs; the 
next three under the head of subjects that 
had been considered ijrcviously at the 
Geneva Convention of 1864; while the 
eighth covered the general jsroposition of 
mediation and arbitration. In outlining 
its work, therefore, the Conference divided 
itself into three great or chief committees 
and one of these general subjects enu- 
merated was assigned to each. These Com- 
mittees were subdivided, such sub-divi- 
sions considering individual subjects 
under the general head. The conclusions 
of these sub-committees were first ap- 
proved or rejected, or varied, by its grand 
committee; and the approved findings of 




THE HOUSE IN THE WOOD. 

these general committees were then taken 
up and acted upon by the Conference as 
a whole. The work was thus greatly sim- 
])lified and much friction and inauy 
stormy debates unquestionably avoided 
with the result that, though the Confer- 
ence was in session from May 18 to July 
29, seventy-two days, — it only met as a 
plenary body ten times. But the story of 
the routine activities of the members 
shows tliat constant and devoted work 
was being done b,y each, daily and nlglitly. 
in the sub- or general-committees. 

All the delegates who have written 
upon the proceedings of the Conference 
bear testimony to the fact that in its 
earlier days a positive spirit of skepticism 
and doubt, even of contempt for the whole 



idea, possessed many of the representa- 
tives assembled ; and it was only gradually 
that this spirit disappeared as members 
became better acquainted, and exchanged 
views and sentiments with each other. 
As soon as it became evident that tangi- 
ble results could and would be secured, 
all worked together harmoniously and 
with unflagging zeal. Two things which 
contributed especially to this end were 
(1) the continuous round of social func- 
tions in the city, which brought the dele- 
gates together in a friendly way at teas, 
dinners, and receptions; and (2) the fine 
tact and generous and thoughtful hos- 
pitality that was everj^vhere in evidence 
on the part of the officers of the govern- 
ment who had the provision for the com- 
forts and necessities of the delegates in 
chai'ge. This was well illustrated in the 
assemblies at the " House in the Wood." 
All the meetings of the Conference as a 
whole or of its committees were held 
there; and on evei'y occasion an elaborate 
luncheon was served, care being always 
taken by the master-of-ceremonies that 
the same delegates should not be grouped 
at the tables day after day, but new com- 
binations made. Before the Conference 
had come to the point of considering any 
of the important subjects as a whole, 
therefore, all the members had become 
pleasantly and quite well acquainted. A 
community of interest and a mutual re- 
spect and regard had been established 
which worked as a potent factor in all 
their deliberations. After the formalities 
of the organization had been completed 
the Conference took up its routine work. 
The eight subjects suggested by the Czar 
were recognized by the delegates as con- 
stituting their programme. In his open- 
ing address Baron de Staal had limited the 
scope of discussion in these terms: " It is 
understood that outside of the topics men- 
tioned above (the Czar's eight proposi- 
tions), the Conference does not consider 
itself competent to consider any other 
question. In case of doubt the Conference 
shall have to decide whether any proposi- 
tion originating in the commissions, is 
or is not within the scope of the topics 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEREISiCES — 1899-1907. 



569 



outlined." This ruling of the president 
turned the discussion into well defined 
channels and greatly simplified the work 
of the delegates. It also served fre- 
quently to dispose of some questions that 
arose which threatened to scatter the 
seeds of discord among the members. All 
acquiesced in the position taken by Baron 
de Staal ; and in the instances where new 
propositions were suggested in the com- 
missions, the Conference declined em- 
phatically to consider them as within its 
jurisdiction. 

In the review of prevailing conditions 
embraced in his first letter to the Powers 
the Czar especially emphasized the exist- 
ing and growing evil of excessive arma- 
ments and the horrible expense of the 
great military establishments. It is evi- 
dent that this was, in his view, the subject 
that should receive the especial attention 
of the delegates to the Conference. Un- 
fortunately, too, the public interest all 
over the world had become fixed upon this 
particular feature of the movement, and 
had overlooked or minimized all other 
questions. It was also the subject first 
assigned to a general committee. When, 
therefore, early in the proceedings, it be- 
came evident that nothing whatever could 
be accomplished looking toward disarm- 
ing nor even a limitation of armaments, 
public opinion was pronounced in its ex- 
pression of disappointment and even dis- 
gust, and the whole scheme of such a 
Conference was declared a failure and its 
proceedings a farce. Very soon after the 
discussion of the question was begun in 
Committee the military representatives of 
Germany took such a position as to make 
further consideration useless. The evil of 
the situation was emphasized by the fact 
that throughout the world the opinion 
had gained foothold that the proposition 
of the Czar contemplated actual and im- 
mediate disarmament by the great mil- 
itary Powers. But such was never the 
idea. A limitation as to increase of arma- 
ments was all that was meditated at the 
time, with a hope for gradual disarma- 
ment in the future as a result. Imme- 
diately after the first suggestion of the 



Conference Count Mouravieff urged the 
British Ambassador to note " that this 
eloquent appeal, which I have drawn up 
at the dictation of the Emperor, does not 
invite a general disarmament, as such a 
proposal would not be likely to receive 
general acceptance at present, nor does 
His Iniperial Majesty look for an imme- 
diate realization of the aims he has so 
much at heart, but desires to initiate an 
effort, the effects of which can only be 
gradual." In opening the consideration 
of the subject in committee Colonel 
Gilinsky introduced the Russian proposi- 
tions, prefacing them with an eloquent 
and earnest address. " Gentlemen," said 
he, " will the peoples represented in this 
Conference be entirely satisfied if, in go- 
ing hence, we take them arhitration and 
the laws of warfare, but nothing for the 
time of peace, — of this armed peace which 
is so heavy a burden on the nations, which 
crushes them to that point where it can 
be sometimes said that open war would 
perhaps he better than- this state of secret 
war, this incessant competition in which 
all the world pushes forward larger and 
larger annies, — larger now in time of 
peace than they used to be in times of 
greatest warfare? The various countries 
have engaged in war only once in every 
twenty or tliirty years; but this armed 
peace lasts for decades, it precedes war and 
follows it." At the close of his address 
Colonel Gilinsky submitted these proposi- 
tions: 1. An international agreement for 
the term of five years, stipulating the non- 
increase of the present number of troops 
maintained in time of peace in each 
mother country. 2. The determination, in 
case of this agreement, of the troops to be 
maintained in time of peace by all the 
powers, not including Colonial troops. 
.3. The maintenance, for the same term 
of five years, of the size of the militai-y 
budget in force at the present time. 

A captain of the Russian Navy presented 
similar propositions to govern marine 
forces and budgets, after which the 
discussion became general. One of the 
earliest and most determined opponents 
of the whole Russian proposition was 



570 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



Colonel von Schwarzlioff, of the German 
army, wlio entertained the Commission 
with a very Kaiserish speech, which 
aroused ill concealed irritation among- the 
delegates. "As far as Germany is con- 
cerned," he said, " I can reassure her 
friends completely and dissipate all benev- 
olent anxiety regarding her. The Ger- 
man people are not crushed beneath the 
weight of expenditures and taxes; they 
are not hanging on the edge of a preci- 
pice; they are not hastening towards ex- 
haustion and ruin. Quite the contrary; 
public and private wealth is increasing; 
the general welfare and standard of life 
are rising from year to year. As for com- 
pulsory military service, which is inti- 
mately associated with these questions, 
the German does not regard it as a heavy 
burden, but as a sacred and patriotic duty, 
to the performance of which he owes his 
existence, his prosperity, his future." 
Strangely the bellicose Colonel did not 
buttress his arguments by reference to the 
fact of the emigration of some two or 
three millions of his countrj-men to North 
and South America within the preceding 
twenty years that they might enjc.v under 
less strenuous conditions the blessings 
which the German military system offers. 
Many earnest and eloquent protests were 
entered against Germany's attitude, and 
favoring the Russian proposals. Dr. 
Stancioff, of Bulgaria, presented the in- 
terest of the weaker nations, declaring 
that " armed peace is ruinous for small 
states, whose needs are numerous, and who 
have everything to gain by investing- their 
means in the development of industry and 
agriculture, and in the requisites of prog- 
ress." After considerable debate, how- 
ever, it -was decided to refer the subject to 
a military subcommittee, which was made 
up of Colonels Gilinsky and Schwarzhoff, 
and military representatives from five 
other large powers and two small po-wers. 
On June 30, this subcommittee reported 
as follows : " The members of the com- 
mittee charged with the examination of 
the propositions of Colonel Gilinsky, i-e- 
lating to the tirst topic of Count Moura- 



vieff's circular, have met twice. With the 
exception of Colonel Gilinsky they have 
decided unanimously; first, that it would 
be very difficult to fis, even for a term of 
five years, the number of troops, without 
at the same time regulating other elements 
of the national defense; second, that it 
would be no less difficult to regulate by 
an international agreement the elements 
of this defense, organized in each country 
upon very different principles. Hence, 
the Committee regrets its inability to ac- 
cept the proposition made in the name of 
the Russian government. The majority 
of its members believe that a more thor- 
ough study of the question by the 
governments themselves would be desir- 
able." 

After this report had been presented 
to the (leneral Committee and read the 
President invited members to discuss it; 
but as no one responded he declared 
that the complete silence of the assembly 
acted as an approval, and that under such 
circumstances it was unnecessary to take 
a vote. After the declaration of the Presi- 
dent, however, several members seized the 
opportunity to explain their position. 
Baron de Bildt, of Sweden and Norway, 
in particular, feelingly voiced his opinion 
and that of his associates. Stating that 
the Russian propositions were disapproved 
by his country because of form only, not 
because of their object, he concluded an 
eloquent and feeling address as follows: 
" We have, therefore, not been able to vote 
for the Russian proposition, as it has been 
formulated, and I state this fact with sin- 
cere regret — I will say more — with 
genuine sorrow. For, gentlemen, we are 
about to terminate our labors, recogniz- 
ing that we have been confronted with 
one of the most important problems of the 
century, and that we have accomplished 
very little towards its solution. Let us 
not indulge in illusions. When the re- 
sults of our deliberations shall become 
known, there will arise, notwithstanding 
all that has been done for Arbitration, the 
Red Cross, etc., a great cry: 'It is not 
enough ! ' And this cry. ' it is not 
enough,' most of us must conseientiouslv 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1899-1907. 



571 



acknowledge to be just. Our consciences,' 
it is true, may also tell us in consolation 
that we have done our duty, since we have 
faithfully followed our instructions. But 
I venture to say that this duty is not ful- 
filled and that there yet remains some- 
thing- else for us to accomplish. Permit 
me to explain. The Czar's proposal (as 
to armaments) has been strewn with all 
the flowers of rhetoric by men much more 
eloquent than I. It will sufiice for me to 
say that, while his idea is grand and beau- 
tiful, and while it responds to a desire felt 
by thousands upon thousands of men, this 
also is true ; it can not die. If the Czar 
will only add to the nobility of heart and 
generosity of spirit of which he has given 
proof the virtue of perseverance the 
triumph of his labors is assured. He 
has received from Providence not only 
the gift of power, but also that of Youth. 
If the generation to which we belong is 
not destined to accomplish the task, he 
may count upon that which is coming to 
take our places. The future belongs to 
him. But, meanwhile, all of us who de- 
sire to be, each in his little sphere of 
activity, his humble and faithful co- 
laborers, have the duty of seeking with 
tenacity the means of doing better and 
doing more, whether these means be found 
in new conferences, in direct negotiations, 
or, with all simplicity, in the setting of a 
good example. This is the duty that is 
left for us to fulfill!" This addrees is 
reported to have created " a profound im- 
pression " upon the delegates and under 
its spell M. Bourgeois, of France, followed 
with similar sentiments most forcefully 
expressed. In conclusion he said: "If 
sad necessity obliges us to renounce for 
the ijresent a direct and positive agree- 
ment on this proposition, we should en- 
deavor to prove to public opinion that 
we have at least sincerely examined the 
problem presented to us. We shall not 
have labored in vain if, in a formula of 
general scope, we indicate the goal 
towards which we desire, unanimously, I 
hope, to see all civilized people advance." 
In response to the President's request 
that he should present his proposition in 



writing for the consideration of the dele- 
gates, M. Bourgeois offered the follow- 
ing mild and inoffensive statement. " The 
Commission believes that a limitation of 
the military expenses which now burden 
the world is greatly to be desired in the 
interests of the ijrogress of the material 
and moral well-being of mankind." This 
declaration was adopted by the Committee 
by acclamation ; and the deliberations con- 
cerning the most impressive and import- 
ant subject before the Conference were 
at an end. The completed work Ol the 
Conference, however, was expressed and 
published in the form of six " Wishes," 
three Conventions, and three Declarations. 
These " Wishes " give expression to the 
efforts of the Conference in distinction 
from its achievements. The fourth Wish 
supplemented .the proposition of M. 
Bourgeois in these words : " The Con- 
ference expresses the wish that the Gov- 
ernments, taking into consideration the 
proposals made at the Conference, may 
examine the possibility of an agreement 
as to the limitation of armed forces by 
land and sea, and of war budgets." As 
this question of Armaments was, in the 
popular estimation, the imperative one be- 
fore the Conference; and as no clear im- 
pression has possessed public opinion as 
to what was really done by the delegates, 
it has seemed desirable to go into the pro- 
ceedings somewhat in detail. That no 
concrete results were achieved was de- 
plored in every country. Peace-men and 
the common people on whose shoulders 
fall the burdens entailed by the enormous 
military budgets of the nations awoke 
from their dreams of the brighter days 
about to dawn with a shock, and a sense 
of wrong, if not of betrayal. But as 
Baron de Bildt said of the Czar's pro- 
posal, — " it can not die ! " It was a great 
advance upon previously existing condi- 
tions even to have got the subject before 
a Conference of delegates representing 
the leading nations of the whole earth. 
To have " disarmament " and " limitation 
of military budgets " in the air bodes 
only good for the burdened nations and 



072 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



suffering- peoples, — and, most of all, for 
Ijosterity. 

The eighth of the subjects suggested by 
the Czar for consideration was expressed 
in these terms : " To accept in principle 
the employment of good offices, of media- 
tion, and facultative arbitration in cases 
lending themselves thereto, with the ob- 
ject of preventing armed conflicts between 
nations ; to come to an understanding with 
respect to the mode of applying- these good 
offices, and to establish a uniform practice 
in using them." Public opinion and de- 
sire had been so centred upon the sub- 
ject of disarmament that the possibilities 
suggested by this article had received but 
little thought and consideration. Yet it 
was in the field of ai'bitration that the 
most significant work of the conference 
was accomplished. The last became first. 
The third of the agreements formulated 
by the delegates was entitled a " Conven- 
tion for the Pacific Settlement of Inter- 
national Disputes," which has since been 
styled the " Mag-na Carta of Liternational 
Law." Though even in this field the Con- 
ference failed to secure as definite and 
binding results as the lovers of Peace had 
hoped, yet forces were set in motion and 
principles accepted which would have been 
regarded as Quixotic six months before. 
A strong fight was made to have a con- 
vention adopted involving the oliUgafory 
submission of all disputed questions to 
arbitration by the Powers; but this was 
a step too far in advance at that time. 
Many provisions, however, were made for 
the peaceful settlement of disputes, and 
the united sentiment of the delegates 
favored their application. It is an un- 
fortunate commentary upon the action of 
the delegates at the Hague that two 
horrible wars have occurred since the Con- 
ference adjourned. It is, however, equally 
true that two wars which threatened 
the most serious results have been averted 
by the application of the principles 
of the " Convention for the Pacific Set- 
tlement of Disputes," and that several 
important international differences have 
been settled by the Court of Arbitration 
established; while a great number of 



treaties looking toward the peaceful settle- 
ment of all disputed questions have been 
made between the leading nations of the 
earth. So that, had the Conference of 
1S99 done nothing more than to create 
this arbitral sentiment, it would have been 
one of the most successful and beneficent 
of all the international conventions of 
history. But it did achieve one positive 
result which has already served a most 
useful pvirpose. The crowning glory of 
The Hague meeting: was the establishment 
of a " Permanent International Court of 
Arbitration," which is imquestionably 
destined to become the most august and 
influential tribunal of the civilized world. 
In reporting the work of his Committee 
to the Conference Chevalier Descamps 
said of this creation: "When one seeks 
through the history of international law, 
from the day when that law was placed 
upon a firm foundation by the man of 
genius (Grotius) to whom America has 
recently rendered brilliant homage on his 
native soil, — when one seeks some page 
eomparable with that which the Con- 
ference of The Hague has just w'-itten, it 
seems difficult to find one more fruitful ; " 
and President de Staal in his final ad- 
dress declared that the Convention which 
established the permanent Court of Arbi- 
tration, the rules which should govern it. 
and the general principles of Arbitration 
" opened a new era in the domain of inter- 
national law " and established what 
" would be called bj' posterity ' the first 
international Code of Peace.'" Several 
eases have already been brought before 
this Court and acceptable decisions ren- 
dered. But many critics have attempted to 
minimize its importance by emphasizing 
the fact that so few causes have been re- 
ferred to it. It should be considered, how- 
ever, that its whole principle was novel 
and that it had no precedent ; and in ques- 
tions of such supreme moment great 
nations can hardly be expected to change 
all their course of thought and action in 
a decade. Even the Supreme Court of 
the United States had been establishcil 
two years before a case was brought before 
it. 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1899-1907. 



The true merit of the first Hague 
Conference is to be found not so much in 
its achievement as its prophecy. No 
civilized people since it adjourned has 
taken the same selfish views of its 
" rights " and its methods of maintaining 
them as it always before had done. A 
new principle is in tlie air, which has af- 
fected not only the plans and purposes of 
sovereigns and statesmen but which has 
mightily influenced and will continue to 
influence the thought of every intelligent 
man and woman on the globe. That this 
is not theory merely was well evidenced 
by the vast pressure of public opinion 
upon the thought of the Second Confer- 
ence. Deputations waited upon its mem- 
bers, and addresses and petitions were laid 
before them, from every part of the world. 
Among the most important may be men- 
tioned those from the International Coun- 
cil of Women, with the signatures of two 
million women living in twenty different 
countries ; The Universal Alliance of 
Women for Peace by Education, repre- 
senting about five million women of all 
civilized countries ; the International Fed- 
eration of Students; twenty-three colleges 
in the central west of the United States 
representing twenty-seven thousand pro- 
fessors and students; a petition for arbi- 
tration bearing two and a quarter inillion 
signatures collected through the efforts of 
a single Boston teacher and iiresented by 
her to the President of the Conference on 
the Fourth of July; fifteen thousand citi- 
zens of Sweden ; and innumerable Peace 
Societies and organizations in every part 
of the world. That the delegates to the 
second Conference realized the importance 
of this influence and were moved as well 
as sustained by it was manifested in many 
ways. In the course of an impressive ad- 
dress M. Beernaert, of Belgium, reminded 
his fellow delegates of their responsibility 
to " that redoubtable Sovereign, public 
opinion," declaring that it " is listening 
to and watching us; and to-day there is 
no assembly which must not sit with open 
windows, listening to the voices fi'om out- 
side." One of the most interested and 
honored attendants upon the meetings of 



both Conferences was the Baroness von 
Suttner, author of that book which has 
worked mightily for Peace, " Lay Down 
Your Arms." Though engaged only as a 
correspondent for the Press her wide ac- 
quaintance among the delegates and famil- 
iarity with every phase of the subjects dis- 
cussed gave her a unique position among 
those assembled at The Hague. Speaking 
of the members of the Second Conference 
she said: " That wdiich impresses me most 
is their respectful obedience to the desires 
of public opinion. If they oppose a re- 
form, it is only because they are persuaded 
that public opinion is indifferent to it. 
If public opinion should express itself 
with appropriate vigor, there is nothing 
the Conference would not try to do. The 
fact is that the delegates are only the 
hands on a watch; their movements are 
governed by a great invisible sjjring. 
This spring is public opinion; not the 
private opinion of individuals; but puhlic 
opinion — opinion expressed, organized, 
made palpable and even disagreeable to 
those who oppose it. That is the master, 
and even the god, of the Conference." 
But the interesting fact regarding this in- 
fluence of public opinion upon such a body 
of delegates is that previous to the Con- 
ference of 1899 it would hardly have been 
seriously considered by statesmen and 
diplomats in their consideration of inter- 
national questions. The change in senti- 
ment in this regard and the realization by 
the people of the power they actually pos- 
sessed if it was concretely expressed, es- 
tablish a significant measure of the real 
results achieved by that first Conference. 
Shakespeare marked " how use doth » 
breed a habit in a man ; " and another has 
well said : " Habit in the individual or 
custom in society is the dominant force in 
all action." If few direct concrete results 
can be traced to that act which history 
will establish as the most significant, far- 
reaching, and beneficent of all the royal 
acts of the present Emperor of Russia, the 
calling of the first Peace Conference, the 
fact that it has made it habitual and 
customary for all people of all lands to 
think and talk of disarmament and arbi- 



574 



PEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tratioii as not only desirable but possible 
of attainment, is one of the most signifi- 
cant achievements of modern times. A 
seed was sown from ■which is growing- a 
tree beneath whose branches all people 
shall enjoy peace and " whose leaves shall 
be for the healing of nations." 




Phuto. Copyrighted 1905 by Rockwood, N. Y. 
HORACE PORTER. 

One of the leading factors in the peace 
movement for several years has been the 
organization known as the Interparlia- 
mentary Union. This body is made up of 
the elected representatives of the people 
in the Congress of the United States, the 
Parliament of Great Britain, the Con- 
gresses of the American Republics, and, 
with two exceptions, the Parliaments of 
European States. Its object is stated to 
be " to promote the spirit of peace and 
friendliness among all the law-makers of 
the world, and, by holding its meetings in 
each of the countries in turn, to arouse 
among the people themselves a genuine 
love of international peace." At its meet- 
ing at St. Louis in 1904, 'Mr. Richard 
Bartholdt, of Missouri, founder of the 
American group of the Interparliamentary 



Union, oifered a resolution requesting all 
the governments of the world to send dele- 
gates to a second International Peace Con- 
ference. The resolution was adopted unan- 
imously, and a deputation of two hun- 
dred members of the LTnion waited upon 
President Roosevelt requesting him to 
issue the call for such a conference. In 
October, 190-1, Secretary Hay sent out a 
circular note to the Powers embodying 
suggestions as to the work of such a Con- 
ference and suggesting The Hague as the 
place for its meeting. As the Russo- 
Japanese War was at its height, however, 
other nations advised postponing the meet- 
ing until it was ended. Early in 1906 the 
Czar conveyed to President Roosevelt, 
through the Russian Ambassador, his de- 
sire to call the second Conference as he had 
the first, provided it should be agreeable 
to the President. As the latter graciously 
yielded the honor to the Czar he soon 
after sent out the invitations for the meet- 
ing; but as the American Republics had 
planned to hold the third Pan-American 
Conference at Rio de Janiero in 1900, 
the assembling of the delegates to The 
Hague was postponed for the time, the 
date of meeting being fixed later for June 
15, 1907. 

The delegates appointed to represent the 
United States at the Second Hague Con- 
ference were the Hon. Joseph H. Cheat e, 
ex-Ambassador to Great Britain; General 
Horace Porter, ex- Ambassador to France; 
David Jayne Hill, the Minister to the 
Netherlands; J. B. Scott, Professor of In- 
ternational Law at Columbia University; 
General George B. Davis, Judge Advocate 
General of the United States Army; and 
Admiral Charles S. Sperry, of the United 
States Navy. 

At the first Conference but twenty-six 
nations, with their dependencies were 
represented by one hundred delegates ; at 
the second meeting two hundred and fifty- 
six representatives of forty-four inde- 
pendent powers assembled. This great in- 
crease in the number of delegates necessi- 
tated quite different arrangements from 
those which were made in 1899. " The 
House in the Wood" was not considered 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1899-1907. 



0/0 



large enough nor convenient for so 
numerous an assemlilage. Consequently 
one of the most historic buildings of 
Europe was set apart for the meetings. 
This Tvas the famous Eitter-zaal, the Hall 
of Knights, which stands within the 
" Binnenhof ," the old fortress of the city. 
While, therefore, the first Conference met 
in the famous House in the Wood, the 
favorite residence of the young and beau- 
tiful Queen, the second and larger body 
assembled in a no less interesting building 
about which clustered the memories of 
many of the most noted and heroic events 
of the earlier modern history. This was 
the castle of the Counts of Holland, built 
in the thirteenth century. Its great ban- 
queting hall, where the Counts with their 
Knights regaled themselves after their 
hunting' expeditions, was restored in 1900, 
and has since been used as the meeting 
place of the States General of Holland. 

As the work of the delegates in 1899 
was facilitated by the hospitality and 
social functions arranged by the generous 
Nethcrlanders, so every effort was made 
to meet the convenience and add to the 
pleasure and comfort of the second body 
of delegates. The government did not on 
this occasion provide the agreeable lunches 
which in 1899 did so much to promote 
good fellowship among the delegates. 
But the Queen graciously received all the 
representatives at the palace in The 
Hague, and gave an elaborate state dinner 
to the delegates-in-chief at the palace in 
Amsterdam. Excursions to various points 
of interest were of frequent occurrence, 
all of which tended to cultivate a friendly 
spirit among the distinguished visitors 
from so many countries. One of the most 
elaborate and largest of the many recep- 
tions was that given by the American 
Minister and delegate, David Jayne Hill, 
at the Hotel des Indes on .July 4. But the 
most notable event outside the range of 
official business was the laying of the cor- 
ner stone of the new Temple of Peace, for 
which Mr. Carnegie had generously con- 
tributed a million and a quarter dollars. 
The Netherlands government had donated 
an attractive site for the building on the 



most imposing avenue of the city; and 
there is now approaching completion a 
superb house for, and worthy of, the 
sessions and library of the great Interna- 
tional Court of Arbitration created by the 
first Conference. At the laying of the 
corner stone the disting-uished Nether- 
lands' statesman, Jonkheer van Kamebeek, 
delivered the principal address, as chair- 
man of the building committee. M. Neli- 
dow, of Russia, President of the Second 
Conference, laid the stone and also made 
an address. And to confirm the interest 
of all nations represented in this great 
work of establishing the principle of arbi- 
tration Baron d'Estournelles, of France, 
introduced a resolution at one of the meet- 
ings of the general Conference " that each 




Photo. Copyrighted im2 by J. S7 Purdy, Boston. 
DAVID JAYNE HILL. 

government represented at The Hague 
should contribute to the erection of the 
Palace of Peace by sending, after con- 
sultation with the architect, materials of 
construction and ornamentation represent- 
ing the purest examples of its national 
production, so that this Palace, an expres- 



5/6 



iKOAI COLOAY TO WOliLD TOWER. 



sion of universal good will and hope, may 
be built of the very substance of all 
countries." This sentiment was received 
with marked enthusiasm and the resolu- 
tion was at once unanimously adopted. 

Of the delegates to the Conference of 
1907 many had also represented their 
countries at The Hague in ISilO, so that 
methods of procedure had not to be 
mapped out anew without jirecedents to 
follow. The general routine order of the 
previous Conference was followed, M. 
Nelidow, the ranking member of the 
Kussian delegation, being chosen i^resi- 
dent of the body. The same plan was fol- 
lowed as before in reference to the assign- 
ment of subjects of discussion to com- 
mittees and subcommittees. At the time 
the Czar issued his second invitation to 
the sovereign states to send delegates to 
The Hague, as in 1S99, he suggested a 
list of topics for discussion ; and in intro- 
ducing the subject he said: "In taking 
the initiative in convoking a second Con- 
ference of the Peace, the Imperial Gov- 
ernment has had in view the necessity of 
giving a new development to the humani- 
tarian principles which served as the basis 
of work for the great international as- 
sembly of 1899." After further prelimin- 
ary remarks the circular concluded in 
these terms: "Believing, then, that there 
is reason at present for proceeding with 
the examination of only those questions 
which are especially prominent, inasmuch 
as they have arisen from the experience 
of recent years, and without raising those 
which concern the restriction of military 
or naval forces, the Imperial Goverjimcnt 
proposes as the jirogrannne of the pro- 
jected meeting the following principal 
points." These points were under four 
licads, with six subdivisions inider the 
third whose general title was " The 
Elaboration of a convention relative to 
the laws and customs of ^laritime war- 
fare." It is of marked significance that 
from this programme the subject of arma- 
ments is expressly eliminated, though it 
lield the first position in the Czar's 
previous scheme. Manifestly the results 
of the war with Japan had materially 



affected his Majesty's views upon this 
subject. On the other hand arbitration, 
which was the last of the eight subjects 
jjroposed for discussion in 1899, is found 
in the first place in 1907, and is intro- 
duced in these words: "I. Improvements 
in those provisions of the Convention rel- 
ative to the settlement of international 
disputes which have to do with the Court 
of Arbitration and the International Com- 
missions of Inquiry." As will be remem- 
bered, at the meetings of 1899 the Baron 
de Staal held the consideration of the 
Conference strictly within the limits 
established by the eight i^ropositions set 
fdrtli by his sovereign. Doubtless mind- 
ful of this fact several of the leading 
nations, in accepting the Czar's invitation 
to the Second Conference did so with the 
reservation that the subjects to be con- 
sidered and tlie range of discussion should 
not be limited exclusively to the topics 
suggested in Russia's note. The United 
States, for example, reserved the right to 
submit at least two other questions, the 
r(>duction or limitation of armaments, and 
an agreement to observe certain limita- 
tions in the use of force for the collection 
of ordinaiy public debts arising from con- 
tracts. Great Britain declared that its 
government considered it of great import- 
ance that the subject of expenditures for 
armaments should be discussed, and re- 
served the right of introducing it. Spain 
took a similar position upon the question 
of armaments. Several countries also 
declared their intention of refraining 
from the discussion of any questions that 
did not tend towards a practical result. 
In this manner eleven countries reserved 
the right to insist upon a variance of the 
Czar's programme. 

The Conference of 1907 was in session 
from June 1.5 to October 18, eight weeks 
longer than that of 1899, although it held 
but one more plenary meeting. At the 
first session which opened at three o'clock 
on the afternoon of June 15, the Nether- 
lands Minister of Foreign affairs wel- 
comed the delegates to The Hague, 
mentioning in his address the part played 
in their convocation by the Czar and the 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEENCES — 1899-1907. 



577 



Queen. He also courteously referred to 
the influence of the United States in 
these words: "But I think it would be 
improper' to omit at this hour the tribute 
of our gratitude to the eminent states- 
man who presides over the destinies of the 
United States of America. President 
Roosevelt has powerfully contributed to 
the growth of the grain sowed by the 
august initiator of the solemn interna- 
tional assemblies convoked for the discus- 
sion and better definition of the rules of 
international law." As in 1899 M. de Staal 
the head of the Russian delegation was 
chosen president of the Conference, so in 
1907 the same honor was conferred upon 
the leading representative of the Czar, 
M. Nelidow. After organization Lad been 
completed, committees were appointed, to 
each of which was assigned one of the 
topics suggested in the Czar's circular. 
These committees were variously subdi- 
vided for the consideration of minor di- 
visions of the general committee's sub- 
ject. In all, more than one hundred and 
sixty meetings of the delegates in plenary 
Conference or in committees were held; 
and as many of these meetings were pro- 
tracted discussions of serious problems 
which covered several hours each, it is 
manifest that the delegates were not 
idle at any time. 

It is impossible to follow the work of 
the Convention in detail. Several 
volumes have been written upon the sub- 
ject, among the most valuable of which are 
]\Ir. Holls's, " History of the Hague Con- 
ference (1899); and W. I. Hull's, "The 
Two Hague Conferences," to the latter of 
which, particularly, we are indebted for 
much valuable material. The President 
of the American delegation to the first 
Conference, Andrew D. White, kept a 
careful private journal of his interests 
and movements during- the sessions, 
which he has embodied in the second 
volume of his most interesting Autobiog- 
raphy, recently published. In this work, 
as nowhere else, one can get the view of a 
most intelligent observer of each day's 
proceedings, as well as familiar descrip- 
tions of many of the leading statesmen 
37 



and diplomats assembled, and an enter- 
taining account of the social life of the 
delegates while the guests of the most 
kindly and hospitable Netherlandors. 

The discussion of the question of 
Armaments, however, deserves some at- 
tention, not because of concrete results 
obtained, but for the sentiments so elo- 
quently expressed by Sir Edward Fry, 
Great Britain's first delegate. The 
British delegation was particularly 
spurred to action upon this subject by 
public opinion at home, as a lively agita- 
tion was being maintained by the members 
of the Interparliamentary Union and 
various peace societies. It was not until 
the plenary session of August 17, how- 
ever, that Sir Edward introduced the sub- 
ject, first quoting the notable warning as 
to increase of armaments contained in the 
Czar's first circular letter of 1898. 
Continuing, he said : " These words, so 
eloquent and so true when they were first 
written, are to-day still more real and 
true. For, Mr. President, since that time 
military expenses, alike for armies and 
navies, have considerably increased. Thus, 
according to the most exact information 
which I have received, these expenditures 
attained in 1898 (that is, the year im- 
mediately preceding the first Conference 
at The Hague) a total of more than two 
hundred and fifty-one millions of pounds 
sterling ($1,25.5,000,000) for the countries 
of Europe, — with the exception of Turkey 
and Montenegro, about which I have uo 
information, — the United States, and 
Japan; whereas the same expenditures 
by the same countries in 1906 exceeded a 
total of three hundred and twenty million 
pounds sterling ($1,600,000,000). Such 
are the excessive expenditures which could 
be devoted to better purposes; such, Mr. 
President, is the burden under which our 
peoples groan; such is the Christian peace 
of the civilized world in the twentieth 
century. ... In the older days of an- 
tiquity, Mr. President, men dreamed of a 
golden age which was said to have existed 
on earth in times long before. But in all 
centuries and among all nations, poets, 
sibjds, proijhets, and all noble and inspired 



578 



FROM COLOi\y TO WOKLD POWER. 



souls have nourished the hope that that 
K'olden age would return in the form of 
the reign of universal peace. 
" ' Ultima Cumaei venit jam earminis stas 

Jlasnus ab iutegro sseculorum nascitur 
ovdn 

Jam redit et virgo: redeunt Saturnia 
regiia.' 

" Such was the dream of the Latin poet 
of his age; but to-day the belief in the 
solidarity of the human race is spread, 
more than ever before, over all the earth. 
It is this belief which has made possible 
the convocation of the present Confer- 
ence; and it is in the name of this belief 
that I beseech you not to separate without 
having demanded that the governmenis of 
the world shall devote themselves reri/ 
scrioiisly to the question of tnilitnrii ex- 
penditures. ... In conclusion, then, 
Mr. President, I have the honor of pro- 
posing the adoption of the following reso- 
lution : 'The Conference confirms the 
resolution adopted by the Conference nf 
fS99 in regard to the restriction of mili- 
tary e.'ipenditures ; and, since military ex- 
penditures have increased considerably in 
nearly every country since the said year, 
the Conference declares that it is highly 
desirable to see the governments take up 
the serious study of this question.' " After 
the representatives of several states had 
indorsed the position advanced by Great 
Britain, the resolution was adopted by ac- 
clannition; and the Second Peace Con- 
ference had finished its consideration of 
this vexatious question. 

Tlinngh nuieh routine work was done 
by the delegates and many new measures 
of importance were inaugurated, a large 
proportion of the time of the Conference 
was spent in enlarging the scope and but- 
tressing the foundations of principles 
wdiieh were established in 1899. As has 
alrea<ly been stated the emphasis of the 
call i'cir the second meeting was placed 
upon arbitration, and most of the dele- 
gates had high hopes of securing marked 
results. Even here, however, the results 
were disappointing to the delegates and to 
the i)ublic. Nothing less than ohligatonj 
arhilralion was the goal at which the dele- 



gates from the United States and a few 
other countries aimed. But a recognition 
of the worlli of Ihe principle was all that 
could be secured. The subject was debated 
long and acrimoniously, with the result 
that the Conference finally voted with 
practical unanimity that certain differ- 
ences, especially those relating to the in- 
terpretation and application of in- 
ternational treaties, 'nay properly be sub- 
ject to obligatory arb'tration without any 
restriction whatever; while the delegates 
congratulated themselves " that the diver- 
sities of opinion revealed in the long de- 
bate did not exceed the bounds of juristic 
controversy." In its report to the home 
government the United States delegation 
said : " It may be admitted that the es- 
liihlisliment of the principle of obligatory 
arbitration is an advance. It is, however, 
not the great advance so earnestly desired ; 
for a concrete treaty embodying the prin- 
ciple would have been infinitely more val- 
uable than the declaration of obligatory 
arbitration, however solemnly made." 
Doubtless this is the most reasonable 
view one can take; for much certainly was 
accomplished when, after long and thor- 
ough discussion, even the principle was 
accepted. 

As is well known the Conference of 
1899 established a Permanent Court of 
Arbitration, and adopted a Code of Pro- 
i-edure for the conduct of causes before it. 
Article XX. of the " Convention for the 
Pacific Settlement of International Dis- 
putes" read as follows: "With the ob- 
ject of facilitating an immediate recourse 
to arbitration for international difFer- 
ences, which it has not been possible to 
settle by diplomacy, the Signatory Powers 
undertake to organize a permanent Court 
of Arbitration, accessible at all times and 
operating, unless otherwise stipulated by 
the parties, in accordance with the Rules 
"f Procedure inserted in the present Con- 
vention." Then follow the stipulations as 
to an " International Bureau, establishcil 
at The Hague" which serves as the " rec- 
ord office of the Court," and is the " chan- 
nel for communications relative to the 
meetings of the Court." Article XXVII. 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFEEENCES — 18!)9-1907. 



57!) 



of the same Convention reads: "The 
Signatory Powers consider it their duty, 
if a serious dispute threatens to break 
out between two or more of them, to re- 
mind these latter that the Permanent 
Court is open to them. Consequently, 
they declare that the fact of reminding 
the conriicting jiarties of the provisions of 
the present Convention, and the advice 
given to them, in the highest interests of 
Peace, to have recourse to the Permanent 
Court, can only be regarded as friendly 
action." The establishment of this Court 
was a marked advance upon any com- 
munity of interest among the nations of 
the world that had ever existed before; 
but it was far from being an ideal 
measure. To avail themselves of its 
beneficent action the parties to a dispute 
must first agree together to submit their 
grievances to its judgment, and to be 
bound by its award. Then would follow the 
somewhat troublesome, tedious, and expen- 
sive process of selecting the judges from a 
large number to be named. The Confer- 
ence decided that in making up a list of 
permanent judges " each signatory power 
shall select not more than four persons 
of recognized competence in questions of 
international law, enjoying the highest 
moral reputation, and disposed to accept 
the duties of arbitration." When two con- 
tending powers agree to arbitrate, each 
must choose two arbitrators from the per- 
manent list of judges, and these four shall 
choose a fifth. It will be readily seen that 
this measure did not provide a "Per- 
manent Court " in any proper sense. As 
the membership of the Court was finally 
established in 1901, upward of fifty judges 
were named, representing fifteen of the 
great nations of the world. Those ap- 
pointed by the United States were ex- 
President Benjamin Harrison, Chief Jus- 
tice Fuller of the Supreme Court, ex- 
Attorney-General John W. Griggs, and 
Judge George Gray of the United States 
Circuit Court. The usefulness of this 
Court was increased by one of the addi- 
tional articles relating to its procedure 
which were determined upon by the Con- 
ference of 1907. By its provisions either 



disputant, if an agreement to arbitrate 
with its opponent cannot be reached, and 
M-ithout waiting for the reminder from 
the Powers, may of its own initiative re- 
port its willingness to arbitrate to The 
Hague Bureau, which shall then inform 
all the Powers of the fact, leaving them 
to perform their duty in the jiremises. 

The Court as thus established, however, 
was not satisfactory to the Powers, not- 
withstanding the fact that it did notable 
service to the world in four important 
cases; and to cure its defects and weak- 
nesses was the high purpose which tlie 
United States delegation to the Confer- 
ence of 1907 set before itself. Without 
disturbing the Permanent Court estab- 
lished in 1899, and leaving its use open 
to all the Powers if they preferred its pro- 
cedure, it was proposed in 1907 to es- 
tablish a " Permanent Court of Arbitral 
Justice." When the Conference came to 
the consideration of the question both the 
United States and Russia presented plans 
for its organization ; but the American 
plan was taken as the basis for discussion. 
Before the question went to its special 
Committee a preliminary discussion took 
place which was opened by the eminent 
jurist of the Netherlands, M. Asser. •' In- 
stead of ■ a Permanent Court," he said, 
" the Convention of 1899 gave only the 
phantom of a Court, an impalpable spec- 
ter, or, to speak more precisely, it gave a 
secretariat and a list. And when two 
powers, having a difference to settle. . . 
demand that the doors of the Court at The 
Hague be opened to them, the Secretary- 
General, thanks to the munificence of Mr. 
Carnegie, can show them a splendid hall, 
but instead of a Court he can only pre- 
sent to them a list on which they may 
find a large number of names of persons 
of a recognized competence, etc. . . . 
You remember, gentlemen, how a great 
monarch, — who was not only a famous 
general but a iihilosopher as well, trained 
in the French school of the eighteenth 
century, — on the point of committing an 
injustice, was struck by the exclamation 
of a simple miller, who reminded him 
that 'There are Judges at Berlin;' and 



580 



FROM COLUXY TO WORLD POWER. 



how, ' charmed that beneath his swaj^ jus- 
tice was believed in,' he submitted to the 
simple miller's suit. Then, gentlemen, 
when some day a tribunal truly permanent 
shall sit here ... it will not be with- 
out practical result that the nations shall 
invoke the famous article inspired by 
France — the article of Duty, — and shall 
say to a state on the point of committing 
an injustice, ' There are judges at The 
Hague.' " Other delegates followed in 
the same sentiment ; but the address of 
Mr. Choate, outlining and explaining the 
plan of the United States, was the most 
effective and received the most marked 
attention. Referring to the defects of 
the existing Court he said: "The fact 
that there was nothing permanent or con- 
tinuous or connected in the sessions of 
the Court, or in the adjudication of the 




Photo. Copyrighted 1902 t'lt Rockwood, A'. Y. 
JOSEPH H. CHOATE. 

cases submitted to it, has been an obvious 
source of weakness and want of prestige 
in the tribunal. Each trial it had before 
it has been wholly indeisendent of every 
other, and its occasional utterances, widely 
distant in point of time and disconnected 



in subject-matter, have not gone far 
toward constituting a consistent body of 
international law or valuable contribution 
to international law, which ought to 
emanate from an international tribunal 
representing the power and might of all 
nations. In fact it has thus far been a 
Court only in name, a framework for the 
selection of referees for each particular 
case, never consisting of the same judges. 
It has done great good as far as it has 
been permitted to work at all. but our 
effort should be to try to make it the 
medium of vastly greater and constantly 
increasing benefit to the nations and to 
mankind at large. Let us. then, seek to 
develop out of it a Permanent Court 
which shall hold regular and continuous 
sessions, which shall consist of the same 
judges, which shall pay due heed to its 
own decisions, which shall speak with the 
authority of the united voice of the na- 
tions and gradually build up a system of 
international law, definite and precise, 
which shall command the approval and 
regulate the conduct of the nations." Mr. 
Choate then outlined in detail the Amer- 
ican plan, taking pains to declare that the 
proposed Court was not intended to de- 
stroy, but only to supplement the existing 
Court, and that any nations which desired 
to do so might still resort to the method 
of selecting arbitrators provided in 1899. 
In closing his address Mr. Choate made 
a most earnest appeal for united and de- 
termined action. " Mr. President," he 
said, " with all the earnestness of which 
we are capable, and with a solemn sense 
of the obligations and responsibilities 
resting upon us as members of this Con- 
ference, which in a certain sense holds in 
its hand the fate and fortunes of the na- 
tions, we commend the scheme which we 
have thus proposed to the careful consid- 
eration of our sister nations. We cherish 
no pride of opinion as to any point or 
feature that we have suggested in regard 
to the constitution and powers of the 
court. We are ready to yield any or all 
of them for the sake of harmony; but we 
do insist that this great gathering of all 
the nations will be false to its work if it 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1890-1907. 



581 



does not strain every nerve to bring about 
the establishment of some such great and 
permanent tribunal which shall, by its 
supreme authority, compel the attention 
and deference of the nations that we rep- 
resent, and bring to adjudication before 
it differences of an international char- 
acter. Let us then, Mr. President, make 
a supreme effort to attain, not harmony 
only, but comijlete unanimity in the ac- 
complishment of this great measure, which 
shall contribute more than anything else 
we can do to establish justice and peace 
on everlasting foundations. . . . Gen- 
tlemen, it is now six weeks since we first 
assembled. There is certainly no time to 
lose. We have done much to regulate war, 
hut vf'i-y little to prevent it. Let us unite 
on this great pacific measure and satisfy 
the world that this second Conference 
really intends that hereafter peace and not 
war shall be the normal condition of civil- 
ized nations." 

When, however, the proposition got be- 
fore its sub-committee the opposition be- 
gan to develop. It was first voiced by M. 
Beernaert, of Belgium, who replied to the 
criticism of the existing Court, which he 
prized highly and unhesitatingly expressed 
his preference for. " The question at 
issue," he said, " is the same as that long 
debated in 1899, namely: Is it better to 
establish a truly permanent tribunal, in 
which judges few in number and immov- 
able or nearly so, will have to decide the 
disputes of the various states of the whole 
civilized world ? " To answer this question 
in the affirmative he considered in line 
with those "vast projects, according to 
which the reorganized world shall form 
henceforth a single state, or at least a 
federation of states, having a single par- 
liament, a single executive, a single 
superior court of justice. ... In my 
opinion, this is lamentable exaggeration 
of ideas which are true in tliemselves and 
which do honor to our century. They are 
moving across the world at this moment 
in great waves of fraternity and solidar- 
ity. Men of different races know each 
other now, and are no longer enemies. An 
assembly like this, of which our fathers 



did not even dream, astonishes no one. 
This is the result of the enormous prog- 
ress of all the sciences, which have an- 
nihilated distance, intertwined interests, 
and mingled the races. But, on the other 
hand, never has the feeling of nationality 
been more alive, and old nations and old 
tongues, which were believed to be asleep, 
have been seen to arise and demand again 
their place in the sunshine. None of us 
would wish to renounce his country, — his 
country fond and dear; and none of us 
would consent to be governed from a great 
distance. We must, then, I believe, dis- 
card as a mere LTtopia the dream of a 
world-state or a universal federation, of a 
single parliament and a Court of justice 
superior to the nations." M. Beernaert 
then considered the method of selecting 
judges, introducing the question about 
which all hostility to the measure centred. 
" The larger number of nations would not 
have a judge of tlieir own on the tribunal," 
he said, " and how can it command their 
confidence ? " 

M. Beernaert thus set up the issue which 
proved to be the rock upon which the 
Committee split. All the smaller nations 
rallied about his position and made unan- 
imity of action impossible. M. Euy Bar- 
bosa, of Brazil, became the champion of 
the cause of the smaller states, maintain- 
ing his position with earnestness, elo- 
quence, and great learning. He argned 
forcibly against the establishment of a 
Court which should supersede all others, 
and esjiecially insisted upon the principle 
of international equality in the constitu- 
tion of the new Court. M. Bourgeois, of 
France, earnestly supported the United 
States delegation in its contentions. In 
concluding an impressive argument he 
said : " We shall hope for, and we shall 
greet with joy, the day when, beside the 
Court of 1899, or better, at its own fire- 
side and perhaps created by itself, there 
shall exist a permanent tribunal for af- 
fairs of a judicial kind, under such condi- 
tions that the smallest as well as the 
largest states shall find in it equal guar- 
antees for the definition and security of 
their rights. The world desires peace. 



582 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



For centuries it clung solely to tlie motto, 
' If you desire peace, prepare for war ; ' 
that is to say, it confined itself to the mil- 
itary orgaiiizatio'ii of peace. We are no 
longer at tliat stage of progress ; but we 
must not be content with promoting the 
more humane organization, the peaceful 
organization of icar. The words i^'hich 
have been uttered here have showed us the 
progress of education in this respect, the 
feeling, now and each day more urgent. 
. of the solidarity of men and nations, in 
the struggle with the fatalities of nature. 
We have confidence in the growing activ- 
ity of these great moral forces, and we 
hope that the Conference of 1907 will take 
a decisive step beyond the work under- 
taken in 1899 hy insuring practically and 
really the judicial organization of peace. ' 
The sub-committee to which the con- 
sideration of this question was referred 
consisted of twenty-three members, rep- 
resenting sixteen nations. M. Bourgeois, 
of France, was its jiresident, and Dr. 
Scott, of the United States delegation, 
acted as its reporter. The subject was 
earnestly discussed for five weeks and Mr. 
Choate, particularly, exhausted evei-y re- 
source of argument and diplomacy to se- 
cure practical results. Thirty-five articles 
were agreed upon, and were adopted by 
the Committee and Conference. Provi- 
sions were made for the term of office, 
privileges, and salary of the judges; for 
the name, place of meeting, sessions, re- 
ports, jurisdiction, and procedure of the 
Court. As Dr. Scott said: "We have 
not only wished to erect the fine facade 
of the Palace of International Justice; 
we have built and even furnished the 
structure in such fashion that the judges 
have only to take their seats." But the 
supreme question of how the judges 
sliould be selected or determined upon 
could not be settled. The smaller states 
with their insistence upon the claims of 
their nations balked every attempt to 
solve it. Ever.v provision was made for 
a Court without judges. " For the number 
and method of selection of the judges 
could not be agreed upon; and these 
features of the proposed Court both its 



advocates and opponents agreed in calling 
its capital, its fundamental, its essential 
ones." 

A distinct achievement, however, of the 
Conference of 1907 was the establishment 
of an " International Prize Court." 
Though this partakes largely of the char- 
acter of the other actual achievements of 
the two Conferences, which serve chiefly 
to regulate the conduct of wars rather 
than establish precedents for peace, it was 
an accomplishment worthy of note. It is 
hoped and believed, too, that its methods 
of selecting judges and conducting its 
functions will make easier the completion 
in a satisfactory and harmonious manner 
of the unfinished work of the Conference 
in establishing the Court of Arbitral 
Justice. 

Before its final adjournment the Con- 
ference considered a resolution, proposed 
by the United States delegation, provid- 
ing for the convening of a third Confer- 
ence in 1914. After considerable delibera- 
tion the delegates adopted a " wish," 
which was incorporated in the Final Act, 
in these words: "The Conference recom- 
mends to the Powers the reunion of a 
third Peace Conference, which shall take 
place within a period analogous to that 
which has elapsed since the preceding 
Conference, at a date to be fixed by com- 
mon agreement among the Powers, and it 
calls their attention to the necessity of 
preparing for the work of this third Con- 
ference long enough in advance to insure 
the pursuit of its deliberations with the 
requisite authority and rapidity. To at- 
tain this end, the Conference considers 
it very desirable that about two years be- 
fore the probable date of the reunion a 
preparatory committee be charged by the 
governments with the duty of collecting 
the various propositions to be submitted 
to the Conference, of investigating mat- 
ters susceptible of future international 
regulation, and of preparing a programme 
to be approved by the governments soon 
enough to i^ermit its serious study in each 
country. This Committee shall also be 
charged with the duty of proposing a 



THE HAGUE PEACE CONFERENCES — 1899-1907. 



583 



mode of org-anization and procedure for 
the Conference itself." 

In his instructions to the delegation to 
the Second Conference from the United 
States, our distinguished ex-Secretary of 
State, Elihu Root, referred to this propo- 
sition in these words : " The immediate 
results of such a Conference must always 
be limited to a small part of the field 
which the more sanguine have hoped ti.i 
see covered; but each successive Confer- 
ence will make the positions reached in 
the preceding Conference its point of de- 
parture, and will bring to the considera- 
tion of further advances toward interna- 
tional agreement opinions affected by the 
acceptance and application of the pre- 
vious agreements. Each Conference will 
inevitably make further progress and, by 
successive steps, results may be accom- 
plished which have formerly appeared im- 
possible. . . . Tlte most valuable re- 
sult of the Conference of 1899 was that it 
made the work of the Conference of 1907 
possible. The achievements of the two 
Conferences justify the belief that the 
world has entered upon an orderly process 
through which, step by step, in successive 
conferences, each taking the work of its 
predecessor as its point of departure, there 
may he continual progress toward mahing 
the practice of civilized nations conform 
to their peaceful professions." 

An effort has been made to give an out- 
line sketch of the foundation, meetings, 
and transactions of the two Hague Con- 
ferences. It has been popular with a large 
portion of the press and with many al- 
leged statesmen to decry the usefulness of 
these meetings and thereby to discredit 
the whole theory of a world peace. No 
one will claim that either Conference 
achieved what was hoped would result 
from its deliberations. But no reasonable 
person can study the subject, even super- 
ficially, without being convinced that a 
mighty advance has been made toward the 
unifying of the hopes and aspirations of 
all mankind. Extended quotations have 
been made from some of the notable ad- 
dresses made at the meetings, not only to 
give the reader an idea of the sincerity of 



purpose and earnestness of the delegates, 
but also to demonstrate how emphatically 
these delegates, — easily the foremost men 
of each of the nations represented, — rec- 
ognized the imperative demands of the 
people that ivars shall cease. Not in a 
single address was the ultimate success 
of this crusade for peace questioned. 




Photo. Cuiiyrightcd by J. K. PuvcUj, Boston, 
ELmu ROOT. 

Vested and special interests, politicians, 
and greedy seekers for wealth may decry 
all peace movements and the futility of 
all demands for disarmament and obliga- 
tory arbitration of disputes between na- 
tions; shouting old and discredited cries 
such as " in peace, prepare for war," con- 
gresses and parliaments may vote to in- 
crease the military strength of their re- 
spective countries and add to the burdens 
of debt and taxation that the people must 
bear. But no great conception like that 
of universal peace has ever yet taken pos- 
session of the minds of the people of a 
single state, not to speak of the world, 
without ultimate and not long-deferred 
realization. The "Mills of God" may 



584 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD I'OWEIJ. 



griiK.l slowly, but — they grind. And no 
more encouraging proof of the approach- 
ing fulfillment of the prophesy of the 
Angels near two thousand years ago — - 
"Peace on Earth; good will to men'' — 
has ever been vouchsafed the weary 
watchers for that consummation than was 
furnished by the untiring, intelligent, ex- 
alted purposes and labors of the distin- 
guished delegates to the two Hague Con- 
ferences, and by their constantly ex- 
pressed conviction that the utmost they 
could achieve would not reach the measure 
of what they conceived the universal pop- 
ular sentiment demanded. 

One of the most earnest and intelligent 
of the delegates at both Conferences was 
M. Martens, of Russia, also one of the 
highest authorities of the world on inter- 
national law. In concluding an earnest 
appeal for harmony at the last Confer- 
ence he said : " Allow me a few words 
more from the bottom of my heart. There 
have always been in history epochs when 
grand ideals have dominated and en- 
thralled the souls of men; sometimes it 
was religion, sometimes a system of phil- 
osophy, sometimes a political theory. The 



most shining example of this kind was the 
Crusades. From all countries arose the 
cry, ' To Jerusalem ! God wills it ! ' Ta- 
day the great ideal which dominates our 
time is arhitraiion; we hear the unani- 
mous cry, ever since the year 1899, ' To 
The Hague ! To The Hague ! ' If we are all 
agreed that this ideal shall take body and 
soul, we may leave The Hague with up- 
lifted head and peaceful conscience; and 
History will inscribe within her annals: 
' The members of the Second Peace Con- 
ference have deserved well of humanity.' " 

" ^len, my brothers, men the workers, 

ever reaping something new; 
That which they have done but earnest of 

the things that they shall do ; 
For I dipt into the future far as liuman 

eye could see, 
Saw the vision of the world, and all the 

wonder that would be, — 

Till the war-drum tJiruhh'd no longer, and 

/he haltle-flaf/s were furl'd 
In the Parliament of man. the Federation 

of the world." 

(Tennyson.) 



XLIX. 



THE DESTEUCTION OF GALVESTON - 1900. 



Sublime Faith and Heroism of Stricken Peoples. — Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, San Fran- 
cisco. — Peculiar Location of Galveston. — Importance as Sea Port. — Converging Point of 
Fifty-three Steamship Lines. — The " Oleander City." — The Terrible Hurricane of September 
8, 1300. — Winds Began to Rise Early in Forenoon. — Constantly Changing Direction They 
Covered Every Point of Compass. — Rapidly Increasing Velocity. — ''Every Building on 
Island Trembled, Many Rooking Like Boats." — Velocity of Wind One Hundred and Ten 
Miles an Hour in Evening. — Whole City Prepares for Death. — At Convent the Sacrament 
Administered to All. — At Orphan Asylum Xuns Tied Little Charges in Bunches, Each 
Sister Fastening Bunch to Herself. — All Perished Together. — Great Rafts of Wreckage 
Hurled in Every Direction b.y Wind and Waves. — Veritable Battering Rams. — After Nine 
P. M., Began to Subside. — Pastor and Family and Three Quarters of Entire Congregation 
Drowned. — Within a Week Six Thousand Bodies Recovered. — Probably Another Thousand 
AVashed Out to Sea. — Wonderful Recuperative Powers of People. — Committee of Safety. — 
The Deep-water Commission. — New City Charter. — Mammoth Sea Wall. — Total Surface 
Level of City Raised from Five to Eighteen Feet. — The New Government By Commission; 
" Tlie Galveston Plan." — Result of Its Work in Relniilding and Redeeming Galveston. — 
Adopted in Many Otlier Cities. 



" Great things thro' greatest hazards are achiev'd. 
And then they shine." — Beaumont axd Fletcher. 




HERE is nothing' iu all histoiy more splendid and inspiring 
than the record of the sublime faith and courage that has 
been manifested by the people of American cities -^'hich 
have by fire, or earthquake, or flood been practically de- 
stroyed, only to rise again within a few months or years 
more beautiful than before, and better equipped in eveiy 
■way for the conduct of the business of great commercial 
centres. The story of the rise of Chicago, Boston, Balti- 
more, San Francisco from wide-spread ruin and devasta- 
tion to greater eminence and opulence savors of the tales 
of the Arabian Nights, or the fertile imagination of Jules Verne. The American 
fseople, engrossed in the struggle for commercial supremacy and wealth, have too 
often been oblivious of the high moral and civic virtues whose constant exercise 
can alone insure good government. But when brought face to face with dire 
calamity, the g-rosser nature has at once given place to such superb exhibitions of 
self-denial and moral and physical heroism as to make every American proud 
that he is of one blood with men and women capable of such exalted faith and 
endeavor. In all the cases referred to, however, many elements of stability were 
untouched, so that courageousl.y facing the situation an immediate determination to 
rebuild on broader and better lines seemed the natural course. In nearly all cases 
great aggregates of insurance promised immediate working capital; the residence 
sections of the cities were largely intact, the homes remained, and the loss of life 



586 



FEOil COLON r TO WORLD I'OWEIi. 



had been proportionately small; while 
the ix'euliar physical conditions that 
originally marked such localities for cen- 
tres of trade and commerce, — all these 
things remained to give courage to the 
people and to nerve them to endure, with 
the l>est cheer possible, the temporary 
hardships and suffering. But when on 
Sunday morning, September 9, 1900, the 
survivors of the terrible hurricane that 
dc^itroyed Galveston, Texas, began to 
awake from the dazed condition in which 
the horrors of the previous night had left 
them, they faced infinitely more disheart- 
ening conditions. The Sand-Spit on 
which the city had been built did not 
seem to offer any such natural advantages 
for rebuilding as to warrant the rein- 
vestment of capital there; the total of in- 
surance was comparatively slight, while a 
corrupt municipal government had al- 
ready plunged the city deeply into debt; 
and one in every six of the entire popula- 
tion of the city had been killed or drowned 
during the previous twelve hours, while 
homes as well as business blocks were 
totally destroyed. One must have a vivid 
imagination, in<leed, to conceive of a more 
heartrending and absolutely hopeless con- 
dition than that which stared these 
survivors in the face. Homeless, hun- 
gry, poverty-stricken, heart-broken, and 
crushed, they could not even communicate 
with the outside world to make known 
their terrible fate and receive the assur- 
ances of the sympathy and aid of their 
fellowmen. Yet before the gentler winds 
and receding waves had made a single 
street passable plans were being formu- 
lated to raise a greater and better Gal- 
veston on the very ground where six thou- 
sand of their own people were then l.ying 
unburied, and where vast piles of wreck- 
age on every hand bore sad evidence of 
the destruction of homes and the ruin of 
business. 

Built on the easterly end of a long, low- 
lying island of sand, Galveston seemed 
literally to rise from the waves. The sur- 
face of the island, which is about thirty 
miles long and from one to three miles 
wide, rose nowhere above twelve to fifteen 



feet, while its average elevation was only 
about six feet above the sea. On the 
southerly, or Gulf side, the coast line is 
<iuite regular, and offers one of the finest 
beaches of the world, about thirty miles 
long. About two miles in an easterly di- 
rection from the city lies Point Bolivar, 
a part of the main land; and the channel 
between this and the island is the en- 
trance to Galveston Bay, — which cuts 
into the mainland to the north for a dis- 
tance of nearly thirty miles, with irreg- 
ular width and depth, — and to Galveston 
harbor. During the early part of the 
nineteenth century this protected harbor 
offered a safe refuge for the bands of 
yiirates that infested the Gulf of Mexico, 
wlio established a regular headquarters 
there, under the leadership of the notori- 
ous Lafitte. At the battle of New Or- 
leans in 1815 these men under Lafitte 
were of great service to General Jackson ; 
and for some years they were not molested 
in their retreat at Galveston. Between 
1820 and 1825, however, they were driven 
farther south, and eventually cleared 
from the Gulf. The first permanent set- 
tlement on Galveston island was in 1838; 
but, owing to the undeveloped state of 
the country back of it, the growth of the 
settlement was slow, though the impor- 
tance of its harbor was recognized. Dur- 
ing the Civil War it was first seized by 
Union troops, but was captured by Con- 
federate forces in 1803. The growth of 
the city has naturally followed the settle- 
ment and the industrial and commercial 
development of Texas and the great 
southwest country, until now it has a 
population of about 35,000 people, and has 
in turn passed Baltimore and Boston and 
become the third port of export in the 
United States. Galveston is now the con- 
verging point of fifty-three different 
steamship lines, twenty-six of which are . 
engaged in foreigii trade alone; and rall- 
wa.v systems, with fifty miles of terminal 
tracks. It has six miles of docks and five 
great grain elevators, exporting about one- 
third of all the wheat shipped abroad from 
the United States; and even during 1003, 
shipped 465,000 more bales of cotton than 



THE DESTRUCTION OF GALVESTON — 1900. 



587 



did New Orleans. The census of 1S90 
gave the city a population of 30,000, which 
had increased to 38,000 in 1900. It was 
during that decade that railroad after 
railroad hridged the wide, shallow bay, 
and so gained entrance to the city. 
Wealth increased and millionaires became 
common. They were, too, men who took 
pride in their home city, and spent their 
money freely in its improvement and 
adornment. Fine college and school build- 
ings, churches, and hospitals were built; 
and it was, to an imusual degree, a city 
of homes. Its thirty-eight thousand peo- 
ple had accumulated property valued 
at upward of seventy-tive millions of 
dollars. Moreover it was an attractive 
and beautiful city. A walk of twenty 
minutes took one from the bay shore to 
the Gulf front, with its magnificent beach. 
Orange and myrtle trees, delicate roses 
and all the rich-hued blossoms of the 
tropics charmed the eye on every hand; 
while the Oleander was to be seen every- 
where, and gave to Galveston its designa- 
tion of the " Oleander City." 

Its people rose on the morning of Sat- 
urday, September S, 1900, to pursue their 
ordinary avocations with no premonition 
of the terrible fate that was awaiting 
tliem. Though the busy season had hardly 
yet set in, there were ready for transfer 
from the elevators and warehouses to ocean 
steamers two and a half nnllion bushels 
of wheat, and moi'e than 1,500 bales of 
cotton. Early in the forenoon, however, 
high winds began to rise, the gale coming 
from the northwest. Gradually a shift 
of the wind to the north occurred, and 
then toward the east ; and at two o'clock 
in the afternoon it had reached a velocity 
of thirty-six miles an hour. The bay 
water was being driven over the city 
front, and soon rising over the wharves 
it flooded the Strand, as the wide front 
occupied by the railroads and docks is 
called, and crept up the streets among the 
business blocks. By this time the surf on 
the Gulf side was breaking over its front 
with tremendous fury, and with a deafen- 
ing roar, and the crests of foam were 
carried far in among the cottages. Al- 



though those who had never experienced 
similar visitations began to be gTeatly 
alarmed, the older settlers felt no anxiety 
as they had weathered several similar 
storms. The poorer whites and negroes 
living in the frailer tenements, however, 
began to desert them, and flee to more 
secure buildings in the business section. 
In the middle of the afternoon there was 
a general cessation of business, as the 
water was constantly growing deeper in 
the streets and men waded home to be 
with their families. By three o'clock the 
wind had increased to forty-five miles an 
hour, and was still rapidly rising and 
piling higher and higher the waves that 
were battering the city. At five o'clock a 
velocity of seventy-four miles an hour was 
recorded by the official anemometer, and 
all began to realize that the situation was 
becoming desperate. The air was filled 
with pieces of tin-roofing, signs, cornices, 
everything that the gale could wrench 
away. Every building on the island 
trembled, many rocking like boats. The 
mild climate had encouraged a frail form 
of architecture and the less securely 
fastened buildings were being torn from 




THE ROSENBERG LTBRARY (nEW). 

their foundations. One who visited the 
island just after the hurricane has said 
that if one hundred survivors were asked 
what was the most terrifying period of the 
storm, ninety would say without hesita- 
tion that it was from five to seven in the 
evening, when people really awoke to their 
terrible danger. Then thousands who 
were in their homes anxiously waiting for 
the hurricane to pass became terror- 



5SS 



TEOM COLONY TO WOliLL) I'OWEE. 



stricken, and rushed forth to seek com- 
panionship in their distress, or some 
promising refuge. Wading, swimming, 
floating, cut and bruised by the hail of 
Wood anil slate and glass, many reached 
places of shelter, but many more were 
drowned. Toward seven o'clock the wind 
again shifted to the southeast, all the 
time increasing in fui'y. At six o'clock 
it had reached a velocity of eighty-four 
miles an hour, when the anemometer was 
carried away. While no further record 
could bo kept, it was certain that the 
velocity constantly increased until a rate 
of from one hundred and ten to one hun- 
dred and twenty miles hail been attained. 
The conditions that prevailed during those 
two fateful hours admit of no descrip- 
tion. Wild despair gradually yielded to 
a more or less calm resignation to in- 
evitable death. Members of families bade 
each other tender farewells, expecting each 
moment would be the last. The whole 
city was preparing for death. At tlic 
Convent the Sacrament was administered 
to all in anticipation of the end. At the 
Catholic Orphan Asylum the nuns tied 
their little charges in bunches, each sister 
fastening a bunch to herself. And so they 
were engulfed together. As the waters 
rose families went to the upper story, or 
attic, aud in darkness and silence waited 
the end. Sometimes a cry from without 
would gain attention, and willing hands 
would draw in through the window a 
floating waif. Just before seven a huge 
wave rolled in from the gulf bringing in 
its wake a solid wall of water more than 
four feet high. This mighty flood swept 
whole blocks of cottages from their foun- 
dations; and in houses that withstood its 
force the water rose from two to four feet. 
p]very foot of ground on which the city 
stood was now under water, with the ter- 
rible hurricane from the Gulf side piling 
1115 the waves higher and higher, and 
battering every object in Its path. In the 
rotunda of the Tremont Hotel, in the 
centre of the business section, the water 
was waist deep. Great rafts of debris 
were constantly accumulating which were 
hurled upon the east, north, and wept 



sides of the city with a force that defied 
resistance. At seven o'clock when the 
wind had reached the highest velocity, and 
the flood had gained its greatest depth, the 
greater part of the buildings of the city 
were still standing. By ten o'clock hun- 
dreds of acres of the residence district 
had been ^^wept of buildings, and more 
than six thousand bodies of men, women, 
and children had been mingled with the 
ruins which were heaped up in vast hills 
on the island, in the waters, and on the 
mainland. As has been said : " Galves- 
ton's visitation was not merely the sweep 
of a cyclone, nor the sudden engulfing 
work of a flood; it was the irresistible 
attack of hurricane waves laden with 
wreckage, which became enormous batter- 
ing rams." — huge engines of destruction 
impelled with terrific speed and resistless 
force. 

After nine o'clock the wind shifted to 
the south and southwest, and began to 
fall. Since early morning it had very 
nearly covered the whole round of the 
compass. About ten o'clock the flood began 
to subside, and the wind continued to de- 
crease; and early dawn showed the higher 
streets above the surface of the water. 
Not until then were the naked survivors 
able to leave their shelter and seek cloth- 
ing and nourishment. All the clothing had 
been torn from the bodies of those who 
had been exposed to the horrible condi- 
tions that prevailed through the night ; 
and in nearly every case the bodies of the 
dead were found naked and badly cut 
and scarred. Everywhere, floating and 
driven by the wind and waves, were 
splintered and jagged pieces of board and 
timbers with shai-p protruding nails, and 
evei-y conceivable kind of wreckage with 
points that would pierce and edges that 
would cut ugly wounds. Many survivoi-s 
told how, while their houses went to 
pieces, they were hurled hither and 
thither by the currents, some remaining 
in the water among the ruins for hours; 
and all came out with their clothes 
literally torn from their bodies, and cov- 
ered with cuts and bruises. 

Investigation proved that it was not 



THE DESTEUCTION OF GALVESTOK — 1900. 



5S9 



among the poorest classes that the great- 
est loss of life occurred, but among the 
middle class, those who had incomes from 
salaries or good wages, professional peo- 
ple, and store-keepers, — people who owned 
the more modest homes. A large part of 
the congregation of every church was de- 
stroyed. Of one church the pastor and 
his entire family and more than three- 
quarters of the congregation were 
drowned, while its parish was left a 
barren wilderness of sand and ruins, not 
a house remaining. That survivors could 
have endured what these did and have re- 
mained sane seems well-nigh incredible. 
Momentarily expecting death, in total 
darkness, cut off from all the rest of the 
world, with the hurricane raging and the 
waves roaring around them, and subject 
to a continuous bombardment by the 
storm-driven wreckage, their situation was 
more horrible and terrifying than any 
words can ever hint. Hapijily the sur- 
vivors did not at first realize the extent 
of their loss, either of life or property ; 
and when on Sunday morning a com- 
mittee put off in a sailboat for the main- 
land, to acquaint the outside world with 
their calamity and to appeal for aid, the 
number of dead was reported as one thou- 
sand-. But before Monday noon more than 
one thousand bodies had been collected 
from the streets and exposed places, and 
taken to temporary morgues ; and two days 
later when the mountains of ruins had 
been only partially inspected, nearly two 
thousand more bodies had been uncovered; 
while before the week was over five thou- 
sand in all had been found in the city 
alone, which number continued investi- 
gations raised to above six thousand; but 
the exact number, of course, will never 
be known, as a great many bodies must 
have been carried out to sea by receding 
waves. More intolerable really than the 
terrors of the hurricane itself, were the 
heartrending sights that met survivors 
on evei-y hand. Some orderly course of 
burial was attempted at first ; but the vast 
number of corpses exposed to the hot rays 
of a tropical sun made more hasty 
methods of disposition imperative. Piles 



of wreckage were at last turned into 
funeral pyres, and thus thousands of 
bodies were cremated. 

Hunger and thirst, too, assailed the liv- 
ing, and pestilence threatened worse de- 
struction than the storm had wrought. 
But as soon as communication with the 
outside world was re-established aid of 
every kind began to reach the sufferers; 
and the sympathy of the whole world 
poured in like another flood upon the 
stricken people. Their response was 
quick and emphatic; courage revived, 
and a mighty recuiperative power became 
manifest. On that never-to-be-forgotten 
Sunday everybody was dazed, and all 
faculties were benumbed. There was only 
water-soaked food to eat, and a mixture 
of rain water and salt spray to drink; 
hardly a whole roof was left on any build- 
ing in the city, while a very large pro- 
portion, including many of the best 
and most prominent buildings, churches, 
schools, etc., were a mass of ruins. But 
within twenty-four hours order began to 
emerge from the chaos. A Committee of 
Safety was organized; guns and ammuni- 
tion were taken from the hardware stores; 
martial law was proclaimed ; citizens 
sworn to stand together for the common 
good patrolled the sti-eets; and on Tues- 
day the restoration of law and order was 
an assured fact. On Wednesday the 
banks opened for business; and mer- 
chants began ordering new stocks of goods 
as soon as the wires were in operation. 
As an eye-witness of the scene has said: 
" One week from the night when Galves- 
ton was smitten the people, — some limp- 
ing, many with arms in slings and heads 
bandaged, all haggard from the strain but 
with the fire of an indomitable spirit in 
their eyes — were looking confidently fur- 
ward." Within a week after the hurri- 
cane vessels were loading with grain, 
while carpenters worked above to repair 
the shattered roofs of the elevators; and 
within twelve daj-s trains were running 
regularly to and from the mainland, 
though it had been declared it would take 
two months to rebuild the bridge. Home- 
less, half-crazed by the loss of those dear 



5yo 



FEOM COLOA'Y TO WORLD POWEE. 



to tliem and of property, without capital, 
the peojale rose in the might of their in- 
vincible courage and faith, determined 
that from the ruins of the okl, a greater 
and more beautiful Galveston should 
rise. 

But the problem that faced the people 
was not a simijlo one. The established 
government had for years been the same 
as that of most American citi&s, — a 
mayor, with a council composed of mem- 
bers chosen from each ward. For a long 
time the administration of the city's 
affairs had been reckless and corrupt, 
political rings and bosses being in control. 
At the time of the flood, the city was bur- 
dened with a floating debt of $200,000; 
there were no funds in the treasury; 
from eighteen to twenty million dollars' 
Avorth of property had lieen destroyed ; of 
the more than six thousand lives that had 
been lost many were taxjsayers, while 
many more tJian that number had been 
left penniless; and, worst of all, confi- 
dence in the city as a place for home- 
seekers and for the investment of capital 
had been destroyed. As a rule the Press 
and the leading Scientific authorities 
through the country, in discussing the 
hurricane and its results, had taken the 
]insition that Galveston island was not a 
fit place for the location of a city. The 
leading men of Galveston, therefore, 
recognized that they must work out their 
own salvation, and not count upcju out- 
side aid for the accomplishment of their 
plans. Fortunately there had been in 
existence in the city for some years a 
" Deep-water Conunission " of seventeen 
men, made up of the very foremost citi- 
zens regardless of party or political con- 
siderations, and men of independent 
means. As its name indicates, the Com- 
mission had been organized to secure 
harbor improvements. It had been rep- 
resented at Washinirton and at the State 
capital for years, and had secured from 
the national government the construction 
of a series of stone jetties at a cost of nine 
million dollars, which insured a deep 
water channel into the harbor, and pre- 
vented its being filled up bj' the shifting 



sands of the Gulf bottom. This Commis- 
sion at once took quiet control of the 
situation. Its members realized that the 
first step in any scheme looking toward 
the rebuilding of the city must be the 
establishment of a municipal government 
which should be capable of conducting 
great undertakings, and should be morally 
above reproach. Without taking the pub- 
lic into their confidence the Commission 
recjuested a committee of leading lawyers 
to draw up a new city charter, whose dis- 
tinctive feature should be the abolition of 
the old form of city government, and the 
establishment in its place of a form of 
government by Commission. Accordingly 
(•he new Charter provided for a Board of 
five Commissioners, one of whom should 
act as mayor; two of these commissioners 
were to be elected by the city, and three, 
including the mayor, were to be appointetl 
by the governor of the State. When the 
scheme was fully worked out, the Commis- 
sion went before the people with their 
Charter. The old political leaders and 
bosses fought hard; but a plain statement 
of the facts to all the people, in the light 
of their present situation and recent suf- 
ferings, prevailed; and at an election 
more than six-sevenths of the voters sup- 
ported the new movement. No time was 
Inst in getting the charter before the 
Legislature, which quickly approved it; 
and at the first meeting of the Commis- 
sion government on September 24, 1901, 
the Deep-water Commission urged im- 
mediate action on certain plans for the 
improvement of the city. Resolutions 
were passed providing for the employment 
(if an expert Board of Engineers who 
should report a definite plan for the pro- 
tection of the city, and the cost of the 
■work. Three of the best-known engineers 
of the country were employed; and on 
January 25, 1902, they reported a plan 
calling for the erection of a solid concrete 
wall along the entire Gulf front, and the 
raising of the entire city's surface to a 
level above the highest point reached by 
the waters during the flood. The total 
cost of the undertaking was estimated at 
ifr,,5n5,000. This was the first step. 



THE DESTKUCTION OF GALVESTON — 1900. 



591 



Next it was requested through the 
Commission's Court that the County 
should undertake the buildint? of the Sea 
Wall, at a cost of $1,500,000, the city to 
bear the burden of raising the gTade, at 
an estimated cost of $2,000,000. As 
nearly all the taxpayers of the County 
were residents of the city, they had to as- 
sume the double burden. The proposition 
to issue bonds by the County had to bo 
voted on by the people, and three thou- 
sand votes were cast for the issue with 
only twenty-two against it, — a most posi- 
tive expression of the unanimity of pub- 
lic opinion, and conclusive proof that the 



built. During the building of the wall the 
outer protection called for by the contract 
was put in place. This consists of a con- 
tinuous breakwater along the sea side of 
the wall twenty-seven feet wide, made of 
rough blocks of stone, many of them 
weighing a ton apiece, which protects 
the concrete wall from the full force of the 
waves. So admirably was the whole work 
conducted that on July 29, 1904, the 
entire wall was completed, — a colossal 
structure resembling a huge fortress, and 
a triumph of engineering ' skill. The 
second part of the scheme was hardly less 
formidable. It called for the filling in 




THE SEA WALL 



people were back of the movement, heart 
and soul. 

The contract for the building of the 
sea wall was awarded September 19, 1902. 
It called for a solid concrete wall sixteen 
feet high, sixteen feet thick at the base, 
and five feet at the top, and was to skirt 
the Gulf for a distance of three and a 
quarter miles. For the foundation creo- 
soted timbers were driven through the 
shifting sands from forty to fifty feet 
until the clay bottom was reached. These 
piers extended in four parallel lines, 
three and one-half feet apart, each being 
four feet from its nearest neighbor. On 
this basis the solid concrete wall has been 



with earth or sand of the entire city's 
surface area, from a height of seventeen 
feet at the sea wall to eight feet at the 
bay front. To accomplish this stupendous 
work the first step was to excavate a canal 
two hundred feet wide and twenty-one 
feet deep just inside the wall and exti'ud- 
ing the full length of the city front. Four 
immense suction dredges were brought 
from Germany, each with a capacity of 
1..500 cubic yards. These dredges steamed 
out into the Gulf and dropped their suc- 
tion mains to the bottom. The engines 
were then set to work, and the semi-liquid 
sand sucked into the immense hoppers of 
the steamers. The heavy-laden dredge 



59: 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEK. 



then steamed back within tlie wall and 
entered the canal. As the canal had been 
advanced, pipe stations were established 
at the head of each street ending on it. 
At these stations the dredges discharged 
their loads forcing the liquid sand through 
forty-two inch mains, extending through 
each street. At the end of the mains 
sand and water gushed out, the sand 
settling, and the water flowing oil. After 
the filling in was completed to the required 
grade, the dredges filled in the canal in 
the same manner, backing out as the work 
advanced. What this great work involved 
may be partially realized if one considers 
that every building in the city had to be 
raised from six to fifteen or eighteen feet; 
that all arrangements for sewerage, light- 
ing, water supply, etc., had to be read- 
justed; that tracks for the car lines were 
relaid, and streets repaved ; and scores of 
incidental changes and improvements had 
to be provided for, which only tlie partic- 
ipation in such a revolutionary undertak- 
ing could develop. But the rehabilitation 
of the city was not even then complete in 
the minds of the far-seeing directors of 
its great improvements. A great cause- 
way, to be constructed of cement and to 
be five hundred feet wide, to connect the 
cit.v with the mainland was planned, and 
is now about completed, forming an en- 
during and permanent connection with 
the mainland. 

But what of Government by Commis- 
sion ( As has been said, the new city 
charter j^rovided for a Board of five Com- 
missioners, two of whom were to be 
elected by the city, and three, including 
the commissioner who should act as 
mayor, were to be appointed by the 
governor of the State. In 1903 such ap- 
pointment of Commissioners was declared 
unconstitutional by the State Courts, 
since which time all five members of the 
body have been elected by the people. The 
mayor acts as a general manager, and the 
four other commissioners head respec- 
tively the departments of Finance, of 
Water-works and Sewerage, of Streets and 
Public Buildings, and of Fire and Police. 
All power resides in the Commission, and 



a majority vote of the body is final. 
Previous to the great catastrophe of 1900, 
Galveston had been, in the broadest sense 
of the term, a " wide-open " town ; and 
only one who is familiar with such con- 
ditions in a place which is at once the sea- 
side resort for all classes of excursionists 
from a wide stretch of not too highly 
civilized country, and the meeting place 
of thousands of sailors and adventurers 
from every part of the world, can under- 
stand in some degree what that term 
means. Saloons of the vilest character 
were open seven days in the week and 
twent.v-four hours of every day; gambling 
and lottery devices of every kind were 
openly conducted ; dance-halls and brothels 
were everywhere in evidence. As one has 
said: "Formerly Galveston was a slat- 
tern, and a southern slattern at that, — 
which is as far as language can go." But 
a critical obsei"ver who recently studied 
the situation on the ground summed up 
his impressions as follows : " Galveston is 
now beginning to reap the results of five 
years of clean, able city government. She 
was desperate and bankrupt ; now her 
credit is good. She was unclean but now 
she is clean; she was a town of vice and 
license; :iow she is orderly. Uupaved 
streets are well paved, there are good 
sewers where formerly there were none, 
there is an ample water-supply in increas- 
ing use. The city is protected from 
future danger from flood. But goo<l 
government has meant more than its di- 
rect service to the city. It has meant in- 
directly industrial and commercial jiros- 
perity. Property which fell dead, with no 
bu.vers, after the storm, has regained its 
former value, and in sections has exceeded 
it. When the grade raising is cleaned up, 
a nuirh largiT increase will undoubtedly 
take place. The city is prospering in a 
business way as it never did before. But 
most imi^ortant of all, the shipping from 
the port is increasing tremendously. It 
has trebled since 1900. The government 
of the town did not, of course, cause all 
this growth; but the conditions it brought 
about were a great factor." 

But the working of the Commission 



THE DESTEUCTION OF GAL VESTOIS' — 1900. 



593 



plan of government is not to be measured 
alone by its results in rebuilding and re- 
deeming Galveston. The " Galveston 
Plan " has now become one of the three or 
four most considered and admired forms 
of municipal government by all who are 
elsewhere seeking to overthrow corrupt 
political administrations, and make their 
further existence impossible. The plan 
has already been copied in several of the 
largest cities of Texas, and in other 
places, and its workings have everyn'here 
proved most effective and salutary. 
Surely the little band of earnest and 
38 



heroic men who faced the direst adversity 
in Galveston in 1900, and undertook to 
conquer circumstances, builded better 
than they knew. And we know of no story 
of intelligent and determined effort to 
achieve great ends under the most ad- 
verse conditions which may better inspire 
all workers for the public good with a 
glorious confidence, nor which more truly 
merits the reverent admiration of all 
worthy citizens of the whole countiy, than 
the narrative of the arduous labors and of 
the sublime achievements of the " Deep- 
water Commission " of Galveston, 



THE PANAMA CANAL - 1903. 



Early Si'arch for Strait Connecting Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. — Efl'orts of Cortez, Saavedra. 
and Others. — Interest of Charles V. and P)iilip II. — Latter Decides, "Contrary to Divine 
Will to Unite Two Oceans Wliich the Creator of World Had Separated." — English Become 
Interested in Nicaragua in Seventeenth Century. — Visit of Humboldt to United States and 
Central America. — Outlines Nine Routes tor \^'ater\vay from Atlantic to Pacific. — Views 
of Goethe. — Remarkable Predictions as to Development of United States ; Also as to Canals. 

— The Treaty of 1846 with Xew Granada (Colombia). — The Clayton-Buhver Treaty.— 
French Interference Under Xapoleon III. — American Position Asserted by President Grant 
in ISO!). — '■ Only American Canal, under Control of Americans Should be Built Between 
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.'' — DeLesseps and tlie French Concession. — Appointment of Com- 
mission to Investigate Merits of All Leading Routes. — Commission Reports in Favor of 
Nicaragua. — Debate in Congress and .Spooner Amendment. — Clayton-Buhver Treaty Abro- 
gated by Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, 1901. — The Remarkable Panama Revolution. — M. Bunau- 
Varilla. — Treat}- with Panama Republic. — President Roosevelt's Attitude. — His Letter to 
Dr. Shaw. — Transfer of All Rights and Property of French Canal Company for $40,000,000. 

— Canal Comniissi<m Appointed. — Repeated Changes in It. — Whole Work Finally Placed in 
Hands of Board of Army Engineers. — - Great Improvement in Its Prosecution. — Statistics 
as to Present Conditions. — Original Estimates and Probably Final Cost of the Canal. 



" Dids't thou never hear 
That things Ul got had ever bad succi'ss? " 

— Shakespeare, 



S one finds the most illuminating accounts of nearly all sub- 
jects of human knowledge, of all ages and all races, in the 
writings of that prince of stoi-y tellers, John Fiske, we 
naturally get from the first volume of his " Discovery of 
America " the clearest statement of some of the causes that 
first led men to search, unconsciously then, for a passage 
from the Atlantic Ocean into the Pacific, Down to the 
thirteenth century Ptolemy's geographical dictum that 
Eastern Asia shaded off into an unknown land of illim- 
itable extent, "full of reedy and impenetrable swamps," 
was universally accepted in Europe. In the first quarter 
of that century occurred the wonderful conquests of Genghis Khan, as a result of which 
China became more accessible to western adventurers and explorers than it ever was be- 
fore or has been since. In northern China they came in contact with a dynasty called the 
Ivhitai ; and when this name became known to Europeans it assumed the form of Cathay, 
the term by which China and the far East was best known for centuries. About the year 
1250 two Franciscan monks were sent on missionary errands to the Grand Khan. 
Both are described as men of " shrewd, and cultivated minds," especially one Rubru- 




THE PANAMA CA:NAL— 1903. 



595 



guis, whose narrative we are told " in its 
rich details, its vivi<l pictures, its acute- 
ness of observations, and strong' good sense 
has few superiors in the whole library of 
travel." Though neither of these men 
visited China, at the Court of the Grand 
Ivhaii they met many Chinese and ac- 
quired much information regarding the 
geography of Asia, learning, among other 
things, that it did not terminate in a 
land of "reedy and impenetrable swamps," 
but bordered upon an Eastern ocean. 
" Here," says Fiske, " we arrive at a not- 
able landmark in the history of the dis- 
covery of America. Here from the camp 
of bustling heathen at Karakorum there is 
brought to Europe the first announcement 
of a geographical fact from which the 
poetic mind of Christopher Columbus will 
hereafter reap a wonderful harvest. 
Since there is an ocean east of Cathay 
and an ocean west of Spain how natural 
the inference, — and albeit quite wrong, 
how amazingly fruitful — that these oceans 
are one and the same, so that by sailing 
westward from Spain one might go 
straight to Cathay." 

It was in this century also that the dis- 
covery of the Mariner's Compass was 
made, or, rather, a knowledge of it became 
somewhat common among European navi- 
gators. Though tradition credits the 
Chinese with a knowledge and use of the 
compass for more than two thousand 
years before this period, it is apparent 
that the virtues of the needle were first 
disclosed in Europe by some of the re- 
turned Crusaders who had learned of it 
from the Arabs, who, iu turn, had gained 
their knowledge from the Chinese in the 
course of their eastern voyages. That its 
use was not common knowledge even 
among- the learned at the middle of the 
thirteenth century the following extract 
from a letter will abundantly prove. In 
12.58, Brunette Latini, the tutor of Dante, 
made a visit to Friar Roger Bacon at Ox- 
ford, an account of which he sent to his 
friend, the poet Cavalcanti. He says: "The 
Parliament summoned to assemble at 
Oxford, I did not fail to see Friar Bacon 
as soon as I arrived, and among other 



things, he showed me a black ugly stone 
called a magnet, which has the surprising 
property of drawing iron to it ; and upon 
which if a needle is rubbed, and after- 
ward fastened to a straw so that it will 
swim upon the water, the needle will 
instantly turn towards the Pole star; 
therefore, be the night ever so dark, so 
that neither moon nor star be visible, yet 
shall the mariner be able by the help of 
this needle to steer his vessel aright. TJiis 
discovery which appears useful to all who 
travel by sea must remain concealed until 
other times; because no master mariner 
dares to use it lest he should fall under 
the imputation of being a magician; nor 
would the sailors venture themselves out 
to sea under his command if he took with 
him an instrument which carries so great 
an appearance of being constructed under 
the influence of some infernal spirit," — 
a sentiment that draws from the his- 
torian this philosophical comment: " Is it 
not a curious instance of human perver- 
sity that while eustomai-y usage from time 
inunemorial has characterized as ' Acts of 
God ' such horrible events as famines, pes- 
tilences, and earthquakes, on the other 
hand, when some jjurely beneficent in- 
vention has appeared, such as the 
mariner's compass or the printing press, 
it has commonly been accredited to the 
Devil I " 

Tliough more accurate information re- 
garding the situation of Cathay had been 
obtained and the mariner's compass had 
come into somewhat general use by the 
end of the thirteenth century, yet for 
two hundred years Europeans made little 
practical use of such knowledge. Nor is 
this wholly remarkable, as it was during 
this period that the overland routes to 
the east were more open than they ever 
have been since. But when the " Un- 
speakable Turk," whose career had been 
cheeked by the Crusades, again, began his 
descents upon Eastern Europe and, in 
1365, establishing himself in the Balkan 
peninsula, began slowly to close in upon 
Constantinople, the main channels of 
trade with the Orient, which were through 
the Volga country or Armenia, were little 



d'M 



iEOM COLO AY TO WOKLi) POWEK. 



by little closed, and by tlie middle of the 
tifteeiith century were effectually cut off 
by the capture of Constantinople. Then 
the demand for another route to the 
Orient became imiierative, and it was to 
he sought by sea, and not by land. As is 
well known all the voyas'es of discovery, 
both down the coast of Africa by the Por- 
tuguese and later to the west by the 
Spaniards, had the Indies and China as 
their objective points: and the earliest 
Spanish navigators naturall.y believed 
when they discovered the Caribbean 
islands and later the maiidand, that the 
object of their quest had been gained. 
lUit when in l.")12 Balboa crossed the 
Isthmus and 

" With eagle eyes 
ITe stared at the Pacific, and all his men 
J.,ooked at each other with a wild surmise, — 
Silent, upon a peak in Darien," 

it was realized that another barrier lay 
between this newly discovered country and 
the land of spices, of silks, and of gold ; 




and from that day, — the first quarter of 
the sixteenth century, to this, — the first 
(piarter of the twentieth century, — the 
]n-oblem has been the same, to discover or 



cut a short and safe route through the 
Isthmus to the ancient and longed for 
realm of Cathay. 

What has generally come to be known 
as the Isthmus of Panama is the long, 
narrow neck of land connecting North 
and South America, and extending from 
Costa Pica in an easterly direction about 
450 miles to the Atrato river, whose 
course practically coincides with the 
westerly boundary of South America. 
The general form of the country is that 
of a somewhat flattened letter " S " lying 
on its face; and the average widih is 
about seventy miles. The bays of Panama 
and San Miguel on the south and of 
Chiriqui and Uraba on the north fonn 
three minor constrictions, having distinc- 
tive names. Beginning at the west the 
Isthmus of Chiriqui, opposite the bay of 
that name, has a minimum width of 
aliout forty-five miles; beyond this the 
neck is broadened to about one hundrt'd 
and twenty miles by the Azuero peninsula 
on the south. The bay of Panama re- 
duces it to about thirty miles opposite the 
bay of San Bias, or about thirty-five miles 
between Panama and Colon: this is 
known as the Isthmus of Panama proper, 
or San Bhis. The Isthmus of Darien is 
properly the portion between the Gulfs of 
Urabii and San Miguel, and has a mini- 
mum width of thirty-five miles. An ir- 
regular mountain chain runs the entire 
length of the Isthmus, generally near the 
northern coast; to the westward it has 
volcanic peaks reaching the height of 
seven thousand feet; but in the easterly 
Ijart it subsides to a range of hills with 
passes less than four hundred feet above 
sea level. The coasts are generally low, 
swampy, hot, and unhealthful. Pains are 
very abundant during nine months of 
the year, with frequent violent thunder 
storms. The dry months are Februai-j-, 
March, and April: while from August 
to October the heat is intense, except in 
the mountains. The latitude of Panama 
is about 10° north, and it lies due south 
of the centre of Cuba, the east coast of 
Florida, and but a little west of south of 
New York. 



THE PANAMA CANAL— 1903. 



597 



The early Spanish explorers on the 
mainland all learned from the natives of 
a fabled strait connecting the two oceans, 
and for the first twenty-five years a large 
share of their energy was expended in a 
search for it, though they were not negli- 
gent of pearls and gold which they found 
in abundance. One of the most indefati- 
gable of these searchers was Cortez, al- 
ready distinguished as the Conqueror of 
Mexico. In a letter to the King in 1524 
he says " if the strait is found, I shall hold 
it to be the greatest deed I have yet 
rendered. It would make the King of 
Spain master of so many lands that he 
might call himself Lord of the whole 
world." He sent out fleets on both oceans, 
one ordered to search to the south, on the 
Pacific, until it should come to the newly 
discovered Straits of Magellan; and the 
other to follow the east coast of North 
America as far as Labrador, if necessary. 
" Thus," said he in another letter to the 
King in 1525, " on the one side or the 
other I shall not fail to solve the secret 
of the Strait." And after referring to 
his wish to explore California and other 
Pacific coast lands, which he believed to 
be of great value, he further says : " but 
being well aware of the great desire of 
your Majesty to know the secret of this 
strait and of the advantage the crown 
would derive from its discovery I post- 
pone all other schemes and interests, some 
of them of the highest moment, to pur- 
sue this object alone." Toward 15.30, 
however, these earnest servants of the 
King began to doubt the existence of any 
Strait, and to consider the feasibility of 
making one. One of the most intelligent 
and determined of these men, a companion 
of Balboa when he crossed Darien, was 
Alvaro de Saavedra. Recalling the nar- 
rowness and low elevation of the Isthmus 
of Panama he prepared plans for a canal 
at that point; and an early Spanish his- 
torian laments his death on a voyage 
across the Pacific from the Moluccas, be- 
cause " if he had lived he meant to have 
opened the land of Castilla del Oro and 
New Spain from Sea to Sea, which might 
have been done in four places." He then 



proceeds to describe the Darien, Panama, 
Nicaragua, and Tehuantepec routes, 
showing that, even at that early date, 
the Spanish explorers had decided upon 




the i)ossible canal sites that have main- 
tained precedence down to the present 
day. Charles V. manifested the deepest 
interest in these propositions, as did 
Philip II. during the earlier years of his 
reign. But upon receiving an unfavor- 
able report from an engineer he sent out 
he changed his attitude; and a little later, 
his superstition getting the better of his 
avarice, he decided that it would he con- 
trary to the Divine will to unite two 
oceans which the Creator of the World 
had separated, and that such an impious 
undertaking would surely call down the 
vengeance of Heaven. 

During the greater part of the next 
century the Spanish were engaged in eon- 
quest and in search for treasure, though 
the canal project was never wholly alian- 
doned. Toward the middle of the seven- 
teenth century the English, who had for 
many years been scouring the Atlantic 



598 



FROM COLOXY TO WOELD POWEK. 



and Pacific Oceans for Spanish treasure 
ships, became an important factor in the 
canal problem. In 1(355 they seized the 
island of Jamaica, and made attempts to 
establish themselves in Central America. 
Settlements were made on the coasts of 




ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 

Honduras and Nicaragua, and a party of 
adventurers went up the San Juan river 
and explored the shores of Lake Nicara- 
gua. Thus for the first time the English 
realized the magnitude of that lake audits 
immense value as a part of a canal route. 
From that period date their determined 
cfFnrts to get control of Nicaragua, while 
forces were set in motion which should 
only find their end in the Clayton-Bulwer 
Treaty two hundred years later. The 
space at our command does not admit of 
detailed reference to the many canal 
schemes and pi'opositions of the next one 
hundred and fifty years; but the visit of 
Alexander Humboldt to this country and 
Central America at the opening of the 
nineteenth century, and his conclusions 
regarding the canal proposition, are of so 
much interest that they must Iv briefly 
noticed. In his work " Four Centuries of 
the Panama Canal," Mr. W. F. Johnson 
has given a full account of TTumb(<ldt's in- 



vestigations and opinions, and it is to that 
work that we are indebted for much in- 
formation on this particular subject. As 
a result of his observations, Humboldt 
outlined nine different routes for water- 
ways between the Atlantic and the Pa- 
cific, the first of which is especially inter- 
esting and amusing. It was to enter the 
Mississippi river from the Gulf of Mex- 
ico, and then reach the Pacific by that 
river, the ^Missouri, the Peace, and the Col- 
umbia rivers. He admits, however, that 
this route might be impracticable because 
of the barrier presented by the " Stony," 
or Rocky Mountains, which, he was told, 
in some places reached a height of 3,500 
feet above the sea level. Each of the four 
routes that have received favorable con- 
sideration from the earliest times wore 
fully indorsed by him, and he was con- 
vinced that the building of such a canal 
was "calculated 'to immortalize a govern- 
ment occupied with the true interests of 
humanity." Not the least notable result 
of his observations, however, was the re- 
markable comment and prophetic utter- 
ance of the great Goethe, inspired by 
reading Humboldt's account of his travels 
and investigations. In the " Conversa- 
tions with Eckermann and Soret," under 
date of February 21, 1827, it is stated that 
Goethe spoke much of Humboldt and of 
his views as to the importance of water 
communication between the two oceans. 
" Humboldt," he said, " has with a great 
knowledge of his subject given other 
points where, by making use of some 
streams which flow into the Gulf of Mex- 
ico, the end ma.v be better attained per- 
haps than at Panama. All this is re- 
served for the future and for an enter- 
prising spirit. So much, however, is cer- 
tain, that if they succeed in cutting such 
a canal that ships of any size can be nav- 
igated through it from the Mexican Gulf 
to the Pacific Ocean, innumerable bene- 
fits will result to the whole human race, 
civilized and uncivilized. But I should 
wonder if the United States were to let 
an opportunity escape of getting such a 
■worl- into their own hands. It may be 
foreseen that this young state, with its 



THE PANAMA CANAL— 1903 



599 



decided predilection to the West, will, in 
thirty or forty years, have occupied and 
peopled the large tract of land beyond the 
Eocky Mountains. It may furthermore 
be foreseen that along the whole coast of 
the Pacific Ocean, where nature has al- 
ready formed the most capacious and 
secure harbors, important commercial 
to^Mis will gradually arise for the fur- 
therance of a great intercourse between 
China and the East Indies, and the 
United States. In such a ease it would 
be not only desirable but almost neces- 
sary that a more rapid communication 
should be maintained between the East- 
ern and the Western Shores of North 
America, both by merchant ships and 
men-of-war, than has hitherto been pos- 
sible with the tedious, disagreeable, and 
expensive voyage around Cape Horn. 1 
therefore repeat thai it is absolutely indis- 
pensahle for the United States to effect a 
passage from, the Mexican Gulf to the 
Pacific Ocean; and I am certain that they 
will do so. ... 1 should like to see 
another thing, — a junction of the Danube 
and the Rhine ; but this undertaking is so 
gigantic that I have grave doubts of its 
comijletion, particularly when I consider 
our German resources. And thirdly, and 
lastly, I should wish to see England in 
possession of a canal through the Isthmus 
of Suez. Would I could live to see these 
three works. It would be well worth the 
trouble to last some fifty years or more 
for the very purpose." 

During the period between 1810 and 

1825 the Spanish possessions bordering on 
the Caribbean Sea achieved their inde- 
pendence, assuming Republican forms of 
government. Immediately upon the es- 
tablishment of these governments, canal 
projects were almost daily broached. In 

1826 Henry Clay, then Secretary of State 
of the United States, ordered an official 
survey of the Nicaragua route, and many 
other canal schemes were advanced in this 
country without results; while for the 
next sixty years, hardly a year passed ■with- 
out some real or pretended representatives 
of foreign interests securing concessions 
and rights of way across the Isthmus, or 



from Nicaragua. The first pronounced 
advance towards definite action by this 
country came in 1846, when the now 
famous treaty of that year was made with 
New Granada (now Colombia), by which 
the United States secured the exclusive 
right of transit across the entire Isthmus 
of Panama, from Costa Rica to the Atrato 
river, guaranteeing in return " the rights 
of sovereignty and isroperty which New 
Granada has and possesses over said terri- 
toiy." This Treaty became of great im- 
portance when in 1903 it seemed neces- 
sary to justify the Administration's course 
regarding the alleged revolution in Pan- 
ama. It was not long before American 
capitalists under its protection built the 
Panama railroad, which was opened for 
public service in 1855. The famous, or 
infamous, Clayton-Bulwer Treaty between 
Great Britain and the United States was 
concluded in 1850. The necessary limits 
of this article preclude the possibility of 
an effort to make clear the many intri- 




cate and perplexing political considera- 
tions which determined the character of 
this most short-sighted and ill-advised 
agreement. Sufiice it to say that its gen- 
eral purpose was to bind the respective 
governments never to obtain any exclu- 



600 



TEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



sive control over au Isthmian Canal, nor 
to maintain fortifications commanding 
the same, nor to malie any use of an al- 
liance or agreement with any Central 
American state to obtain unequal advan- 
tages in regard to commerce or naviga- 
tion through any such canal. It is hardly 
necessary to say that the treaty has been 
a bone of contention and a prolific source 
of misunderstandings and strife from the 
day of its enai'tment until it was super- 
seded by the Ilay-Pauncefote Treaty of 
1901. 

Between 1860 and 1870 the Emperor 
Napoleon III. became a somewhat active 
factor in canal matters, and not at all to 
the satisfaction of the American people. 
These movements, in connection with his 
attempt to establish Maximilian as king 
in Mexico, in 1864, gave birth to a strong 
anti-French sentiment in this country. 
And so many were the tlireatened foreign 
complications that in 1869 President 
Grant was moved to announce in no inv 
ccrtain tones, for the first time, what has 
come to be the attitude of the United 
States, that only an American canal, 
under the control of Americans, should 
be anywhere built between the Atlantic 
and Pacific Oceans. 

In 1878, however, Lt. AVyse of the 
French Navy secured from the Colombian 
government a conc'ession for the con- 
struction of a canal anywhere on the 
Isthmus, provided he could make terms 
with the Panama railroad. This he suc- 
ceeded in doing, and returning to France, 
disposed of his concession to the Sacic/e 
Civile Internaiional du Canal Iiilrr- 
oceanique, with Ferdinand de Lesseps, 
the builder of the Suez Canal, as its 
president. This company was organized 
under a charter guaranteed by the French 
Government. It had a capital stock of 
600,000,000 francs. Books were opened 
for a popular subscription at fifty francs 
a share, and so great was the entlmsiasni 
over the project that the number of sub- 
scribers quickly reached 600,000. Al- 
though there was no evidence that the 
French Government had any interest 
whatever in the undertaking, yet so \\n- 



pleasant were the recollections of Napol- 
eon's attempt to get a foothold in Central 
America that people came to regard that 
as a part of French policy; and it was 
persistently rumored that the French Gov- 
ernment was backing de Lesseps. Even 
if this were not true, it was easily seen 
that the Government had only to take ad- 
vantage of some of the political disturb- 
ances which are constantly arising among 
the Central American states, and make of 
it an excuse for assuming control over 
any canal that the Company should have 
constructed. The whcjle proposition was, 
therefore, regarded with very unfriendly 
sentiments by both the government and 
the people of this country. To overcome 
this opposition and to encourage Amer- 
ican subscriptions to the Company's stock 
de Lessejis came to the United States in 
1880. lie appeared before a House Com- 
mittee, addressed public assemblies, oc- 
cupied a great deal of space in magazines 
and papers, and in every way endeavored 
to remove the misapprehensions of the 
people; and in that, campaign he was re- 
markably successful. LTnfortunately, how- 
ever, the change of attitude of many 
[irorainent papers and influential business 
niciL and bankers was so complete and 
sudden that their conversion was viewed 
with considerable skepticism. The net re- 
sults, however, of his efforts were ex- 
tremely satisfactory to de Lesseps and his 
company, notwithstanding the fact that 
his visit was the occasion of President 
Hayes sending a message to the Senate in 
which he announced in the most em- 
phatic terms the attitude of the American 
p("oi)le towards every movement of that 
natui'C. " The policy of this Country," 
he said, " is a canal under American con- 
trol. The United States cannot consent 
to the surrender of this control to any 
European Power or to any combination 
of European Powers. . . . No Eu- 
ropean Power can intervene for such pro- 
tection without adopting measures on this 
continent which the United States would 
deem wholly inadmissible. An inter- 
oceanic Canal across the American Isth- 
mus will essentially change the geograph- 



THE PANAMA CANAL— l'JU3. 



GUI 



ical relations between the United States, 
and between the United States and the 
rest of the world. It will be the great 
ocean thoroughfare between our Atlantic 
and our Pacific shores, and virtually a 
part of the coast line of the United States. 
. . . No other great power would under 
similar circumstances fail to assert a 
rightful control over a work so closely and 
vitally affecting its interest and its wel- 
fare." 

In the face of this warning, however, 
the Trencli Company actively continued 
its preliminary work, and its stock was 
largely sought for. The plan which had 
been adopted provided for a sea-level 
canal, 29 1-2 feet deep, 72 feet wide at the 
bottom, involving the excavation of 157,- 
000,000 cubic yards of earth and rock at 
an estimated cost of $127,000,000. The 
canal was to be completed in eight years. 
Work was begun in 1881 in the most spec- 
tacular manner, Sara Bernhardt even go- 
ing to the Isthmus to give a performance 
in honor of the event. The subsequent 
history of the Company is scandalous in 
the extreme, though it was not until 1888 
that the day of reckoning came. The 
Company then suspended payments, and 
went into bankruptcy, a receiver being 
appointed shortly after. Instead of the 
$127,000,000 which it had been estimated 
would be ample to complete the work, it 
was found that nearly $400,000,000 had 
already been expended, and only about 
two-fifths of the work had been completed. 
Legal investigations followed, which dis- 
closed the most shocking- extravagance, 
misuse of funds, and bribery. More than 
one hundred members of the French leg- 
islature had received liberal bribes, as 
had also several members of the Execu- 
tive Government, the bureau of police, 
and others; while the press had been richly 
subsidized to prevent exposures. As a re- 
sult of the investigations the two leading 
financial agents of the Company com- 
mitted suicide, and de Lesseps himself 
became a mental wreck. Notwithstand- 
ing the conditions which existed, however, 
the public in France and throughout the 
world believed that he was only techni- 



cally guilty, and was not cognizant of the 
rascality of his associates. He was, never- 
theless, fined and sentenced to imprison- 
ment for two years, — but the sentence was 
never executed. He died in 1894, for- 
tunately, perhaps, never having rallied 
from his mental collapse and so probably 
not conscious of the disgrace that had 
fallen upon a great and honored name. 




FERDINAND DE LESSEPS. 

The Receiver appointed by the Courts 
was authorized to cede to any new com- 
pany all or part of the old company's 
assets, to borrow money and to make new 
contracts looking toward the completion 
of the work. Three different extensions 
of the time-limit on the concessions were 
obtained from the Colombian Govern- 
ment, the last carrying the term over to 
1910. In October, 1894, the Eeceiver suc- 
ceeded in forming a new company, and 
assigned to it all the rights, property, and 
assets of every nature of the old company. 
This company secured the services of an 
international technical commission, com- 
posed of ten eminent engineers from the 
LTnited States, Great Britain, Germany, 
and France, which proceeded to the Isth- 
mus and carefully studied every feature of 
the work done and to be done; and in 
1899 the Commissioners reported unani- 



602 



FKOM COLOKY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



luously in favor of the feasibility and prac- 
ticability of conii^leting- the canal. It was 
estimated that $102,500,000 would be 
needed for the work, and that it would 
take ten years. The Company resumed 
operations on a small scale; and \ip to 
1900 had spent about $8,000,000, when the 
work practically ceased. The subsequent 
efforts of representatives of the company 
were confined to schemes to centre the in- 
terest of the United States on a canal at 
Panama and to prevent, so far as possible, 
the consideration of any other route, in 
the hope that a sale of assets of the com- 
pany might be made to Americans. To 
this end an active lobhy was maintained 
ill Washingfon and no opportunitij was 
lost to Iceep public attention directed 
towards Panama. 

In the meantime the Maritime Canal 
Company, which was an organization of 
private capitalists, had secured a conces- 
sion from Nicaragua, and in 1890 began 
work in a small way by making surveys, 
dredging the harbor of Greytown, etc. 
This company became a most persistent 
suitor for popular and government sup- 
port; and for eight or nine years the dis- 
cussions of the relative claims of the 
Nicaragua and Panama supporters were 
well-nigh continuous, — Senator Morgan 
especially doing notable service in behalf 
of the Nicaragua Company. Towards the 
close of the last century public opinion 
was considerably aroused upon the sub- 
ject by the failure of the Panama Com- 
pany, but more especially by the outbreak 
of the Cuban War, and the innnediate 
necessity of getting one of the newest 
and best of the battleships, the Oregon, 
from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic. 
Tier spectacular race around the Horn 
against time and the enemy was observed 
by the people with breathless interest; and 
no greater object lesson could have been 
presented of the need of an Isthmian 
canal; while the sentiment first forcibly 
voiced by President Grant, — " an Amer- 
ican Canal under the control of the Amer- 
icans," — became the universal popular 
cry. 

In 1899 President McKinley was au- 



thorized by Congress to appoint yet an- 
other Commission to investigate thor- 
oughly the characteristics and merits of 
all the leading routes, and $1,000,000, was 
appropriated to cover all the expenses of 
the commission. After visiting Nicaragua, 
Panama, and Paris, as the powers of the 
French Company and its disposition to 
sell were important factors in reaching 
conclusions, tlie Cummissioneirs reported 
November 10, 1901, in favor of ilw 
Nicaragua route. They estimated the 
cost of a canal at that place at $189,864,- 
062, while the cost of completing the 
Panama Canal was placed at $144,233,- 
358. To this latter sum, however, must 
be added the cost of acquiring the rights 
and assets of the French Company, which 
had been offered to the United States Gov- 
ernment for $109,141,500, which would 
make the total cost of the Panama Canal 
$253,374,858. The commission also ex- 
pressed its opinion that the United States 
should not pay over $40,000,000 for the 
interests and rights of the new Panama 
Canal Company, and its report closed 
with these words : " After considering all 
the facts developed in the investigations 
made by the Commission and the actual 
situation as it now stands, and having 
in view the terms offered by the new 
Panama Canal Company, this Commis- 
sion is of the opinion thai the most prac- 
ticable and feasible route for an Isthmian 
Canal, la he under the control, manage- 
ment, and oivnersliip of the United States, 
is ihat known as ttie Nicaragua route." 
This decision created the greatest con- 
sternation in the Panama Company's 
councils; and at a general meeting of the 
stockholders it was decided to negotiate 
for a sale to the United States on the 
best terms to be secured. Accordingly 
on January 4, 1902, a definite offer to sell 
for forty millions was cabled to the 
United States Commission; and upon the 
receipt of the message that body at once 
proceeded to reverse itself, in a supple- 
mentary report, dated January 18th, rec- 
ommending to the President the adoption 
of the Panama route instead of the Nica- 
ragua. In the meantime a bill had been 



THE TAXAMA CAXAL— l'J03. 



introduced in the House providing for the 
cunstruetiou of a canal through Nica- 
ragua as recommended hy the Commis- 
sion; and on January 9, 1!)02, more than 
a week before the Commission made its 
supplementary report, the hill was passed 
hy an almost unanimous vote of 308 to 2. 
When the House bill came before the Sen- 
ate, Mr. Morgan labored strenuously in 
its behalf. In a speech in its favor, how- 
ever, he made a declaration that the Pan- 
ama Company could not make a valid 
transfer of its properties; whereupon Sen- 
ator Spooner moved an amendment to the 
bill, which was practically a substitute, 
authorizing the President to acquire the 
rights and property of the Panama Canal 
Company at a cost not to exceed $40,000,- 
000; to secure from the Republic of 
Colombia perpetual control of a strip of 
land, not less than six miles wide, extend- 
ing from the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific, 
upon such terms as he might deem rea- 
sonable; to proceed, upon acquiring these 
rights, to construct a canal through the 
Isthmian Canal Commission created by 
this act. But should it not he possible to 
obtain a satisfactory title to the property 
of the French Company, and the control 
of the necessary territory of the Republic 
of Colombia, " within a reasonable time 
and upon reasonable terms," then the Pres- 
ident was instructed to secure control of 
the necessary strip through Nicaragua 
and proceed to construct a canal there. 
The bill as amended passed the Senate 
June 19, 1902, by a vote of 67 to 6. The 
House at first refused to concur in the 
Senate amendment; but after a confer- 
ence the Spooner measure was adopted by 
a vote of 260 to 8 and the act was signed 
by the President June 28th. Probably no 
other act of Congress has ever settled a 
question that had been studied, discussed, 
investigated and worked over for four 
centuries ; for this " Spooner Amend- 
ment " simply put in a form destined to 
receive practical development the plans 
that Saavedra and Cortez first laid before 
their King in the first quarter of the six- 
teenth century. 

During the previous year the Hay- 



Pauncefote Treaty had been ratified by 
the Senate (December 16, 1901). By this 
second draft of that treaty, the first hav- 
ing proved objectionable to the Senate, 
the old Clayton-Bulwer treaty was ex- 
plicitly abrogated, and it was provided 
that the United States might construct a 
canal which should be under its exclusive 
control and management. The principle 
of neutralization was nominally retained 
but under the sole guarantee of the 
United States, with power to police the 
canal; and the clause of the first draft, 
forbidding fortifications, was omitted. As 
a distinguished authority has well said, 
" a unilateral guarantee amounts to noth- 
ing; the effect, therefore, of the Hay- 
Pauncefote treaty is to place the canal 
politically, as well as commercially, under 
the absolute control of the United States." 




Photo, copyrighted 1902 by J. E. Purdy, Boston. 
JOHN C. SPOONER. 

Nothing seemed therefore to stand in 
the way of a clear field for immediate 
action. The Spooner Amendment had 
distinctlj- outlined an alternate course for 



eui 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



the president to pursue, if he could not 
" within a reasonable time and upon rea- 
sonable terms " secure the necessary right 
of way from Colombia. An investigation 
uf the title of the French Canal Com- 
pany, and of its powers to deliver all its 
interests and as^ft* on the Tsthinus to the 




Photo, copyrighted 190y by J. E. Purdy. Boston. 
JOHN HAY. 

United States, made by the law depart- 
ment of the Government, had revealed no 
flaw. Secretary Hay, therefore, at onco 
began negotiations with Mr. Herran, the 
representative of the Colombian Govern- 
ment at Washington, which resulted in 
the completion of the Hay-Herran treaty 
and its signature on January 22, 1903. 
By it the United States agreed to pay to 
Colombia ten million dollars cash, and an 
annuity of $2.'')0,000 for the perpetual lease 
of a strip of land six mile; wide extend- 
insi entirely across the Isthmus of Pan- 
ama. But the Colombian Senate whirh 
met in extra session June 20th for the 
purpose of considering the Treaty devel- 
oped a soirit adverse to ratification, and 
bv a final vote t.^ken August 12tli. it Avas 



rejected by the unanimous vote of all the 
Senators jsresent. Then followed another 
of the unfortunate affairs that have been 
too common in our history. A made-to- 
order revolution was started, clearly with 
the knowledge of the oflicials of the United 
States Government, although, as a gov- 
ernment, it had no part in its inception. 
This movement belongs in the same eate- 
g'oi-y with the acquisition of Texas, of 
Hawaii, and the Philippines. In all these 
cases all the rights of a weaker power 
were ignored by the strong one which 
wished to acquire territory belonging to 
the weaker power, and determined to dic- 
tate the method of acquisition, as well as 
the terms. It is not a chapter of history 
that any lover of his country and of fair 
play, not to speak of common morality, 
ran contemplate with any pride. 

In consideration of this subject, three 
points, should be kept in view. 1st — That 
Colombia was an independent, sovereign 
state with which the American govern- 
ment was, and had for a long time 
been, at peace. 2nd' — That under the 
constitution of Colombia, just as under 
ours, the sole power of accepting or 
rejecting treaties lay with its Senate. 
:ircl — Tliat under the Treaty of 1846, 
this government bound itself to protect 
the rights of Colombia on the Isthmus, 
in these words : "x\nd in order to se- 
cure to themselves the tranquil and con- 
stant enjojanent of these advantages 
(previously named) and as an especial 
compensation for the said advantages, and 
for favors they have acquired by the 4th, 
.ith, and 6th articles of this Treaty, the 
United States guarantees positively and 
efficaciously to New Granada (now 
Colombia), by the present stipulation, the 
perfect neutralization of the before-men- 
tioned Isthmus, with view that the free 
transit from one sea to the other may not 
be interrupted or embarrassed in any 
future time while the treaty exists; and 
in consequence of which the United States 
also guarantees in the same manner the 
rights of sovereignfi/ and property which 
New Granada has and possesses over the 
said territory." 



THE PANAMA CAXAL — 1900. 



GU5 



Our space is too limited to go into all 
the details of this peculiar proceeding, 
and they are of so recent occurrence that 
it is hardly necessary. Suffice it to say that 
on November 3rd, 1903, a revolution was 
set down for Panama ; tliat all its details 
were so well known in Washington some 
days before that on the 2nd of November 
despatches were sent to the commanders 
of the naval vessels at Colon and Panama, 
as follows : " Maintain free and uninter- 
rupted transit. If interruption threat- 
ened by armed force, occupy line of rail- 
road. Prevent landing of any armed force 
udih hostile intent, either government or 
insurgent, either at Colon, Porto Bello, or 
other point." As no one knew better than 
the authorities at Washington that the 
" insurgents " had no forces to land, the 
order was simply that the United States 
naval vessels should prevent the State of 
Colombia from landing troops in its own 
territory to protect its own rights and 
maintain its own authority. The opera- 
bouffe character of the whole proceeding 
is illustrated by the despatches sent out 
from W^ashington. Although it had been 
arranged that the " uprising " should oc- 
cur on the 3rd, there was a hitch in the 
proceedings, the two or three leaders los- 
ing their nerve. Consequently our State 
Department got impatient, and at 3 :40 
P. M. on that day telegraphed to the 
American Consuls at Panama and Colon 
as follows: "Uprising on Isthmus re- 
ported. Keep Department promptly and 
fully informed. Loomis, Acting." At 
8 :15 P. M. the following reply was re- 
ceived from Consul Ehrman at Panama : 
"No uprising yet. Reported will be in 
night. Situation is critical." As nothing 
was known of the " Uprising " at either 
Colon or Panama, it certainly seems 
mysterious how Asst. Sec. Loomis got the 
information which he wired from Wash- 
ington in the afternoon. 

The form of a revolution, however, was 
later gone through with, as well as that of 
establishing a " Eepublican " form of 
government; and a most interesting and 
interested actor in the events, M. Bunau- 
Varilla, \e\y quickly appeared at Wash- 



ington as the "Envoy Extraordinary and 
Minister Plenipotentiary " of what Sen- 
ator Teller aptly termed " The twenty 
minute Republic of Panama." It was 
the work of but a few days to draw up a 
treaty such as the United States wanted, 
which was at once executed. By its pro- 
visions the Republic of Panama granted 
to the United States, " in perpetuity, the 
use, occupation, and control of a zone " 
ten miles wide across the Isthmus, with a 
long enumeration of other privileges 
which amounted to a virtual cession of 
the entire territory; and in return this 
government agreed to pay to the Republic 
of Panama $10,000,000 in gold coin upon 
the execution and ratification of this 
Convention, and an annuity of $250,000 
in gold coin after seven years from the 
same date. 




Copyrighted 1909 by Underwood t& Underwood^ N, Y, 
THEODORE ROOSEVELT. 

To the great surprise, apparently, of 
the Administration this proceeding did 
not furnish unalloyed pleasure to all the 
citizens of the United States. A tre- 
mendous storm of adverse criticism burst 
forth as there were, happily, a vei-y large 
number of the people who thought it 



606 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



would Lave been far better to have gone 
without the Isthmus site, or at least to 
have made its acquisition the subject of 
future negotiation, than to have secured 
it in what the President had himself, only 
a short time before, declared to be an 
" underhand way." For while the Eevo- 
lution was " fomenting " in Xew York, he 
had evidently been " sounded " to see how 
far. he would sanction the course that 
was being planned; and on October 10th, 
about twenty-five days before the upris- 
ing, he wrote the following letter to the 
Editor of the Eeview of Reviews: 

" jMy dear Dr. Shaw : I inclose you, 
purely for your own information, a copy 
of a letter of September 5th from our 
;Minister to Colombia. I think it might 
interest you to see that there was abso- 
luely not the slightest chance of securing 
by treaty any more than we endeavored 
to secure. The alternatives were to go to 
Nicaragua, against the advice of the ma- 
jority of competent engineers, some of the 
most competent saying that we had better 
have no canal at this time than to go 
there, — or else to fake the territory hi/ 
force, without any attempt at getting a 
treaty. I cast aside the proposition at 
this time to foment the secession of Pan- 
ama. Whatever other governments can 
do, the United States cannot go into the 
securing, by such underhand means, the 
cession. Privately I freely say to you 
that I should he delighted if Panama ivere 
an independent State or if it made iiitelf 
so at this moment; hut to say so puhlichi 
would amount to an instigation of a re- 
volt, and, therefore, I cannot say it." 
With great regard. Sincerely yours, 

Theodore Roosevelt." 

At first this criticism was treated veiy 
cavalierly by the Administration; but as 
its volume rapidly increased, and even 
many Administration papers found the 
transaction more than they could sup- 
port and so joined the opponents of the 
Administration's course, various efforts 
were made to justify its action. A mes- 
sage was sent to Congress endeavoring to 
explain the circumstances satisfactorily, 



and inspired utterances appeared in lead- 
ing papers, but the strained construction 
put upon precedents, and international 
law, and treaties only made the whole 
transaction more unpalatable. Just what 
considerations led the President to deter- 
mine upon the Panama route at all 
hazards have never been made clear. 
Under the Constitution, as executive of- 
ficer of the Government, his course had 
been clearly marked out for him by the 
legislative department in the Spooner 
Amendment; and its provisions were 
carefully framed to meet just the emer- 
gency that did arise. Under it the Pres- 
ident was directed, if it was impossible 
to obtain the " control of the necessary 
territory of the Republic of Colombia 
within a reasonable time and upon rea- 
sonable terms," to drop further considera- 
tion of the Panama route, and proceed to 
build a canal at Nicaragua. More sur- 
veys of that route by the most competent 
engineers had been made than of any 
other, and one has only to read their re- 
ports covering a period of more than fifty 
years, to see that it had been repeatedly 
declared to be the most practicable and 
feasible of the four great routes. The rea- 
son that it had received less favorable 
attention than the Panama route was 
that heretofore the Clayton-Bulwer treaty 
had presented almost insuperable ob- 
stacles to the building of an American 
canal at that point, as it was in Honduras 
and Nicaragua that Great Britain claimed 
extensive rights of sovereignty. But 
with the abrogation of that treaty by the 
Ilay-Pauneeforte treaty all such obstacles 
had been removed ; and it would seem 
that under such conditions the duty of 
the President was clear. Had he gone to 
Nicaragua, or deferred action at Panama 
for further negotiations, the honor of the 
nation would not have been smirched, and 
the opposition of those who still believe 
that " righteousness exalteth a nation " 
would not have been aroused. 

The transfer of its rights and property 
to the United States by the French Canal 
Company was completed in May, 1904. 
Already the Commission of construction 



THE PANAMA CANAL— 1903. 



607 



provided for by the Spooner Amendment 
had been appointed, with A(hniral J. G. 
Walker, who had already served on two 
Commissions, as Chairman. On June 1st, 
an important change in plan was made 
by the appointment of John F. Wallace 
as Engineer-in-Chief of the whole enter- 
prise. Before the year was over much 
dissatisfaction with the work of the Com- 
mission was manifested, and in March, 
190.5, all its members resigned. On April 
1st, a new Commission was appointed, of 
which T. P. Shonts was made Chairman, 
with Judge C. E. Magoon, as Governor 
of the Canal Zone, and Minister to Pan- 
ama. Mr. Wallace retained his office of 
Engineer-in-Chief. In mid-summer, how- 
ever, another trouble arose, and Mr. Wal- 
lace resigned. The circumstances attend- 
ing his resignation were very unpleasant, 
coming as a shock to the public, as well 
as revealing a disagreeable lack of har- 
mony among the officials on the Isthmus. 
In February, 1906, a committee of Con- 
gress which had been appointed to inves- 
tigate the Canal aSairs examined Mr. 
Wallace as to his reasons for resigning. 
He stated that it was the result of his 
failure to get along with two men, — Mr. 
Shonts and Mr. Cromwell. The latter 
has not appeared in this narrative before, 
but as tlie 2Tew York attorney for the 
French Canal Company and of M. Bunau- 
Varilla, he has had a great deal to do 
with developments that have been re- 
corded. In his testimony Mr. Wallace 
complained in a general way that ilr. 
Cromwell had too much influence with 
the President and Secretary of War, and 
was interested in too many things. " I 
thought about him," he said, " as being 
the man who hrought about the sale of 
the Canal to the government; who hrought 
about the revolution in Panama; ivho as- 
sisted the government of Panama in mak- 
ing its investments; who is carried on 
the diplomatic list of that government ; 
and who is interested in public utilities 
in the Isthmus. I felt that a man mixed 
up in so many things might have his 
mind perverted, and at some time he 



might give the wrong advice, and the 
result would be a scandal."' 

On May loth, 1905, Secretary Taft an- 
nounced that all supplies of every kind 
for the Canal Zone would be bought in 
open market, — where they could be 
bought cheapest. But as soon as Con- 
gress took this matter up. such a course 
was condemned and abandoned. Of course 
the retirement of Mr. Wallace involved 
other changes, and he was succeeded by 
]\rr. John F. Stevens. About the same 
time a board of consulting or advisory 
engineers was appointed, chiefly to de- 
termine the character of canal that 




Copyrighted by Clinedinst, Washington, D. C. 
SIR JULIAN PAUNCEFOTE. 

should be built. Five of the thirteen 
members of this Board were, at the re- 
quest of the President, appointed by for- 
eign governments ; and it would have been 
difficult to select a more distinguished 
and experienced body. In their report, 
which was made public January 10th, 
1906, eight favored a sea-level, and five 
a lock, canal. In submitting the report 
to Congress, however, the President urged 
a lock-canal, and, after considerable dis- 
cussion, that plan was approved. In the 
early part of 1907 still another change of 
plan was made. It was announced that 



GUS 



FEOAL COLOA'l TO WOKLD POWER. 



it had been decided to build the Canal 
by private contract, and bids were called 
for. Three contracting firms sent bids; 
but upon investigation and further con- 
sideration it was determined to cancel all 
bids, and the announcement was made 




Photo. Copyrighted by Clinedinsi, Washington, D, C. 
COLONEL G. W. GOETHALS. 

that the canal would be completed under 
direction of eng-ineers of the United 
States Army. On January 29th, Mr. 
Shonts had resigned from the Commis- 
sion, and was succeeded by Mr. Stevens, 
who, in turn, resigned on March 4th; and 
on April 1st. Lt. Colonel Goethals be- 
came Chairman of the Board, now com- 
posed of officers of the army, and en- 
gineer-in-chief. 

The decision to place the construct inn 
work in the hands of army officers seems 
to have been a fortunate one. As con- 
stituted at the opening of the year 1909 
the Board consisted of Lt. Colonel G. W. 
Cioethals, Chairman and Engineer-in- 
chief, with a salary of $1.5,000 per annum; 
Alajor W. L. Sibert, in charge of Depart- 
ment of Locks and Dam Construction ; 
Major D. D. Gaillard, Department of 
Excavation and Dredging; H. LL Rous- 
seau, Engineer in the Navy, Department 
of Jlunicipal Engineering, Motive Power, 



and Machinery; Hon. J. C. S. Black- 
burn (the only civilian, retained on the 
Board), Department of Civil Administra- 
tion; Colonel W. C. Gorgas, Department 
of Labor, Quarters, and Subsistence. All 
members of the Board, except the chair- 
man, receive a salary of $1-1,000 a year. 
The Secretary, Joseph Bueklin Bishop, is 
paid $10,000 a year. In addition to these 
amounts each member of the Connnission 
is provided with a furnished house, and is 
allowed all expenses while in the United 
States on official business. As soon as 
the new commission became thoroughly 
familiar with the work a marked im- 
provement was manifest in the results ob- 
tained. From May 1, 1904, to November 
1, 1907, the total excavation amounted 
to only 18,714,931 cubic yards; while 
from jSTovember 1, 1907, to November 1, 
1908, the amount excavated was 35,01G,- 
Oi'4 cubic yards. This vast increase of 
.speed in the conduct of the enterprise 
gave rise to very optimistic conclusions as 
to the date of completion of the canal ; 
many writers and iDress correspondents de- 
claring that it would be open by the 
close of the year 1910. While in Wasli- 
ington in July, 1908, Colonel Goethals 
took pains to correct these too hopeful 
prophecies, unofficially predicting that 
ships would pass through the great water- 
way on January 1, 1915. It is, however, 
believed by those familiar with the work 
that the Chief was too conservative in his 
estimates and that the canal will be 
opened at a considerably earlier date. 

The labor problem has, of course, been 
a most serious one. The force employe<l 
in the Canal zone is divided into two 
classes, — the first composed of all officials, 
clerks, skilled laborers, mechanics, etc., 
who are on the " gold roll '' — that is, arc 4 
paid in the money of the United States; 
the second class is made up of the labor- 
ers, who are almost entirely Europeans 
or West Indians, and are on the " silver 
roll," — that is, are jjaid in the currency 
of Panama, or its equivalent. Accord- 
ing to official reports on September 1, 
1908, there were actually at work on the 
Canal 25,985 men, — 4,377 of whom b'.'- 



THE PANAMA CANAL— 1903. 



609 



longed to the first class, and the re- 
mainder to the second. 

As in the majority of such undertak- 
ings, it is evident that the original esti- 
mated cost of the work will have little re- 
lation to the ultimate cost of the com- 
pleted canal. By the Spooner Amend- 
ment the limit of expenditure for the 
Panama route was fixed at $1.33,000,000, 
exclusive of the $40,000,000 paid for the 
French rights and properties and the 
$10,000,000 paid Panama. As early as 
January, 1908, Colonel Goethals had ex- 
pressed the opinion that the total 
cost would be more than double the 
amount named in the Amendment; while 
the present indications are that it will be 
nearer three times that amount, or more. 
The total amount appropriated by Con- 
gress for construction purposes alone 
down to June 30, 1908, was $120,904,408, 
that is, of course, exclusive of the amounts 
paid the French Company and Panama. 
When work was begun on May 1, 1904, it 
was estimated that a total of 174,660,595 
cubic yards of earth must be excavated. 
Down to February 1, 1909, the whole 
amount taken out was 62,751,925 cubic 
yards, leaving 111,914,670 yards yet to be 
removed. With these figures before him 
anyone can form his own estimate as to 
the date of completion of the great work 
and its ultimate cost. 

In accordance with the present plans 
the canal will be of the lock type and will 
be about fifty miles in length, from deep 
water in the Caribbean sea to deep water 
in the Pacific Ocean. As the distance, 
however, from deep water in the Caribbean 
sea to the shore line is about four and a 
lialf miles, and it is five miles from the 
Pacific coast line to deep water, the canal 
proper will be about forty miles in length. 
Its summit elevation will be eighty-five 
feet above the sea, and will be reached by 
a flight of three locks located at Gatun on 
the Atlantic side, and one at Pedro Miguel 
and two at Miraflores on the Pacific 
side. These locks will all be in duplicate, 
having two chambers side by side, each 
one thousand feet long and one hundred 
find ten feet wide. The summit level is 
39 



to be maintained by a great lake at Gatun 
which will have an area of about one 
hundred and sixty-five square miles. The 




From Tfie Independent, April22, 1909, by permission. 
RELIEF MAP OF THE CANAL ZONE. 

bottom width of the canal will vary from 
two hundred feet iu the famous Culebra 
cut to an Indefinite width in the deep 



610 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



\\;iters of the lake. The approaches on 
either side from the deep waters of the 
ocean are to be five hundred feet wide. 
The canal will have a minimum depth of 
forty-one feet. Tliat the reader may com- 
pare this g-reat undertakins' with similar 
c(jmpleted works, general statistics regard- 
ing- other great canals of the ■world are 
given. The most famous of these is, of 
course, the Suez Canal, connecting the 
Mediterranean and Red Seas. This has a 
total length of about one hundred miles, 
with a width at the bottom of one hun- 
dred and eiglit feet, and a depth of thirty- 
one feet. Its total cost was about $100,- 
000.000. The Manchester Ship Canal, 
between the cities of Manchester and 
Liverpool in England, is thirty-five miles 
long, one hundred and twenty feet wide 
at the bottom and twenty-six feet deep. 
This great work cost $75,000,000. The 
Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, connecting the 
Baltic and North Seas, is sixty-one miles 
long, seventy-two feet wide at the bottom, 
and has a depth of twenty-nine and a 
half feet. Its cost was $40,000,000. 

Though serious opposition to the lock- 
canal was manifested in Congress during 
the winter of 1908-9, it seems probable 
tliat the present plans will be adhered to. 
The in-coming Taft administration seems 
as detennined in its adherence to the lock 
plan as is that of President Roosevelt. 
It will be remembered tliat of the Expert 
Commission of thirteen members, ap- 
pointed by the President in 1905, five of 
whom were distinguished foreign en- 
gineers, eight reported in favor of a sea- 
level, and five in favor of a lock, canal. 
The chief argument with the Senators, 
at least, was that the sea level canal 
would be so much more costly, something 
like $270,000,000 against $140,000,000, for 
which sum the minority engineers 
" pledged their reputations " that the lock 
canal could be built. But already nearly 
their total estimate has been covered and 
the work is hardly one-third done. In 
view of the fact that the lock typo was 
evidently going to cost so much more 
than the estimated cost of the sea level, 
much discussion was given to the subject 



in Congress, many of the leading senators 
declaring their decided preference for the 
sea level plan, and that they had originally 
been led to vote for the other only be- 
cause of the assured difference in cost. 
Early in February another selected body 
of engineers accompanied President-elect 
Taft to Panama to make an exhaustive 
investigation of conditions there, es- 
pecially regarding the projected Gatuu 
dam. As three of the engineers chosen for 
this exi:)ert work were of the minority 
who " pledged their reputations " upon 
tlieir report of 1905, in much of which 
succeeding- events have proved them so 
entirely wrong that their " reputations " 
should need repairing, it was well under- 
stood before they -n-ent to the Isthmus 
what their conclusions would be. Their 
report to the President, which he embodied 
in a message to Congress, was, tlierefore, 
largely perfunctorj'. The crucial ques- 
tion is the possible staljility of the pro- 
posed Gatun dam. According to press 
reports the Engineers spent eight hours in 
studying the situation there, — an under- 
taking which competent engineers the 
world over have declared to be the most 
complicated and serious engineering prop- 
osition of the age. The manner in which 
tlie whole subject has been treated by 
those having the work in charge has 
created wide-spread doubt and suspicion. 
It is generally conceded at the present 
t iiiie that the canal will cost at least $400,- 
11(10,000; and a bill has been introduced 
in Congress asking for authority to issue 
$.".00,000,000— one-half billion dollars— 
of canal bonds, in addition to $140,000,000 
already voted and available. This is cer- 
tainly most amazing trifling with public 
confidence. But when many of the most 
experienced authorities in the world de- 
clare that it is utterly impossible to se- 
cure a safe foundation for the Gatun 
ilani, and that to construct a canal of 
which that dam will be a vital feature is 
to " invite the most dramatic catastrophe 
ill the history of public works," it would 
certainly seem the part of political -svis- 
dom as well as sound business judgment 
to delay further action initil more uii- 



THE PANAMA CANAL - 



1UU3. 



611 



questionable and less partisan advice is 
secured. The disgust with the muddled 
manner in which the whole undertaking- 
has been managed from the start which 
dominates many thoughtful Americans 
was voiced in an editorial of the New 
York Herald of February 26, which said : 
" If it should be decided to neither go 
ahead on jjresent lines nor dig the sea 
level canal as advocated, but to abandon 
the whole enterprise, that might be the 
wisest way out of the difficulty." So many 
have been the peculiar transactions con- 



nected with the undertaking from its in- 
ception, so numerous the changes of mau- 
agement and plans, and so doubtful even 
now the ultimate success of the work that 
one needs hardly be superstitious to agree 
with Philip II. who four hundred years 
ago, after various investigations by his 
engineers, gave the whole scheme up as 
impracticable, declaring that it was im- 
pious and opposed to the Divine will to 
attempt to join oceans that God had put 
asunder. 



LI. 



THE TREATY OF PORTSMOUTH - 1905. 



Tlie liitrrests of Russia anil Japan in Mamluuia. — Position and Ininortance of tlie Province. 

— Position of Korea. — Tlie Building; of tlie Siberian Railroad. — Japan's Vital Xeed of Man- 
ehurian and Korean ^Markets and Products. — The Chinese-Japanese War of 1804-5. — Japan 
Robbed of tlie Fruits of Victory by European Powers. — Russia's Agreement of 1902 to 
Kvacuate Manchuria. — Xot Only Fails to Evacuate but Strengthens Forces. — Russia'.s 
Interests on the Yaln. — Dignified but Forcible Protest of Japan in 1(103. — Russia's Dilatory 
Tactics. — Diplomatic Relations Severed February 5, 1!X)4. — The Battles of Chemulpo Bay 
and Port Arthur. — Unpiecedented Successes of Japan on Sea and Land for Fifteen Months. 

— Final Battles of ilukilen and Korean Straits. — Movements Looking Toward Peace. — • 
The Influence of the Hague Conference. — President Roosevelt's Identical Xotes to Czar and 
Mikado of .Tune 7. 1003. — Conference Agreed Upon. — Ambassadors Named by Both Powers. 

— Reception of Aniba-ssadors on the Mai/flon-er — President Roosevelt's Tact, and Amicable 
Toast. — Reasons for Choosing Portsmouth as the Treaty City. — First Meeting of Enivoys 
August 9. 1905. — Account of Deliberations. — Dark Days. — I'inal Agreement. — Result of 
Compromises. — Treaty Signed September 5. — Interesting Interchange of Courtesies Be- 
tween Envoys. — Notable Tc Dcvni Service in Episcopal Cluiroh at Portsmouth. — Reception 
of News Througliout United States. — Cannons Roar, Bells Ring, Bonfires Everywhere. — 
Hostile Reception by .Japanese People. — Results Achieved. — Happy and Proud Position of 
President Roosevelt. 



"A peace is of ihe nature of a conquest; 
For thrn both parties nobly are subdued. 
And neither party loser." 

— Shakesteahe. 



^(>R nearly half a, century the eastern extremity of the gi-eat 
territory uiiiler the dominion of China known as Man- 
cliuria has been a bone of contention and a constant source 
of friction between the surrounding- nations who have 
wished to obtain a foothold, or zone of supremacy, within 
its borders. During- the last fifteen years these contests 
have become more acute, Ru.ssia having been constant and 
unscrupulous in her aggressive efforts to dominate the 
situation, while Japan, in proportion to her growing 
strength and influence, has been as determined to block 
the advance of Russia, and to preserve at least the " open 
door'' policy for all the territory in question. China, of w-hose acknowledged sovereign 
possessions Manchuria forms a part, has been an apparently disinterested observer, 
yielding to either disputant concessions and territorial privileges in proportion to the 
strength of the influence with which they have been demanded. And the peculiar 
spectacle has recently been presented of two powerful nations conducting- the greatest 
war. all things considered, of all history, for the control of, and within the confines 




THE TREATY OF PORTSMOUTH - 



1905. 



613 



of, a Country to which and within which 
neither had any territorial or political 
rights that would bear scrutiny in law, 
and certainly none that had any founda- 
tion in justice. The physical situation is, 
however, a most peculiar one and must 
necessarily lead to political complications. 
Manchuria is a country of about 365,000 
square miles area, or about three times 
the size of Great Britain and Ireland 
combined. For more than four thousand 
miles the great empire of the Czar of 
Russia borders on the Chinese empire; 
but the former only reaches the ocean in 
a latitude where the bays and harbors are 
frozen over for more than half the year. 
Manchuria covers all the eastern part of 
this territory from the Russian line and 
east of the great Gobe desert to the Yel- 
low sea, with the exception of the im- 
portant peninsula of Korea, which puts 
out from the southeastern extremity of 
this great Manchurian province, from 
which it is separated politically by the 
Yalu river. From the Russian border in a 
generally southern direction to the Yellow 
sea is about one thousand miles; and 
from the Khingan mountains on the west 
to the Yalu river and Russian boundary 
on the northeast averages about four 
hundred miles. Manchuria is divided 
politically into three provinces, of which 
the southerly, Fing-tien or Shen-King 
province, whose capital is Mukden, is the 
most important ; while the distinctive 
feature of this Shen-King province is the 
important Liao-tung peninsula, extend- 
ing far out into the Yellow sea, culminat- 
ing in the headlands and bay about which 
Port Arthur was built. The estimated pop- 
ulation of Manchuria has been placed at 
from ten to twenty-five millions ; and 
there are at present about sixteen thou- 
sand square miles of the country under 
cultivation, an area that may be vastly 
increased. This is one of the principal 
features that make at least free trade 
communication of vital importance to 
Japan. 

Korea, so long known as the " Hermit " 
nation, extends for about five hundred 
miles as a long peninsula from the south- 



eastern limit of Manchuria, averaging 
about one hundred and eighty miles in 
width, — an almost exact reproduction, 
physically, of Italy, in Europe, and hav- 
ing about two-thirds of its area. Between 
its west coast and the Chinese mainland 
is the Yellow sea, while its easterly shores 
make, with the curve of the Japanese 
Archipelago, the great circular sea of 
Japan. From its southern extremity to 
the Japanese mainland, across the straits 
of Korea, is less than one hundred miles. 
The country has been but little developed 
though known to possess very rich natural 
resources; and it was the immense and 
valuable tracts of timber lands along the 
banks of the Yalu that appealed so 
strongly to Russian avarice that Treaty 
rights were ignored and trampled upon, 
giving rise to one of the immediate causes 
of the great war. Just how important a 
part these timber lands played in promot- 
ing hostilities between Russia and Japan 
h.as been well shown in the first chapters 
of " The Military and Political Memoirs 
of General Kin-opatkin," as published in 
McClure's Magazine for September, 1908. 

Such are the physical conditions of the 
countries the control of which, or at least 
the neutralizing of which, has been the 
prize for which Japan has fought twice 
during the past fifteen years, ultimately 
winning the cause, and at the same time 
raising herself from an insignificant posi- 
tion among the powers of the world to one 
of the foremost j^ositions as an intelli- 
gent, intensely patriotic, and fearless 
nation. Let us try to determine what the 
interest of the two great contesting 
powers in this territory really were. 

About 1890 the Russian government 
decided to build the great Siberian rail- 
road, whose eastern terminus should be 
at Vladivostock, on the Japan sea. With 
tliis determination new and most impor- 
tant elements were at once injected into 
the far eastern question, as Vladivostock 
was wholly unfitted in every way to serve 
as the terminal port of such a trans-con- 
tinental road, especially as its harbor was 
ice-bound for more than half the year. 
The very announcement of the pui-pose 



(iU 



FEOM COLONY TO WOliLD POWER. 



to build suoli a road was, therefore, a 
virtual notice to the various interests of 
eastern Asia that other terminal arrange- 
ments must eventually be secured; and 
nature had made it possible that these 
advantages could be acquired only through 
concessions from China to construct a 
branch of the road south through Man- 
churia to an open harbor on the Yellow 
sea. These concessions were secured, as 
will be shown later, by diplomatic pro- 
cesses familiar to Russia for many years, 
but which were so " peculiar " that even 
Bret Harte's " Heathen Chinee " would 
have blushed at his simplicity. By a 
secret treaty with China made in 1890 
Russia gained all the privileges neces- 
sary; and by 190o had invested more than 



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Photograiili I'nfh'rtrond if- Underwood, A'. }'. 
THE EMPEHOK OF JAPAN. 

$;iOO,(J()(i.i»ni) in the railroad project, a 
large proportion of which went into Man- 
churia, where the enormous expenses were 
incurred in the establishment of new 
cities like Daliiy and Harbin, the latter 
nt the junction of the main line with the 



.side line through Manchuria to Port 
Arthur. Harbin, about six hundred miles 
from Port Arthur, and called the Moseovf 
of Asia, is said to have had but a single 
Chinese house in 1898, with a iwpulation 
of 50,000 in 1903. Russia's interest natur- 
ally centred in the development of this 
railroad and in making the entire coun- 
try tributary to it, which must result in 
its becoming politically tributary to itself. 
More than eighty so-called " depots " had 
Ix'en established along the lines of the 
Manehurian railway before the outbreak 
of the war, of which Harbin was originally 
one. each covering several square miles, 
witliin which only Russians and Chinese 
had the right of permanent settlement. 
Russia's whole policy was that of the 
" closed door ; " to exploit the country and 
its i^eople solely for her own aggrandize- 
ment. A natural result, too, of the in- 
creased means of communication was the 
influx of Russian speculators and ad- 
venturers of every class, who were con- 
stantly demanding protection from the 
home government for real or alleged prop- 
erty and property rights. Particularly 
was this true of the great lumber com- 
panies that were beginning to operate ex- 
tensively on the Yalu river, among whose 
members were the highest officials of the 
Empire, even the Czar himself being a 
heavy stockholder. The impelling ht (cr- 
ests of Russia, therefore, were the com- 
mon ones of territorial expansion, increase 
t)f ttie Empire, and opening up of new 
spheres of influence. 

Quite other considerations directed the 
course of Japan. During recent years 
the increase of population in the Island 
Empire has been very rapid, resulting in 
a change from an agricultural develop- 
ment to an industrial. The population, 
which in 1828 was estimated at twenty- 
seven millions had only risen to thirty- 
four millions in 1875 ; while between the 
latter date and 1904 it rose to upwards 
of forty-seven millions, exclusive of more 
than three millions in Formosa and the 
Pescadores. At that time the average an- 
nual crop of rice was estimated to be two 
hundrccl and ten million bushels and of 



THE TREATY OF PORTSMOUTH— 1905. 



615 



other cereals ninety-five million bushels, 
while the average consumption was re- 
spectively two hundred and twenty-eight 
and one hundred and ten million bushels, 
showing an average shortage of eighteen 
million bushels of rice and fifteen million 
bushels of other grains, — in other words, 
of the actual necessities of life. In 1904 
less than thirteen million acres of the 
country were under cultivation, and ex- 
pert investigation proved that not above 
ten million more could be made arable, 
which gives, at the best, an average of 
but one-half acre of land per capita. In 
its great problem of existence even, it be- 
comes evident, therefore, how important 
a factor the control or neutralization of 
Korea and Manchuria becomes to Japan, 
as they together receive a large jjortion of 
the cotton yarn and cotton textiles ex- 
ported from *\ie country, besides several 
other manufactured goods and coal, and 
in r(?turn supply Japan with much of the 
wheat and rice, and practically all of the 
millet, beans, and oil cakes imported. The 
imports for 1903 were valued at eighty- 
five million dollars, about fifty-five per 
cent of which came from Korea and Man- 
c]mria in the form of cotton, wool, rice, 
flour, beans, etc. Moreover, as has been 
said, the exports of manufactured articles 
from Japan has been constantly increas- 
ing. Between 1890 and 1903 the volume 
of business transacted between Japan and 
Eastern Asia increased 643 per cent, — 
from about $23,000,000 to upwards of 
$148,000,000, while the American trade in- 
creased 161 per cent, and the European 
100 per cent, for the same period. Of 
these exported goods a large proportion 
went to Korea and Manchuria; as nearly 
as can be estimated those countries tak- 
ing for the year 1903 about 36 per cent of 
tlie total export of cotton yam, and about 
70 per cent of the total of cotton textiles 
<-X]X")rted. Such statistics are uninterest- 
ing for the general reader, but they serve 
to show, as nothing else can, the vital in- 
terest Japan has had in all the insidious 
and aggressive attacks upon the integrity 
and control of Korea and Manchuria, — 
countries which supply her so largely 



with the very necessaries of life, and take 
in return so large a proportion of her 
manufactured products; and they demon- 
strate why she was forced to act, and to 
act quickly, when affairs came to a crisis 
in 1904, and not wait further upon Rus- 
sia's dilatory tactics, which simjily meant 
the tightening of the alien grasp upon the 
very sources of her national life and whose 
control by a hostile power meant paralysis 
and ruin for the Empire. 

Eor some time prior to 1894 internal 
dissensions were constant in Korea, and 
Japan, claiming that they were prejudi- 
cial to her interests, sent a large force into 
the country, taking steps which were 
equivalent to a declaration of war against 
China, which still claimed suzerainty over 
Korea. Our space does not admit of refer- 
ence to the events of that war, which was 
formally declared by Japan August 1, 
1894, during which, by a series of brilliant 
engagements on land and sea, the Jap- 
anese overthrew the power of China in 
the eastern province and in Korea. 
Early in the next year China began to sue 
for peace, with the result that on April 
17, 189.5, the Treaty of Shimonoseki was 
concluded and signed, by which China 
recognized the complete independence of 
Korea and ceded to Japan " in perpetuity 
and full sovereignty " the Liao-Tung 
peninsula, which embraced the important 
fortifications at Port Arthur, etc. This 
cession to Japan of territory on the main- 
land, however, greatly exercised the lead- 
ing Powers of Europe; and Germany, 
France, and Russia at once made vigor- 
ous protest to the Japanese Emperor 
against his taking such territory, a course 
that would " endanger the peace of Eu- 
rope." Accordingly on May 10, 1895, 
the Emperor yielded to the demand of 
tlie Powers, and in " the interests of 
peace " re-ceded to China the Liao-Tung 
peninsula, contenting himself with the 
cession of Formosa and the Pescadores 
islands, and the payment of an indemnity. 
But even while these negotiations were 
liending and the noble Emperor of Japan 
was yielding to the influence of the 
Powers, Russia was working secretly with 



G16 



FROM COLONY TO WOELU POWER. 



the Chinese govcriiineiit to secure- uiu'l- 
sti-icted rights and privileges in the same 
territory she had just forced the Japanese 
to abandon; with the result that a secret 
treaty was made granting to Russia for 
thirty years exclusive rights to build rail- 
roads in Manchuria and well-nigh exclu- 
sive privileges of trade; also allowing 
them to build up fortified towns, and re- 
build and greatly strengthen Port Arthur. 
In other words the entire territory of 
Manchuria was virtually made a province 
of Russia, to develop and exploit as she 
would. The effect of this action upon 
the Japanese mind can be more easily 
imagined than described. Under this 
Treaty the Russians at once proceeded 
to establish their long coveted railroad 
connections with the Yellow sea, and, 
strengthened in their position b.v the 
formal lease of Port Arthur and Talien- 
wan in 1.S9S, to rebuild and strongly 
fortify that port. In fact, all things 
seemed to work together for the advan- 
tage of Russia, her»Ambassador at Peking 
having the most favorable attention of 
the Chinese government, and securing 
practically all the concessions and privi- 
leges demanded. The " Boxer " troubles 
in Peking naturally afforded an oppor- 
tunity and excuse for Russia's pouring 
troops into Manchuria, through which 
she, of course, ajiproached the scene of 
action. But toward the close of the long 
negotiations following the attack of the 
Allies on Peking influences were brought 
to bear on China to force her to demand 
that Russia should withdraw her troops 
from Manchuria; and the conclusion of 
the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, the agree- 
ment for which was signed at London on 
January -30, 1902, boded no good to Rus- 
sia's advance. The result was a some- 
what remarkable agrc-ement between Rus- 
sia and China, " done in Peking in dupli- 
cate, March 26, 1902," in accordance with 
whose terms the former goverinnent 
agreed to evacuate certain districts within 
certain periods, the whole movement to 
be accomplished within eighteen months. 
Events made it evident, however, that this 
Convention was made solely to mislead the 



P(]wers, as but few troops were with- 
drawn, the majority being only shifted 
from one place to another, while many 
new troops were introduced as laborers, 
who settled in the " depots " along the 
lines, which were referred to above. Fif- 
teen months of action under the agTce- 
ment to evacuate seemed to have left the 
Russians more firndy intrenched than 
ever in Manchuria, and Japan's iMtience 
was fast becoming exhausted and her 
righteous indignation aroused. Accord- 
ingly on June 23, 1903, the four principal 
members of the Japanese Cabinet and 
five Privy Councilors " met before the 
Throne " and decided on the principles 
upon which negotiations with Russia 
should be opened; and having formulated 
a policy to be pursued. Baron Komura 
telegraphed to the Japanese Minister at 
St. Petersburg on July 28, in substance 
as follows: "The Imperial Government 
have observed with close attention the de- 
velopment of aifairs in Manchuria, and 
its present situation causes them to view 
it with grave concern. So long as it was 
hoped that Russia would carry out, on 
the one hand, the engagement that she 
made with China, and, on the other 
hand, the assurances she had given to 
other Powers, regarding the subject of the 
evacuation of Manchuria, the Imperial 
Governmejit maintained an attitude of 
watchful reserve. But the recent conduct 
of Russia has been, at Peking, to propose 
new demands, and, in Manchuria, to 
tighten her hold upon it until the Im- 
perial Government is led to believe that 
Russia must have abandoned the inten- 
tion of retiring from Manchuria. At the 
same time her increased activity upon the 
Korean frontier is such as to raise doubts 
as to the limits of her ambition. The un- 
conditioned and permanent occupation of 
Manchuria by Russia would create a 
state of things prejudicial to the security 
and interest of Japan. The principle of 
eqiml opportunity would thereby be an- 
nulled, and the territorial integrity of 
China impaired. There is, however, a 
still more serious consideration for the 
Japanese government. That is to say. 



THE TREATY OF POKTSMOUTII — 1D05. 



617 



if Russia was established on the flank of 
Korea, it would be a constant menace to 
the sepai'ate existence of that Empire, or 
at least would make Russia the dominant 
Power in Korea. Korea is an important 
outpost in Japan's line of defense, and 
Japan consequently considers her inde- 
pendence absolutely essential to her own 
repose and safety. The Imperial Govern- 
ment, after the most serious considera- 
tion, have resolved to consult the Russian 
Government, in a spirit of conciliation and 
franli'ness, with a view to the conclusion 
of an understanding designed to comiiose 
(juestions which are at this time the cause 
of their anxiety. . . . You are ac- 
cordingly instructed to open the question 
by presenting to Count Lamsdorff, Minis- 
ter of Foreign Affairs of Russia, a note 
verhale to the following effect: 

" ' The Japanese Government desire to 
remove from the relations of the two em- 
pires every cause of future misunder- 
standing, and believe that the Russian 
Government share the same desire. The 
Japanese Government would therefore be 
glad to enter with the Imperial Russian 
Ciovernment upon an examination of the 
condition of affairs in the regions of the 
extreme East, where their interests meet, 
with a view of defining their respective in- 
terests in those regions. If this sugges- 
tion fortunately meets with the approval, 
in principle, of the Russian Government, 
the Japanese Government will be prepared 
to present to the Russian Government 
their views as to the nature and scope of 
the proposed undertaking.' 

" In presenting the foregoing note to 
the Russian Foreign Minister you will be 
careful to make him understand tliat our 
purposes are entirely friendly, but that 
we attach great importance to the sub- 
ject." 

We have quoted quite fully these in- 
structions of the Japanese Government to 
its representative at St. Petersburg, cov- 
ering also the note to be delivered to the 
Russian foreign minister, because they 
seem to illustrate so well the mental and 
political attitude of the Japanese Govern- 
ment as it enters upon the last ante- 



bellum period, and begins the long-drawn- 
out negotiations, exasperatingly dilatory 
and conducted too often on the part of 
Russia only to gain time, which ended 
with the ultimatum of Japan presented 
to the Russian Government early in 1904. 
Not only were the scarcely courteous and 
frequently long-delayed replies of the 
Russian Government to the messages of 
the Japanese Government such as would 
excite the ire of any self-respecting peo- 
ple, but evidences were accumulating 
every day that the Russian Government 
was taking advantage of the time they 
were gaining by their dilatory tactics to 
strengthen their various positions along 
the Korean frontier. Early in January 
large numbers of troops were moved from 
Port Arthur and Liao-Yung to the Yalu; 
and on Januai-y 28th Viceroy AlcxeiefF 
ordered the troops on the Yalu to be 
placed upon a war-footing; while on 
the 3d of F'ebruary all the war vessels 
located at Port Arthur steamed out of the 
harbor. 

The Japanese Government now con- 
sidered that a crisis had been reached. 
The Cabinet members and Privy Coun- 
cilors held a conference " before the 
Throne " on February 3d, and again the 
next day, and on February .5th, at 2 
P. M., two decisive notes were telegraphed 
to Mr. Kurius at St. Petersburg, — one 
communicating Japan's decision to break 
off negotiations which had received scant 
attention and had become useles^ and 
the other severing diplomatic relations 
with the Russian Government. These 
notes were transmitted by the Japanese 
Minister to Count Lamsdorff, on Feb- 
ruary 6th at 4 P. M., — Baron Rosen, the 
Russian Minister at Tokio, having already 
been informed by Baron Komura of the 
severance of the negotiations and general 
diplomatic relations betwen the two 
Powers. 

As the news of Japan's unexpected 
action was transmitted over the world 
blank astonishment was everywhere mani- 
fested. Public feeling was beyond ques- 
tion strongly and warmly favorable to 
Japan; and while there was an enthusias- 



GIS 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tir outburst of admiration loi- Ikt pluck, 
it was accompanied by a general senti- 
ment of regret at what seemed to be her 
hasty action, which, it was generally con- 
sidered, could oidy result in her total de- 
feat and humiliation. Russia's military re- 
sources had Ions' been considered as un- 
limited; while the several " hi guess" of 




Photoi/rapit Underwood £ Underwood, N. Y. 
THE CZAR OF RUSSIA. 

everything Russian had so impressed it- 
self i>pon the popular imagination that 
" little " Japan's action seemed foolhardy 
and rash. But the world was to receive 
many surprises before' the struggle was 
over; and that the public attention should 
not become wearied by waiting for the 
<lrama to begin, almost before the press 
had published through the land the facts 
of the severance of friendly relations be- 
tween the two countries, Japan had at- 
tacked and destroyed the Russian vessels 
in Chemulpo harbor, and followed that 
little aifair up with the naval batile at 
Port Arthur on the night of the second 
day after; furnishing, as it were, an excit- 
ing and interesting " curtain raiser '' for 
the tragedy which was to follow, whose 



beginning was formally announced by the 
official declarations of war made by both 
Emperors on the 10th of February, 19Ui. 
Neither our space nor our purpose ad- 
mit of a detailed recital of the events of 
the Russian-Japanese war, probably the 
greatest conflict between nations, consid- 
ered in all its aspects, that history records ; 
and it is not least remarkable in the fact 
that from the attack on Port Arthur on 
the night of February 8, 1904, down to the 
destruction of the Russian Baltic Fleet 
in the Korean straits on May 27, 1905, 
the war was, during its entire course of 
fourteen months, one complete uninter- 
rupted victory for one of the combatants 
alone. Jai)an lost no engagement either 
on sea or land, while Russia at the close 
found her entire navy annihilated and 
had not a single victory worthy of men- 
tion to her credit. It has been authorita- 
tively stated that Russia sent to Man- 
churia about 900.000 men, of whom, 375,- 
000 were killed or incapacitated; while 
the Japanese forces were not much fewer 
in number though their loss in killed and 
wounded was much smaller, probably 
about 250,000. The Official Gazette of 
St. Petersburg placed the approximate 
cost of the war to Russia at one thousand 
million dollars; and the Japanese expen- 
diture has been estimated at about one- 
half that amount. An official statement 
showed that the Russian naval loss was 
seventeen battleships, twelve cruisers, and 
many torpedo boats and destroyers, all 
valued at $113,000,000. On the other 
hand, notwithstanding her loss of nine 
battleships, cruisers, and destroyers valued 
at $20,000,000, Japan came out of the 
contest with a gain of $30,000,000 value 
in war vessels. Of officers of high rank 
Japan lost but two generals while Rus- 
sia lost six generals and four admirals. 
But far beyond the value of these mili- 
tary gains of the Japanese was the worth 
of the moral and commercial position se- 
cured. As was well said: " The prestige 
in both Europe and Asia has been quietly 
but absolutely transferred from Russia to 
Japan. The ' Land of the Rising Sun ' 
is now the first nation of the East, and 



THE TEEATY OF POETSMOUTH — 1905. 



619 



Eussia's Mancliurian venture is ended for 
generations, if not forever." 

There was hardly a month from the 
first success of the Japanese forces on the 
Yalu and the investment of Port Arthur 
during which proposals looking toward 
Peace did not emanate from some more or 
less distinguished source. That this was 
the case was doubtless largely the result 
of the influence of the first Hague Con- 
ference, though that was, perhaps, at that 
time never recognized as the promoting 
cause. It would, however, be idle to deny 
that the attitude of all civilized rulers 
and peoples had been affected by the at- 
mosphere of that Conference, though 
tangible results of its deliberations and 
conclusions were not at first apparent. It 
is certainly doubtful whether previous to 
its meeting any sovereign or ruler would 
have had the presumption to attempt to 
intervene between two great contending 
forces, unless on an intimation from the 
contestants that such interference would 
be agreeable. But the " Convention for 
the Peaceful Adjustment of International 
Differences," concurred in by the repre- 
sentatives of all the Powers assembled at 
The Hague, contained the following pro- 
visions : 

" Title II. Art. II. In case of serious 
disagreement or conflict, before an appeal 
to arms the Signatory Powers agree to 
have recourse, as far as circumstances 
will allow, to the good ofiices or mediation 
of one or more friendly Powers. 

"Title II. Art. III. Independently of this 
recourse, the Signatory Powers consider it 
to be useful that one or more Powers who 
are strangers to the dispute should, on 
their oivn iiiitiative and as far as circum- 
stances will allow, offer their good offices 
or mediation to the states at variance. The 
right to offer good offices or mediation be- 
longs to Powers who are strangers to the 
dispute, even during the course of hostili- 
ties. The exercise of this right shall never 
he considered hy one or the other of the 
parties to the contest as an unfriendly 
act." 

The way was thus paved for just such 
humane and Christian efforts as Presi- 



dent Eoosevelt undertook ; and what ten 
years before would have been a gross im- 
pertinence assumed rather the air of 
gracious concern for the welfare of one's 
fellow men, — not the least of the blessings 
for which the world owes thanks to the 
much abused and frequently ridiculed 
" Peace Conference." As early as Sep- 
tember, 1904, the great body of representa- 
tives and distinguished men from all parts 
of the world assembled at St. Louis, — ■ 
The Interijarlianientary Union, — uttered a 
formal and urgent call upon the Powers 
Signatory to the Hague Conference to in- 
tervene at the earliest possible proper 
moment, and seek to end the horrible war 
in the East. The great Peace Congress 
held at Boston in the following October 
voiced the same sentiment; and the ques- 
tion of the offer of friendly offices had 
been frequently the subject of considera- 
tion by the leading rulers of the world, 
through the usual diplomatic channels. 
But however much the nations and their 
peoples, shocked by the frightful slaughter 
occurring in Manchuria, may have been 
looking for and woi-king toward a peace- 
ful solution of the great contest, it will 
be a matter of gratification and honor- 
able pride to every true lover of the United 
States that to our own President fell the 
lot of speaking the first word directly 
tending toward peace ; and that it was to 
our own friendly shores, consecrated to 
the holiest rights of man, that the envoys 
of the great contesting Powers chose to 
turn their steps that they might in quiet 
conference seek for some common ground 
on which their sovereigns could meet, 
and so end all the terrible struggle that 
had been sucking the very life-blood out 
of two great peoples for a year and a half, 
and of which no end was in sight unless 
through mutual concessions at such a con- 
ference some friendly agreement could 
be reached. 

Happily, too, may the people of this 
nation reflect that the exercise of the good 
offices of the United States were not con- 
fined to the close of the war. Nothing 
seemed more certain than if such a strug- 
gle began the integrity of China would 



620 



PEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



bu seriously menaced. Ever since the 
outbreak of the Powers on China in 1SU7 
the future of that great empire had 
seemed precarious, and the hostile atti- 
tude of the most powerful nations of the 
West was only aggravated by the " Boxer " 
outrages of 1900. Like hungry wolves 
the Powers debated the question of the 
partition of the Empire, jealousy of each 
other rather than any regard for China 
only restraining them from hostile action. 
At that time it was largely the result of 
the efforts of that prince of diplomats and 
christian gentleman. Secretary John Hay, 
that the vultures did not seize upon their 
prey. So, too, when it became evident 
that Manchuria was to be the seat of a 
vast war which, with the impulses of the 
contestants unchecked, must have led to 
the violation of the rights of China and 
probably a general invasion of all her east- 
ern territory, it was the circular note sent 
by Secretary Hay on the day fcillowing the 
outbreak of hostilities that led to the de- 
termination of the strict neutrality of 
China, and the agreement of the belliger- 
ent governments to confine all land 
actions to the territory in Manchuria ac- 
tually in the hands of Russia at the out- 
break of the war. 

After the terrible defeat and slaughter 
of the Russians at Mukden at the end of 
February 1905 the faith and hope of Rus- 
sia were centred in the movements of the 
Baltic fleet, which was then Hearing Jap- 
anese waters. But when that fleet was 
completely annihilated in the Straits of 
Korea atiihe end of May by Admiral Togo 
in command of the Japanese fleet, it 
seemed that the time for the injection of 
" friendly offices " had certainly arrived. 
Accordingly on the 7th of June identical 
notes from President Roosevelt were pre- 
sented to the Czar personally by Ambas- 
sador Meyer, and to the Mikado, at Tokio. 
After referring to the terms of the Hague 
Conference which looked toward such 
action, the notes continued: " The Presi- 
dent feels that the time has come when, 
in the interest of all mankind, he must 
endeavor to see if it is not possible to 
bring to an end the terrible and lamentable 



conflict now being waged. With both 
Russia and Japan the United States has 
inherited ties of friendship and good will. 
It hopes for the prosperity and welfare of 
each, and it feels that the progress of the 
world is set back by the war between these 
two groat nations. The President ac- 
cordingly urges the Russian and Japa- 
nese Governments not only for their own 
sakes, but in the interest of the whole 
civilized world, to open direct negotia- 
tions for peace with each other. The 
President suggests that these peace nego- 
tiations be conducted directly and e.xclu- 
sively between the belligerents ; in other 
words that there be a meeting of Russian 
and Japanese plenipotentiaries or dele- 
gates without any intermediary, in order 
to see if it is not possible for these repre- 
sentatives of the two Powers to agree to 
terms of peace. The President earnestly 
asks that the (Japanese) (Russian) gov- 
ernment do now agree to such meeting; 
and is now asking the (Russian) (Jaijan- 
ese) government likewise to agree. While 
the President does not feel that any in- 
termediary should be called in in respect 
to peace negotiations themselves, he is en- 
tirely willing to do what he properly can 
if the two powers concerned feel that his 
services will be of aid in arranging the 
preliminaries as to time and place of 
meeting. But even if these preliminaries 
can be arranged diixjctly between the two 
Powers or in any other way the President 
will be glad, as his sole purpose is to 
bring about a meeting which the whole 
civilized world will pray may result in 
peace." 

This proposal was received with more 
or less cordiality by both Powers, and 
after some consideration of prelimi- 
naries it was agreed that the Conference 
should be held at Washington during 
August, though in view of the fact that 
the heat is often so oppressive at that sea- 
son the President suggested the possibil- 
ity of holding the sessions at some cooler 
northern port. The Envoys Plenipoten- 
tiary finally selected to represent the two 
Powers were for Russia Count Sergius 
Witte and Baron Rosen, the then newly 



THE TREATY OF PORTSMOUTH — 1905. 



621 



appointed Ambassador from Russia to the 
United States; and for Japan the Baron 
Komura, and Mr. Takahira, the Japanese 
vVmbassador at Washington. Late in July 
and early in August the distinguished 
representatives, with their suites, arrived 
in this counti-A-, and were at once ac- 



fully avoided; and in tliis regard it has 
been universally agreed that President 
Roosevelt showed marvelous tact and 
good judgment. On Saturday August 
5th, the iirst formal meeting of the En- 
voys witli the President took place on 
board the latter's yacht, the Mayflower, 




From Stt-reograph, Copyright 1905, btj Underwood £ Underwood, N. Y. 

THE PRESIDENT AND ENVOYS ON THE MAYFLOWER. 



corded a most generous and hospitable 
reception by the Government as well as 
the general public. The official recep- 
tions were delicate affairs as all suspicions 
of favoritisni or of granting precedence 
to envoys or individuals must be care- 



to which tlie Japanese delegates were 
brought on the cruiser Tacoma and the 
Russian, on her sister-«hip, the Chaf- 
ianooga. The flag of each nation received 
the regulation salute of nineteen guns as 
the vessels approached the Mayflower. 



622 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



Alter formal introductions had been made 
and the ceremonies demanded by official 
oti(iuette had been concluded, an informal 
lunch was served, during which the Pres- 
ident proposed the only toast. Requesting 
that there should be no response, he said : 
" (icntlenien, I propose a toast to which 
there will be no answer, and which I ask 
you to drink in silence, standing. I drink 
ti. the welfare and prosperity of the 
Sovereigns and peoples of the two great 
nations whose representatives have met 
one another on this ship. It is my most 
earnest hope and prayer in the interest 
not only of those two great Powers, but 
of all civilized mankind, that a just and 
lasting peace may speedily be concluded 
between them." 

After this reception the President left 
the Mayflower, the Russian Envoys pro- 
ceeding on her to Portsmouth, N. H., 
while the Japanese Ambassadors were 
transported to the same city on the 
Navy Department Yacht, the Dolphin, 
both parties arriving at the Treaty 
City August 8th. Portsmouth had been 
selected as the place for holding the 
Conference because of its seclusion and 
the generally more comfortable condi- 
tions that prevail there during the 
summer months. The great Hotel Went- 
wiirth, one of the finest of the smn- 
mer hotels on the north coast, afforded 
comfortable and convenient accommoda- 
tions for each Embassy and its suite, 
as well as for the large number of 
press correspondents that had assem- 
bled from all parts of the world. Thi: 
government had recently finished a fine 
naval building on the island at tlie mouth 
of the river, and in it the sessions of the 
Conference were held. On Wednesday, 
August 9, 1905, the first meeting took 
place, at which the details of procedure 
were determined and credentials were ex- 
changed. At subseiiuent meetings, after 
some discussion as to the method of con- 
sidering Japan's proposals, which were put 
in the form of twelve distinct proposi- 
tions, it was finally decided to discuss 
each one separately; and the wise course 
was taken of eliminating those to whose 



terms Russia could assent without serious 
discussion. In this way after six days 
eight of the twelve articles had been 
agreed upon ; the other four were those 
about which the Russian opposition 
centred, all of them touching upon, or 
embracing, the questions of the payment 
of indemnity or of cessions of territory. 
Early in the proceedings Count Witte had 
advanced the broad principle that Russia 
would not "pay one dollar of indemnify, 
nor cede one acre of ground." The dis- 
cussion of these matters was most earnest 
and uncompromising, neither party being 
disposed to yield ; and the whole civilized 
world was in anxious suspense, fearful 
that after all the war must go on. But at 
the darkest moment influences were 
brought to bear which led the Envoys to 
take a recess for a few days, during which 
time the wires were kept busy between 
Washington and St. Petersburg and 
Tokio, the Envoys also going over the 
whole matter with their respective home 
governments. Representatives of each 
Embassy were also invited to meet the 
President at his summer home at Oyster 
Bay. At the same time he held direct, 
personal connnunications through our 
ambassadors with the Emperors of each 
country; so that it is the general belief 
that it was duo to his hearty and active 
interest and personal solicitations and 
influence that the Mikado was led to yield 
the point of an indemnity, and the Czar 
to yield as to the cession of a part of 
Saghalien island, which brought the 
parties once more within the sphere of 
friendly relations. Upon the reconvening 
of the Conference occurred what has been 
declared to have been the most dramatic 
moment of the meetings, when upon 
Count Witte's reiteration of Russia's po- 
sition that not one cent would be isaid for 
indemnity, Baron Komura quietly inter- 
posed that he should withdraw the de- 
mand for an indemnity; "it was the 
^[ikado's wish." Then in turn. Russia 
yielded the point as to the cession of the 
Southern half of Saghalien, which almost 
touches Japanese territoi-y; and peace 
once more reigned in Portsmouth and the 



THE TEEATY OF POETSMOUTII — 1905. 



623 



Envoys were in a position to proclaim the 
good news to all the world. 

During the proceedings protocols cover- 
ing the conclusions under each of the 
twelve heads of Japan's propositions had 
been made; and at the close of the Con- 
ference these protocols, each of which, as 
concluded, had been signed by the En- 
voys, were placed in the hands of Pro- 
fessor Martens for Russia, and of H. W. 
Denison, Japan's legal adviser, for the 
preparation of the treaty itself. The 
completed Treaty, of which four copies 
were required, one in English and one in 
French for each Embassy, was then 
signed by the Envoys. This functiim 
took place at 3.40 on the afternoon of 
September 5, and was the occasion for the 
other principal dramatic event of the 
sessions. On tliis occasion there were 
present in addition to .the principals the 
Asst. Sec. of State, H. D. Pierce, rep- 
resenting the President ; Admiral Mead, 
Commandant at the Navy Yard ; Capt. 
Wiuslow of the Mayflower; Gov. McLane 
of New Hampshire; and the mayor of 
Portsmouth. According to the account 
of those present the scene was a most im- 
pressive one. Without a word the four 
plenipotentiaries in turn signed each of 
the four copies of the treaty, a proceed- 
ing that covered more or less ten minutes 
of absolute silence. When his signature 
had been afKxed to the last copy. Count 
Witte threw his pen aside impetuously and 
reaching across the table at which all their 
business had been conducted he grasped 
Baron Jvomura by the hand. This move- 
ment was followed by all his associates, 
all hands being warmly joined across the 
table, but without a spoken word. Then 
Baron Rosen, the junior Russian Envoy, 
arose and said in French, in behalf of his 
senior and himself: "As plenipotentiaries 
of Russia we fulfill a most agreeable duty 
in acknowledging that in negotiations 
with our hitherto adversaries, and from 
this hour our friends, we have been deal- 
ing with true and thorough gentlemen, to 
whom we are happy to express our high 
esteem and personal regard. We earnestly 
hope that henceforth friendly relations 



between both Empires will be firmly es- 
tablished, and we trust that his excellency 
Baron Komura, as minister of foreign 
affairs and one of the leading statesmen 
of his country, will apply to the strength- 
ening of these relations the wide experi- 
ence and wise statesmanship which he so 
conspicuously displayed during these 
negotiations which have been auspiciously 
concluded." To this Baron Komura re- 
plied in English recipi'ocating all the 
sentiments expressed by Baron Rosen, and 
declaring that it would always be pleasant 
to recall that throughout their long and 
serious negotiations he and his colleague 
had invariably received from the Russian 
plenipotentiaries the highest courtesy and 
consideration ; and he begged to assure 
their Excellencies that it would be his 
dutj' as well as his great pleasure to do 
everything in his power to make the 
Treaty " in fact what it professed to be in 
words, — a treaty of peace and amity." 

At the close of the ceremony of signing 
the Treaty announcement of the fact was 
at once made to the world over telephone 
and telegraph wires, and joy and rejoicing 
everywhere were manifested. Bells were 
rung and cannons fired, for the people of 
the United States had made the questions 
at issue their own, and were truly jubilant 
that success had crowned the efforts of 
tlieir President and of the Envoys to end 
the horrible strife that had disturbed the 
peace of the world and disgraced civiliza- 
tion for so long a time. One of the inter- 
esting incidents of the general rejoicing- 
was the Te Deiim service in the Episcopal 
Church at Portsmouth, attended by the 
Russian visitors, which was conducted in 
part by Bishop Potter and in part by 
Father Hotoviski of the orthodox Greek 
Church in New York, which is said to 
have been the first union since the days 
of the early church of the Eastern and 
M'^estern Communions in a single service 
on an international occasion. 

Thus were concluded in the sleepy old 
town of Portsmouth negotiations that 
were as momentous, probably, as any of a 
political character that were ever con- 
sidered by any representatives of the 



624 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD LOWER. 



Great Powers. Limits were set, and di- 
rection given, to the energies of great and 
jealous forces which will deterniine for 
many years their course of development, 
and remove the causes of friction and un- 
rest that were a constant menace to the 
peace and prosperity of a great and rapidly 
advancing part of the world; while the 
swords of a million men in arms were 
sheathed, joy and gladness were made to 
brighten hundreds of thousands of weary 
hearts and lonely homes, and the energies 
of probably a half million men, outside the 
regular armies, were diverted from the 
evil and base uses of slaughter and devas- 
tation to the pursuit, in their homes, of 
the ennobling and civilizing arts of Peace. 
That the Treaty was unsatisfactory to 
both the Japanese and Russian people 
counts for little, as they were in no posi- 
tion to gain liroad views of the situation, 
or comprehend the larger issues. The 
Japanese, in particular, were riotously 
mad because the indemnity feature was 
abandoned, not realizing what the rest of 
the civilized world as well as their own 
Envoys saw, that if Japan should have re- 
fused to make terms simply because 
Russia refused to indemnify her for her 
, losses and should thus have forced a re- 
newal of the war, she would have placed 
herself in the position of a nation fighting 
for money considerations alone, and so 
would have merited and received the 
abhiirrent regard of the whole civilized 
world. Shortly after the signing- of the 
Treaty Baron Kaneko remarked, " Mili- 
tant Japan passes, and industrial Japan 
takes its place with the coming of peace." 
And as a result of the treaty, and as a 
basis for more successful prosecution of 
the arts of i^eace, she secured far more 
than any indemnity that Russia ever 
could have paid. Not to speak of the 
great prestige achieved as a result of the 
proved valor and vigor of her people, of 
their devotion to high principles and their 
intense patriotism, of their superb mechan- 
ical and industrial genius, of their keen 
wit and quick intelligence, all of which 
had been manifested in every way and 
continually through the war, and which. 



tlujugh recognized and appreciated by a 
few, then first became patent to the whole 
world, — Japan gained immense material 
advantages under the Treaty and as a 
result of the war which were hardly real- 
ized at first. At the commencement of 
the war she was obliged to pay 8 1-2% for 
her first foreign loan; she made her last 
at ,5%. Mr. Denison, the legal adviser of 
Japan and her respresentative in framing 
the Treaty, and also one of the best living 
authorities on the far Eastern Question, 
declared uneiiuivncally that Japan liad 
gained much more then she went to war 
for and much more than any indemnity 
she could have exacted, as illustrations 
only, estimating the value of the railroads 
transferred by Russia to Japan at $150,- 
000,000, and of coal mines at upwards of 
$300,000,000; wliile the single item of 
fishing rights along the Siberian Coast 
secured to Japan by the Treaty were esti- 
mated to be worth more than $10,000,000 
annually. 

The Treaty of Portsmouth marks a red 
letter day in the history of the American 
people. They had achieved glory and 
honor in war, in commerce and industry, 
in literature, in science, in art, in all 
things that make for material and intel- 
lectual advancement and uplifting; and 
then was added tlie crowning honor and 
privilege, through the humane impulse 
and wise and earnest persistence of Presi- 
dent Roosevelt, of being able to say to a 
million men ready to jump at each others 
throats, "Peace, be still." Rarely have 
the people of this country ever become so 
deeply interested in a proposition or ques- 
tion which in fact concerned them only 
in the most general and indirect way ; 
and the sentiment everywhere manifested 
was the best possible evidence that the 
people, as a whole, are sound at heart. 
What the Treaty meant to the people of 
the great contesting nations no imagina- 
tion can picture, much less any words 
even suggest. Seven hundred thousand 
men, hardened to the brutality and sav- 
agery of war, stood read.y again to close 
at once in deadly battle should the Envoys 
fail in their efforts to arrive at a basis for 



THE TREATY OF POETSMOUTH — 1905. 



625 



peace. It is generally conceded that 
Mukden was the most fiercely contested, 
the bloodiest, and in all respects the most 
terrible battle recorded in history; and the 
next must have been even more horrible, as 
both armies had been re-enforced, and the 
demon spirit of war was more aroused. 
T'nquestionably hundreds of thousands of 
lives and millions of treasure were saved, 
and untold mental suffering and sorrow 
were averted, by that simple conference of 
a few days at Portsmouth. There has 
been no more emphatic evidence of the 
folly of war, nor nobler illustration of the 
value of arbitration, — of reasoning to- 
gether; and though the outbreak of the 
Russo-Japanese war so soon after the 
meeting of the Hague Conference served 
as a fruitful source for ridicule of the 
".vliole conception of Peace movements, 
yet, taken as a whole, the war in its 
various phases and ending has demon- 
strated conclusively the wisdom and value 
of every principle for which the represent- 
atives of the nations contended at The 
Hague. There has been much of the 
" Jingo " and military spirit manifested 
in our country during the last decade, of 
which Mr. Roosevelt has been a leading- 
apostle; and many, weary of its insist- 
ence, have been prone to cry " O Lord, 
liow long!" But the noble course taken 
by the President in regard to the settle- 
ment of the great war we have been con- 
sidering e.xcites the highest enthusiasm 
and admiration of his friends and his 
critics alike, and savors of nothing but 
clieer and encouragement. Certainly he 
40 



must be esteemed supremely happy to 
whom is given the opportunity to serve 
his fellow-men so royally, and the tact 
anil wisdom to direct so truly movements 
that make for righteousness and the 
betterment of all mankind. A recent 
writer has raised the question whether 
President Roosevelt will go down in his- 
tory as the hero of San Juan hill, or of 
the Treaty of Portsmouth. We believe 
better things of historians and of the in- 
telligent American people than that thin- 
will ever doubt for a moment on which 
pedestal to place their hero. One is of 
the earth, very earthy; the other has the 
atmosphere of the divine. Surely the 
Master Teacher of mankind had little re- 
gard for military honors as a measure of 
glory when he declared " Blessed are the 
Peace-makers, for they shall be called the 
children of God." 

" In the years that have been I have 
bound man closer to man, 
And closer woman to woman ; 
And the stranger hath seen in a 
stranger his brother at last. 
And a sister in eyes that were strange. 
In the years that shall be I will bind 
me nation to nation, 
And shore unto shore," saith our God. 
" Lo ! I am the burster of bonds and the 
breaker of barriers, 
I am He that shall free," saith the 
Lord. 
" For the lingering battle, the contest of 
ages is ending. 
And victory followeth me." 

(Stephen Phillips.) 



LII. 

THE EARTHQUAlvE AND FIRE AT SAN FRANCISCO — 
DESTRUCTIUN OF THE CITY — 1906. 



The Long Cliaiii of San Franciscan Missions in California. — Tlie Mission Dolores On the Site 
of San Francisco. — Took Present Name in 1847, with Population of 450. — Discovery of Gold 
on Sutler Ranch.- — The Early Vigilance Leagues. — C'liaracter of Early Citv. — -"A Free and 
Ea.sy City, Bohemian to the Core." — Early " Baptisms of Fire." — Peculiar Location of Citv. 
— Market Street and Van Xess Avenue.— The Fateful IStli of April, inOO. — Small Loss of 
Life and Property from Eartliquake. — The Starting of the Fire and Causes. — Xo Water. 
The City at the Mercy of the Flames. — Dynamite the Only Weapon with Which to Fight 
the Fire. — "Shoot at Sight Anyone (aught Pilfering or Looting." — Sorrowful Flight of 
Refugees to Suburban Towns, or The Presidio and Ciolden Gate Park. — Wonderful Fortitude 
of Sufferers. — Progress of the Fire on the 19th. — Final Stand of Fire Fighters at Van Xess 
Avenue. — -Sudden Cliange of Wind Saves the Rest of tlie City. — Tliree Quarters of a Mile 
of Mansions Blown L^p. — Region Destroyed Covered About Four Square Miles. — 498 City 
Blocks. — Month Following Fire Most Orderly City Had Ever Known. — The Bread Lines. — 
"Neither Markets nor Money with Which to Buy." — -Glorious Outburst of Sympathy 
Throughout tlie Country.— More than .$20,000,000 Contributed in Thirty Days.— Hon. .T. D. 
Phelan's Review of the Situation. — Character of New Buildings. — Systematic Plans for 
Rebuilding. — The Burnham Plans. — Labor Troubles and Municipal Rottenness. — The Case 
of Mayor Schuiitz. — Widespread Sympathy With the Stricken People. 



" Wise men ne'er git and wail their loss. 
But cheerly seek how to redress their harms."- 



■ SIHKESI-EARE. 




I NE of the objects of especial interest to tourists in South- 
ern California is tlie long chain of Missions which extends 
from the Mexican border to the Golden Ciate, and El 
Camina Beal. the Koyal road, or King's highwa.v, wdiich con- 
nects them. Originall.v discovered by Cabrillo, a Portugese 
navigator in the Spanish service, — an enlarged reproduc- 
tion of whose vessel made fast to the long pier at Venice, 
one of the seaside resorts of Los Angeles, now serves 
as a restaurant and hotel, — California was again visited 
by Sir Trancis Drake in 1.578, and by the Spaniard 
those explorers made only brief visits to conspicuous 
coast points, without penetrating the interior. During the latter half of the 
eighteenth century, however, the Spanish governors of Mexico began to take an 
interest in the immense territory lying to the north, which was as yet an miknown 
country, and interested the Franciscan Fathers in the work of exploration and 
establishing missions among the native people. Accordingly, in 1769 the first 
mission was founded at San Diego ; and during the next seven years six others 
were established. The last of these, the Mission Dolores, was planted on the present 



Viscayno, in 1602. But 



THE EARTHQUAKE A^'D FIKE AT SAN FEANCISCO — 1906. 627 



site of the city of San Francisco, in 1776, 
the very year in which the original thir- 
teen states declared their independence of 
the British crown. Gradually intermediate 
Missions were established with the result 
that early in the nineteenth century they 
numbered twenty-six. They were from 
twenty to twenty-five miles apart; and 
the King's Highway was laid out to 
connect them, and formed the only 
road from Mexico to the entrance to 
the great bay which 
had named the Bay 
cisco, in honor of the 
their Order, St. Francis 



last century the wealth of the California 
^Missions excited the cupidity of the new 
Government, and they were soon nearly 
all abandoned and their wealth in cattle 
and lands was confiscated. 



the Franciscans 
of San Fran- 
holy founder of 
These missions 



became thriving agricultural centres, and 
the Fathers rapidly accumulated great 
wealth in cattle, sheep, and the products 
of the olive orchards and vineyards, as 
well as from desultory mining ventures. 
All the native Indians were brought under 
their influence, and were taught the prin- 
ciples of agriculture as well as, in a rough 
way, the rudimentary arts of civilized 
life. The Mission centres being estab- 
lished just about one day's journey apart, 
and on the only highway, they were the 
natural stopping places for all travelers; 
and open-hearted and open-handed hospi- 
tality was generously offered by the 
Fathers. Though most of these mission 
buildings are now in ruins, a few are 
still in a fair state of preservation, 
notably those at Monterey, Santa Bar- 
bara, Los Angeles, and San Diego; while 
through the active interest of the His- 
torical Society of California the King's 
Highway has been made a state road, all 
p(]ints of interest connected with the 
Franciscan possessions have been marked 
in an interesting and appropriate manner, 
and to-day hundreds of automobiles are 
constantly traversing the road, covering 
the distance from San Diego to San Fran- 
cisco by such stages as their owners wish, 
the finest hotels of the world now extend- 
ing to the tourists the hospitality that a 
century ago was rendered by the missions 
and the Fathers, — but not now, as then, 
gratuitously. 

When Mexico achieved her independ- 
ence of Spain in the first quarter of the 




THE DOLORES MISSION. 

Then in 1836 the little settlement of 
Yerba Buena succeeded the Dolores Mis- 
sion, and in 1847 its name was changed 
to San Francisco, which then boasted of 
a population of 450 men, women, and 
children. The next year, however, g-old 
was discovered on the Sutter ranch, and 
the face of every adventurer and restless 
man or youth of the East was set toward 
the golden West. By 1852 it was esti- 
mated that 250,000 men were in the State 
of California, nearly all of whom had 
entered through San Francisco. There 
were among them many men of sterling 
integrity, possessed of all the virtues of 
the best pioneers ; but these were greatly 
outnumbered by a lawless crowd, who re- 
belled against any restraint. Licentious- 
ness of every kind prevailed and crime 
was rampant. Twice, in 1851 and 1856, 
when the ascendency of the criminal 
classes made life in the settlement intol- 



6^8 



FROM COLOXV TO WOKJ.D POWER. 



erablf. vif;ilancc leagues were I'ornieil, 
which took the administration of law 
into their own hands, and by hanging- or 
driving from the state the leaders of the 
lawless element, re-established decent gov- 
ernment. And it is interesting to trace 
back many of the characteristics that have 
made the modern city of San Francisco 
both famous and infamous to the seeds 
which were planted in the earliest days 
of its history, and to note that advancing 
civilization has been unable to root out 
the tares, or keep them wholly in restraint. 
It is unquestionably true that the city cast 
a spell over those familiar with it which 
was not approached by the influence of 
any other locality. But it was largely the 
result of a freedom bordering on license 
which existed nowhere else. It was a free- 
and-easy city, bohemian to the core. 
Tourists went there expecting to see 



heanl was. "Dear Old Frisco! She will 
never be the same again." Even so digni- 
fied and conservative a citizen as Ben- 
jamin Ide Wheeler, President of the 
University of California, cannot picture 
the fairer city he sees about to rise on the 
ashes of the old, without a touch of re- 
gret that old things have probably forever 
passed away. lie says : " The New San 
Francisco will be far stancher and nobler 
than the old, but we shall always miss the 
old nooks and localisms and bohemian- 
isms, and the variegated flavors of many 
nationalities, ming'led with glimpses and 
odors of Cathay, which blended in old 
California's grace of freedom and love of 
elbow room to make the dear old town so 
inexhaustible a spring of human interest." 
Naturally the early city was constructed 
entirely of wood, and its "baptisms of 
fire " were many and costly. As lias been 




IN FRANCISCO IN 1855. 



phases of life that were not to be seen 
elsewhere, and they were not disaiipointed. 
For weeks, of course, after the great earth- 
quake and fire, it was the chief topic of 
conversation among all men who were 
traveling West of the Rocky Mountains; 
and the most common expression one 



•II 



d: " Xo other city in the worh 



has ever suffered a comparable loss by con- 
flagration." Its first great fire occurred 
D(>cember 24, 1849, with a loss of over 
$1,000,000 in a town hardly a year old. 
The second. May 4, 18.50, destroyed prop- 
erty valued at $4,000,000, and the loss 



THE EARTHQUAKE AND EIRE AT SAN FRANCISCO — 1906. 629 



from the third, June 14, 1S50, was placed 
at the same figure. On May 4, 1851, oc- 
curred the most destructive conflagration 
of all, consuming $12,000,000 of property, 
and on June 22 of the same year $3,- 
000,000 went up in flames. Nor was the 
city less familiar with earthquakes, which 
had been of frequent occurrence though 
rarely attended with serious loss of life or 
destruction of property. As a result of 
these experiences with fire and earth- 
quakes, nearly all the buildings of the 
rapidly growing city were constructed of 
wood, and were but two or three stories 
in height. Statistics showed that in 1906 
more than ninety per cent of the stores and 
houses of the city were wooden buildings. 
About 1890, however, when the new steel 
construction began to be common and the 
" sky-scraper " began to rear its lofty bead 
in all the large cities, some of the more 
venturesome among San Francisco's capi- 
talists erected a tew tall and elegant build- 
ings along the new lines. These were, of 
course, confined to a small area of the 
busiest part of Market street, but the 
manner in which these buildings with- 
stood the effects both of the earthquake 
and fire makes it certain that the new city 
will be largely a steel and concrete city. 
As President Wheeler said: "The old 
architecture was mostly bad, — heinously 
bad, as everybody knows. The earthquake 
tried the works of men and found much 
of the construction was also bad. Men 
will not veneer any more wooden build- 
ings with their skins of brick. Honest 
wooden structures on the one hand, and 
steel-cage and re-euforced concrete on the 
other have come off triumphant." 

The peninsula on the east side of 
which San Francisco is located is about 
eight miles wide, from the Pacific Ocean 
un the west to the bay on the cast, with 
the world-renowned Golden Gate as its 
northern boundary. A range of high hills 
extends along the ocean front which is 
deflected to the east by the Golden Gate 
Strait, and extends entirely around the 
city on the west, north, and northeast. 
(Jradually sloping to the east and south, 
a level area is reached at distances vary- 



ing from two to four miles from the ocean 
and strait; and along the northerly edge 
of this level tract the famous Market 
Street extends in a southwesterly direc- 
tion for about four miles. At the begin- 
ning of Market Street at the bay are situ- 
ated the great Ferry houses, forming 
practically the only exits and entrances 
to the city. About two miles from the 
Ferry house the other celebrated street 
of the city, Van Ness avenue, cuts Mar- 
ket street, and extends in due northerly 
line to the city limits; and it was within 
the irregular quadrangle formed by the 
(lolden Gate on the north, the bay on the 
east, Market street on the south and Van 
Ness avenue on the west that the devas- 
tation by the fire was complete. This 
area included the celebrated Nob Hill, 
Telegraph Hill, and Chinatown; was the 
location of all the famous hotels, of which 
the city was justly proud; and here was 
transacted practically all its banking and 
wholesale and retail business. It is true 
the fire started and burned over a large 
area south of Market street before it 
leaped across that wide thoroughfare; but 
the buildings were of a cheaper character, 
and chiefly of a poorer class of dwellings, 
smaller factories, etc. 

At about fifteen minutes after five on 
the morning of April 18, 1906, the four 
hundred thousand inhabitants of San 
Francisco were rudely but etlectually 
wakened by an earthquake shock which 
literally threw many into the streets, 
though many more were pinned firmly to 
their beds by falling walls and debris of 
every character. This destruction of 
property and loss of life was chiefly con- 
fined to the flimsy structures south of 
Market street; and had the earthquake 
not been followed by fire, the property 
loss might have reached some five or eight 
million dollars, with a death record which 
has been ofiieially placed at 33.3. Such 
results would have been slight in compari- 
son with the seven thousand lives de- 
stroyed in the Galveston flood, the one 
thousand lost by the burning of the 
" General Slocum " in the East river, at 
New York, or the more than six hundred 



(i3() 



FEOM COLOXY TO WORLD PO\VER. 



instantly klllcMl at the Iroquois Theatre 
tire in Chicago. So iueonsiderable. in 
fact, was the direct loss of either life or 
property as a result of the eartluinake 
alone, that it would have hardly aroused 
more than local interest, and would 
scarcely have interrupted the daily rou- 
tine life of the people of the city. But 




From Stereograph, Copijrigltt 1906. Uiulerwood di- Under- 

woodt Neiv York. 

GEXERAL FUNSTON. 



from the crossing- of electric vi'ires, or 
breaking of gas mains, fire immediately 
broke out among the ruins, and at several 
different points. The fire department of 
tho city had been brought to the highest 
state of efficiency, as the combustible 
character of its buildings made especial 
attention to that protective force im- 
perative. But as soon as the firemen 
reached the scene of the conflagration the 
horrifying discovery was made that there 
was no water ; the force of the earthquake 
had shattered the old wooden water mains, 
and the people and the city were at the 
mercy of the flames. The department had 
lost its head, too, as its Chief was mortally 
wounded in bed by a falling cupola in the 
first moment of the shock, and passed away 
four days later without ever learning of 
the fire. 



At the northwest end of the peninsula, 
skirting the Golden Gate and stretching 
back up the hills is the Presidio, the 
United States Military Reservation, em- 
bracing some fifteen hundred acres. Here, 
in all the difl^erent arms of the service, 
were stationed about eighteen hundred 
men, with Gen. Funston as commandant 
nf the department. As he has written, 
when he came out of his house on the 
slope of Nob Hill after the earthquake 
shock and saw the fires breaking out over 
south of Market street, he realized that 
serious work was before the city depart- 
ment, and of his own volition he at once 
sent orders to the Fort and the Presidio, 
instructing the officers to assemble all 
the regular troops on Market street, to 
lend any support to the fire or police de- 
partments that might be needed. In the 
absence of water, the only weapon left 
was dynamite; and under the direction of 
the artillery officers its use was kept up 
throughout the next two days, but with no 
appreciable effect. Early in the day the 
troops were drawn around the burned and 
burning districts to keep the crowds from 
trying to enter buildings, or to rush into 
localities made dangerous by weak walls. 
Mayor Schmitz issued a proclamation in- 
structing the police and troops to shoot 
at sight anyone caught pilfering or loot- 
ing, with the result that it is generally 
agreed that, notwithstanding the terrible 
strain the people were under, the city was 
never more orderly than during the fire 
and the thirty days following it. During 
the first forenoon the flames broke across 
Market street in several places and be- 
gan rapidly to work into the best busi- 
ness section and to threaten all the public 
buildings, hotels, churches, and places of 
amusement. All of the 18th and through 
the night and during the 19th the fire 
raged with terrible fury, the horror of the 
situation, too, being constantly augmented 
by the continuous explosions- of dynamite 
and powder. The streets were filled with 
refugees carrying or dragging every con- 
ceivable kind of a burden from a bird 
cage to a sewing machine or trunk. With 
weary eves, too dazed to realize what was 



THE EARTHQUAKE AND FIRE AT SAN FRANCISCO — 190G. 631 



really happening, they saw all that they 
possessed in the world licked up by the 
flames. Thousands sought refuge in flight 
by the ferries across the bay to Oakland, 
Berkeley, and other suburbs; while other 
thousands were directed or drifted toward 
the great open space aiforded by the 
Presidio and the Golden Gate Park. All 
spectators of the scenes bore witness to 
the wonderful fortitude and good nature 
disjjlayed by the sufferers. Under the 
spell of the mighty forces that were con- 
tending around them, they seemed to lose 
all thought of the seriousness of the situa- 
tion, and to act as though it was some 
great celebration or monster picnic with 
fireworks on a gigantic scale, which they 
were attending. But hunger and thirst 



widest street in the city, it was determined 
to make the final stand against the fire. 
Here all the remaining resources, — all the 
dynamite, and powder, and a battery of 
guns — were massed. Between the avenue 
and the fire a line of mansions three- 
quarters of a mile long was raked by the 
artillery, and blown up with dynamite and 
barrels of powder. This was by far the 
most desperate fight of the two days. The 
fire flanked the line at both eiids, leaping 
the cleared space on the north and burn- 
ing the five blocks bordering the woslern 
side of Van Ness avenue, while coming up 
from Market street at the other end. But 
the centre held for several blocks; and 
soon a most opportune change of wind 
turned the flames back at either end; 




A SECTION OF MAHKET STREET BEFORE THE FTOE. 



are hard masters; and there was no water 
and the bulk of all the provisions in the 
city had been destroyed, so that all soon 
began to feel the pinch of existing condi- 
tions. By the evening of the 19th the 
flames had swept over Chinatown, Tele- 
graph Hill, and Nob Hill, and were work- 
ing up to Van Ness avenue. At this, the 



and that night the fire was under control. 
The next day it dealt one last blow, the 
changed wind turning it back upon its 
course to wipe out most of the poorer 
houses on Telegraph Hill which had been 
passed on its first advance. The whole 
region which had been destroyed covered 
practically four square miles, — 498 blocks. 



632 



IKOM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



— and a barren waste had been made of 
about everything that to the outside world 
constituted San Francisco. Most happily 
the great steel ferry house, with its piers 
and boats, had been saved, largely through 
the exertions of the harbor fire patrol, and 
of the sailors from vessels in the bay. 
The situation would have been unspeak- 
ably horrible had this building been 
destroyed, as it was the only way left for 
the thousands of desperate and destitute 
people to leave the city, and the only 
gateway through which the relief supplies 
of all kinds could be brought in, the single 
line of road running down the peninsula 
to the south having been put out of com- 
mission early on the first day of the fire. 
Then followed four or five weeks of such 
life as it rarely happens to one to ex- 
perience. Fortunately a vast number of 
tents and camping outfits were stored in 
the various government warehouses, all 
of which were at once placed at the dis- 
posal of the city authorities. Vast ([uan- 
tities of supplies, too, were immediately 
turned over, so that few jirobably really 
suffered from hunger at any time. The 
month following the fire was by far the 
most peaceful and orderly the city had 
ever known. Every citizen, whatever his 
wealth and position, submitted himself 
and his family to the most paternal sort 
of government. Everybody lived on free 
food, which was given out, one ration at 
a time, at the bread lines. Freedom of 
action was surrendered for the public 
good, and everybody did as directed by 
the sentry. All cooking had to be done in 
the streets; no lights were allowed in the 
houses, and the most rigid sanitary regu- 
lations were enforced. Business men were 
not even allowed to open their own safes 
until permission was given by the autlior- 
ities. And the cheerfulness with which 
all submitted to these irksome restraints 
was the wonder of the day. As one has 
said: "For one month there was a reign 
of brotherly love such as poets and sages 
have pictured. Laborers, professional 
men, servants, and captains of industry, 
served without compensation, or even 
promise of any. The bitterest political 



enemies worked harmoniously for the 
connnon good, — worked hard and long, 
day and night. ' Hand out ' methods took 
the place of purchase and sale for there 
were neither markets nor money with 
which to buy." 

And how gloriously the whole country 
opened its heart and its purse for the 
consolation and relief of the stricken 
people! Before darkness set in on that 
first day of the fire there was not a city 
or town of an.v size throughout the whole 
land where a relief committee was not 
actively at work; and early on the morn- 
ing of the 19th trains loaded with every 
kind of provisions, clothing, medical sup- 
plies, delicacies for the sick, and every- 
ihing that the most sympathetic thought 
and tenderest love could suggest, were 
rolling towards San Francisco on pas- 
senger train time, as all the roads center- 
ing on the bay had announced that relief 
trains should have the right of way over 
all others. LIow quickly Boston, New 
York, Chicago, and all the larger cities 
wired amounts that would be a ransom for 
a king! In less than a month more tiian 
twenty million dollars had been gener- 
ou.sly subscribed to feed, cloth, cheer, and 
up-lift the homeless and penniless brothers 
and sisters in the desolate city. One of 
the most widely known Californians 
sunnned it all up in these words: "Amid 
all our money-making obession, amid all 
the artificial excitation of amusement 
whicli goes witli a commercial age, a 
shock like this brings us all back to human 
nature. It was lieautiful to read of the 
swift response of Boston and New York 
and the whole East to the unspoken need 
of the city by tlie Golden Gate. It was 
beautiful to see in the nearest large popu- 
lation, which is Los Angeles, the dropping 
of business to org-anize material relief — to 
.see the busiest men neglecting their hanks, 
and their stores, and working like navvies 
to put money, food, and clothing into San 
Francisco. But finest of all it was to see 
the San Franciscans — the distinctions of 
money and class all forgotten, the artifices 
of civilization laid aside, and a great 
i-onnnunity on a common footing, cooking 



THE EAKTHQUAKE AND FIRE AT SAN FRANCISCO — 1906. 633 



by the curb-stoue, siiiiliny.- over the ashes 
of their business and their homes, and 
Ijlanning with unshaken heart for a better 
to-morrow. Between two days, the Heroic 
Afi-e came back to California." 

But the " Heroic Age " was an anaelii'o- 
nism, and its duration was short. By 
the first of June individual and collective 
interests began to assert themselves, and 
a period of restless and nervous activity 
ensued. Men were imi)atient to re-estab- 
lish their business connections, and in 
some way and upon some scale, to see the 
wheels of traffic in motion once more. 
But the city was a mass of ruins and no 
stores of any character were available. 
Property variously estimated at from 
three hundred to five hundred millions of 
dollars in value had been wiped out of ex- 
istence ; but a new working capital of 
close to two hundred million dollars was 
being realized from the settlements made 
by the Insurance Companies. Mayor 
Sehmitz, who had lost the confidence of 
all conservative business men and of the 
leaders of public opinion before the fire 
broke out, suri)rised both his friends and 
enemies by rising to the spirit of the oc- 
casion and developing a force, character, 
and judgment of which he had been 
deemed incapable. Before the fire was 
under control, he had called about him as 
an advisory and executive board, a com- 
mittee of fifty of the men most prominent 
in every line of the old city's activities, 
who possessed in an unusual degree the 
confidence of everyone in the community, 
and the greater number of whom were 
among- his bitterest and most active politi- 
cal opponents. Day and night these men 
labored in perfect harmony, administering 
the relief funds and supplies so gener- 
ously joouring in from every part of the 
country; but also, and all the time, devis- 
ing plans for the rehabilitation of the 
city. One thing only, at the start, was 
recognized by all the members of this 
eonniiittee, and that was that the new city 
must not repeat, in its construction and 
laying out, the vicious defects of the old 
city. The lessons of inadequate water sup- 
ply, of cheap buildings and insecure 



foundations, of narrow streets, and the 
neglect of iirccautions of various kinds, 
had been learned from the sad experience 
through which they had passed; and it 
was determined that before any rebuild- 
ing should be allowed, certain definite 
plans and laws should be established to 
govern the work. The Hon. J. D. Phelan, 
Chairman of the Finance Board of 
the Committc-e of Fifty, and the one 
who has done more than all others to 
revive the confidence of capitalists and 
investors in the new city, summed the 
situation up as follows: " The recent 
earthquake of itself did comparatively 
little damage. It merely developed the 
weak spots in the construction of our 
buildings, and revealed the city's danger 
rather than imperilled its life. Our 
case is diagnosed and the remedy is 
at hand. No more flimsy construction 
will he permitted, and the foundations 
will be laid strong and deep. A water- 
supply will be procured to protect our 
property, and wide streets will be laid out. 
The city has jjermitted itself to be served 
by a private corporation with water drawn 
from near-by sources, carried in pipes over 
marsh lands on rotten trestles, unsup- 
ported by piles. These fell at the slightest 
disturbance of the ground, having no sup- 
port, and by reason of that fact the city 
was left without water, an easy prey to 
the flames. The people of San Francisco 
are perfectly satisfied that by the observa- 
tion of ordinary precaution, improved 
building laws, and careful inspection the 
mistakes of the past shall never be re- 
peated, and that the new city will be 
greater and better than the old." 

As soon as financial arrangements could 
be made building began on an extended 
scale in many parts of the burnt district, 
but especially on Market street, and its 
immediate vicinity, from the Ferry Build- 
ing, West. From five to twelve blocks 
from the water front had been the centre 
of the best class of retail trade. Pending 
rebuilding, however, the retail merchants 
took possession of the west side of Van 
Ness Avenue, with a mutual understand- 
ing that they would eventually together 



(;;;4 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



luuve to such a lucality for permanent oe- 
eiipancy as the development of the city 
along its new lines should make most de- 
sirable. There seems to be little doubt 
tliat they will return to the old centre as 
soon as new stores now beins:; erected are 
ready, which sliould be early in 1909 at 
the latest. Already a great number of 
fine buildings for commercial purposes, 
along ilarket street for a mile from the 
Ferry and to the nortli of it. are Hearing 
completion. Xearly all of these take the 
place as permanent structures of one or 



heavy hanuners on the steel bolts is deaf- 
ening. The proverbial " ant-hill " is tlie 
most perfect simile, barring noises, that 
one could use to represent existing con- 
ditions. Of course desultory building has 
been going on in other localities, and for 
a mile or more north of Market street 
toward Telegraph Hill, a large area has 
lieen covered b,v wooden buildings for 
cheaper homes. As far as the eye can 
reach from Market street out over Nob 
Hill and to Van Ness avenue, however, 
there is vet a barren waste, much of it 




A PORTION OF BUSINESS SECTION AFTER THE FIRE. 



two story temporary affairs, which were 
erected hastily after the fire. Those new 
buildings are all of steel, and mostly of 
concrete construction, and average from 
ten to twelve stories in height. 

It would be difficult to conceive of a 
more apparently chaotic condition than 
has existed in this district for the past 
year, nor one whose noises were more in- 
tolerable. On every hand are great piles 
of steel trusses and heavy building ma- 
terial, which enormous cranes are hoisting 
into place, while the din of tliousands of 



still made doubly hideous by the ugly 
ruins left standing, but a larger part prac- 
tically cleared. The many hills of San 
Francisco are formidable obstacles to an 
artistic development. Two years before 
the fire the subject of city improvement 
was earnestly agitated, and the renowned 
architect D. H. Burnham, of Chicago, the 
designer of the famous " White City," was 
commissioned to work out a scheme for 
the renovation of San Francisco. This 
he did, and the " Burnham Plans " were 
accepted as a basis along whose lines 



THE EARTHQUAKE AND FIRE AT SAN FRANCISCO — 1906. 635 



future improvements should be made. 
These plans provided for a great central 
square, or circle, at the junction of 
Market street and Van Ness avenue, about 
whicli should be artistically grouped all 
the municipal buildings. Court House, 
Library, etc.; for the radiation from this 
and other central circles of wide avenues ; 
and for the change from the then exist- 
ing rectangular arrangement of streets up 
and down the sides of the steeijest hills, 
which were practically impassable except 
for mountain climbers and cable cars, to 
winding avenues at easy grades. The 
whole scheme was not unlike that origi- 
nally designed for the City of Washing- 
ton, the gradual development of which has 
transformed that once " city of magnifi- 
cent distances " and ugly wastes into what 
is confessedly one of the most beautiful 
capital cities of the world. Of course, 
when Burnham's plans for the improve- 
ment of San Francisco were accepted in 
1905, no one anticipated that in so short 
a time the ground would be wholly 
cleared, and that they would serve as the 
general outline for the reconstruction of 
the city. Naturally, in view of the terrible 
loss of property suffered, and of the im- 
perative need of haste in rebuilding in 
some sections, those plans cannot be fol- 
lowed as closely as the best citizens would 
have desired. The general scheme has, 
however, so far been kept in mind by the 
building department and property holders 
in the work of reconstruction that its 
ultimate development in all its beauty will 



be much easier than it otherwise would 
have been. It is probable that at this 
time, the summer of 1908, about one-half 
of the whole burnt district, or, say two 
hundred and fifty blocks, has been cov- 
ered with buildings which may be con- 
sidered as permanent, though not all of 
the buildings, as the great new Pacific 
hotel, for example, will be ready for oc- 
cupancy for some time. Unfortunately, 
labor troubles, which have always been 
sources of frequent disturbances in San 
Francisco, have interfered very materially 
with the work of rebuilding; while the 
ashes of the burned city were hardly cold 
before Mayor Schmitz was indicted, tried, 
and sent to jail on charges of extortion 
and bribery, all of which, however, ante- 
dated the fire. But the rotten condition 
existing in the city's affairs which was 
brought to light during his trial and by 
the antecedent investigations, and which 
has been the occasion of some of the 
fiercest legal battles of the past two years, 
has grated upon the genial feeling that 
everyone had toward the city after its 
dreadful scourge. Certainly the people 
of the whole country share the hope of 
its best citizens, even if they cannot share 
fully their faith, that the wonderful city 
by the Golden Gate will rise from its 
ashes not only more beautiful without and 
fairer to look upon, but also more whole- 
some within, and purged of the political 
and social evils that have too frequently 
smirched its good reputation, and tar- 
nished its honored name. 



LIII. 
THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



/\inl)er and the Lodestone. — Views of Ancient Philosophers and of the Church Fathers. — 
The Chinese " South-Pointing Car." — Rise of Experimental Philosophy. — Dr. Gilbert the 
Pioneer Experimenter. — Formation of the British Roya,l Society. — The " Roarings and 
Crackings " when Electricity was Produced. — Earliest Comparison with Thunder and 
Lightning. — Franklin's Experiments. — His " Electrified Bumpers." — His Demonstration 
that Lightning of the Storm Same as He produced. — Lightning Rods.— Invention of Leyden 
Jar. — Line of Jlonks, Nine Hundred Feet Long, Electrified. — Experiments of Cialvani and 
Volta. — Humphrey Davy and the Arc Light. — Oersted's Great Discovery. — Faraday 
Determines Relation of Electricity and Magnetism. — Joseph Henry's Distinguished Career 
and Discoveries. — Morse and the Electric Telegraph. — Strange and Sad Vicissitudes of 
Inventor. — First Telegraph Laid, Baltimore to Washington, Opened May 24, 1844. — First 
Message, "What God Hath Wrought." — Cyrus Field and the Atlantic Cable. — Repeated 
Failures. — First Perfect Connection Established, July 27. 1866. — Statistics as to Cable 
Service. — Bell, and the Telephone. — Remarkable Characteristics of Invention. — The 
Microphone.— Every Other Family in the L^nited States Has Telephone. — Development of 
Dynamos and Motors. — Remarkable Transmission of Currents for Power and Light.— The 
Electric Liglit. — Incandescent and Arc Lights Described. — Arc Light 3,000,000 Candle 
Power. — Uses of Selenium. — Various Applications of Electricity in Railroad Service. — 
Dr. Holmes's " Broomstick Train." — Hertz and the Hertzian Waves. — Ether. — Marconi's 
Wireless Telegraph and Its Principles. — -Remarkable Invention of Orling and Armstrong. — 
The Wireless Telegraph and the Republic Collision. — What Next, Telepathy ? 



" .\n the myriad phenomena of the Universe are the manifestations of a single animating principle that 

IB both infinite and eternal and eai-h art of scientific explanation but reveals an opening through which 

shines the glory of the Eternal Majesty." — John Fiske. 




the great forces of the Universe that have been so studied 
nnd controlled as to be of infinite service to man. Electric- 
ity has ahva.vs excited the most lively interest. Certain 
of its proisertie? have been known since the dawn of civil- 
ization, and the knowledge has been put to some practical 
use; but until toward the middle of the nineteenth cen- 
tury hardly a hint had been g-iven of the marvelous trans- 
forming- powers of the force, of which we really know 
niiTluiii;, .vit can make serve our needs in such important and diversified ways. One of 
the favorite jewels and decorative stones of the ancient world was Amber. Its color 
and lustre appealed to the old Greeks, reminding them of the virgin gold in the sands 
of some of their streams, and of the yellow sunshine. Later they came to apply the 
same name to the compounds of metals which when burnished gave a golden glow, 
all being classed as children of Elel-tor, — the Sun — and reflecting his radiance. Thus 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



30/ 



Amber, in Hellenic speech, came to be 
called Elektron; and to its peculiar prop- 
erty of attracting light objects when rub- 
bed, was given the name of Electricity. 
The stone was found along the shores of 
the Baltic Sea, and the early Phoenicians 
did a thriving business in transporting it 
to the Mediterranean and Aegean cities, 
even before either Rome or Carthage was 
founded. Amber beads were found in the 
ancient tombs of Mycense, which are now 
supposed to belong to a period at least 
two thousand years before the Christian 
era; while Homer, Hesiod, and all the 
earliest writers speak of its beauty and 
remarkable powers. Because when rubbed 
it would " clutch " at. or draw, light 
substances, Amber was used by all Syrian 
women who could afford it for a spindle 
in spinning, serving "to hold fast the 
newly finished length of weft." This 
seems to have been the first practical use 
made of the electrical force and the first 
intelligent operation of an electrical 
etfect. 

Equally ancient has been the knowledge 
of the Lodestone, or Magnetite. This ore 
(if iron was a frequent outcropinng on 
the mountains aroinid the Aegean sea; 
and one legend tells of the shepherd 
blagues who, guarding his flocks on the 
slopes of Mt. Ida, suddenly found him- 
self held fast by the adhering of the nails 
of his shoes and the iron ferrule of his 
stafl^ to a stone, which was subsequently 
called after him " Magnes' Stone," or 
" Magnet." The two-fold phenomena of 
the lodestone were early observed, — that 
it not only attracts iron but also has 
polarity; that is, exhibits opposite effects 
at op])osite ends. By reason of this, when 
in elongated form and supported so as to 
turn freely, it will place itself nearly in 
a north and south direction. This 
prophecy of the mariner's compass was 
used in various ways by the ancients 
though it is impossible to determine the 
direct origin or source of the compass it- 
self. The " strange hunger of this mag- 
netite for other iron," which it seized and 
drew unto itself, was to the superstitious 
Greeks a mystery concerning which the 



uninitiated might not even think, for fear 
of the anger of the Gods. From the 
earliest legends it would appear that the 
first miners of Greece came from Phrygia, 
where magnetite was abundant, and set- 
tled in Samothrace. There they intro- 
duced their " mysteries ; " and as proof of 
their supernatural skill exhibited the 
celebrated " Samothracian rings." Later 
the magnetite was termed the Hercules 
stone because of its power of overcoming 
iron, and of forcing that metal to come 
to it. From the earliest times these won- 
derful properties of amber and the lode- 
stone filled the superstitious with profound 
awe, while the philosophers sought in vain 
for some explanation of the phenomena. 
As a result of his study of the subject 
Thales, the " Father of Philosophy," who 
lived about 600 B. C, is said to have " at- 
tributed souls to lifeless things, forming 
his conjecture from the nature of the 
magnet and the amber;" and, again, 
Aristotle says: " Thales, too, as is related, 
seems to regard the soul as somehow pro- 
ducing motion, for he said that the stone 
had a soul since it moves iron." Plato 
jjuts into the mouth of Socrates this in- 
teresting and beautiful comparison of the 
magnetic powers with the inspiration of 
the poet. "The gift you have of speaking 
excellently about Homer is not an art," 
said Socrates; " but, as I was just saying, 
an inspiration ; there is a divinity moving 
you, like that in the stone which Eu- 
ripides calls a magnet, but which is com- 
monly known as the stone of Heraclea. 
For that stone not only attracts iron 
rings, but also imparts to them similar 
power of attracting other rings; and some 
times you may see a number of pieces 
of iron and rings suspended from one an- 
otlier, so as to form quite a long chain ; 
and all of these derive their powers of 
suspension from the original stone. Now 
this is lilce to the Muse, who first gives 
to man inspiration himself, and from 
those inspired, her sons, a chain of other 
persons is suspended, who will take the 
inspiration from them." For centuries 
after Plato the Samothracian rings are 
frequently described. i\[oreover, as the 



G38 



PKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



popular belief lias always attributed won- 
derful properties to any force which 
shows wonderful effects, so the healing 
and restoring properties of the magnet 
and the magnetic rings were fully be- 
lieved in. The priests of Saniothrace did 
a great business as magnetic healers, sell- 
ing magnets and rings, chiefly for the 
cure of rheumatism and gout. Their 
magnetized iron rings were recognized 
as " cure-alls," were later worn by the 
Roman priests of Jupiter, and, as Pliny 
says, had in his time become the usual 
pledge of betrothal. 

When, and by whom, the magnet and 
the needle were first wedded and became 
the compass, will probably never be 
known. The Chinese claims are very 
strong and would establish a very ancient 
use of that instrument. One sen'ice to 
which we know the magnet was put at a 
veiy early date was the directing of tlie 
Chinese " South Pointing Car." These 
cars resembled somewhat an old-fash- 
ioned, heavily built chaise. Just in front 
of the passenger's seat was a square box 
on which stood a figure " made of jade," 
about sixteen inches in height. Within 
the right arm, which was always ex- 
tended in front, was concealed a magnet, 
whose force is supijosed to have been suf- 
ficient to turn the figure on its pivot, and 
so to have caused it always to point to the 
South. There are records of these cars 
as far back as the ninth century B. C, 
though there seems to be no account for 
several centuries later, when they again 
appear in use about the fifth or sixth 
century of our era. 

To the Fathers of the Christian Church 
the mysteries of magnetism were es- 
pecially interesting, suggesting to them 
symbols of the attractive powers of Divine 
Love. " If the magnet and amber have 
the strength to draw rings and seeds and 
chaff," says St. Jerome, " how much the 
more irresistibly can the Lord of all 
created things draw unto Himself that 
which He desires." And St. Gregory saw 
in the united rings of Samothrace an il- 
lustration of the binding power of the 
Spirit. But most interesting of all is St. 



Augustine's account of what ho had seen 
and heard in this regard. Speaking of 
the attraction of the magnet, he says: 
" When I first saw it I was thunder- 
struck for I saw an iron ring attracted 
and suspended by the stone; and then, 
as if it had communicated its own prop- 
erty to the iron it attracted, and had made 
it a substance like itself, this ring was 
put near another and lifted it up; and 
as the first ring clung to the magnet so 
did the second ring to the first. A third 
and fourth were similarly added, so that 
there hung from the stone a kind of chain 
of rings with their hoops connected, not 
interlinking, but attached together by 
their outer surface. Who would not be 
amazed at this virtue of the stone, sub- 
sisting, as it does, not only in itself, but 
transmitted through so many suspended 
rings and binding them together by in- 
visible links? Yet far more astonishing 
is what I heard about the stone from my 
brother in the episcopate, Severus, bishop 
of Milevis. He told me that the Count 
of Africa, when the bishop was dining 
with him, produced a magnet and held 
it under a silver plate on which he placed 
a bit of iron; then as he moved his hand 
with the magnet, underneath the plate, 
the iron upon the plate moved about ac- 
cordingly. The intervening silver was 
not affected at all, but precisely as the 
magnet was moved backward and forward 
below it, no matter how quickly, so was 
the iron attracted above." This is said 
to be the first record of the movement of 
a magnetic body under the control of a 
moving magnet. But St. Augustine more 
than wondered at the things he saw and 
heard ; he questioned ; and had the days 
of inductive philosophy been at hand his 
acute mind might have anticipated some 
of the later discoveries in electrical de- 
velopment. What most interested him to 
discover was why the lodestoue should 
move iron, and yet be powerless to stir 
straws or light chaff; while amber drew 
the straws and chaff but had no apparent 
effect upon iron. This recognition of the 
difference between amber attraction (Elec- 
tric) and the lodestone attraction (mag- 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



639 



netic) was to disturb the \vorld, so far as 
the world gave any attention to these sub- 
jects, for more than a thousand years be- 
fore any reasonable theory should be ad- 
yanced. 

We are indebted to Mr. Park Beh- 
jamiu's "Intellectual Rise in Electricity," 
for much interesting matter relating to 
the views of the ancients regarding this 
subject; and he has given an entertain- 
ing account of one of the curious myths 
regarding the lodestone which lias been 
very tenacious of life. This myth relates 
to the magnetic mountain, variously 
placed in different seas and oceans, whose 
ores, as a vessel approached it, began to 
draw all the nails from its timbers, so 
that the ship fell to pieces. "One of the 
most interesting accounts of this fabled 
mountain is to be found in the "Arabian 
Xiglits Entertainment," being a part of 
the tale of the third royal mendicant who 
ventured to sea. " After a long period of 
calm the captain of the ship tells him, in 
great perturbation, that ' to-morrow we 
shall arrive at a mountain of black stone 
called lodestone; the current is now bear- 
ing us violently towards it, and the ships 
will fall to pieces and every nail in them 
will fly to the mountain and adhere to it, 
for God hath given to the lodestone a 
secret property by virtue of which every- 
thing of iron is attracted towards it. On 
that mountain is such a quantity of iron 
as no one kuoweth but God, whose name 
be exalted : for, from times of old, great 
numbers of ships have been destroyed by 
that mountain.' On the following morn- 
ing as the ship approached the fatal stone, 
the current carried us toward it with 
violence; and when the ships were almost 
close to it they fell asunder, and all the 
nails and everything that was of iron 
flew from them toward the lodestone." 

But Electricity is the science that more 
than all others depends upon experiment. 
For more than fifteen hundred years the 
ancients marvelled at its phenomena, but 
stopped there. Its further advance must 
await the awakening of the human under- 
standing to the supreme importance of ex- 
perimental and inductive methods, which 



constitute the glory of modern philosophy. 
Moreover, in other branches of scientific 
development and industrial advancement, 
individual tliinkers have worked out com- 
pleted systems and inventions that have 
revolutionized the particular industry af- 
fected. Arkwright, Whitney, Fulton, 
Watt, Stevenson, — each stands as the rep- 
resentative of a practically unique and 
completed work. But every advance, evea 
by the masters, in electricity has been 
upon a basis of a vast number of experi- 
ments covering a period of more than five 
centuries. So true is this, that a leading 
writer on the subject, summing up the 
work of Morse in establishing the electric 
telegraph says : " In the Morse telegTaph 
are found the battery, for which credit 
must be given primarily to Volta, and 
then to Daniell, who in 183'3 devised a 
battery nearly constant in strength, — an 
essential requisite to its application to the 
telegraph; the key, or transmitter, which, 
except in details of construction, is prac- 
tically that in use since experiments on 
electricity began; the receiving instru- 
ment of which the essential feature is 
the electro-magnet, due primarily to Stur- 
geon, but modified and improved so as to 
be available for this work by Henry; the 
relay, by means of which the local cur- 
rent is put in operation, which was used 
by Henry and also by Wheatstone; the 
line wire suspended on poles, a method 
first practically used by Dr. W. O. 
Shaughnessey at Calcutta, in 1839. While 
it appears, therefore, that Morse cannot 
justly claim priority in the aiseovery of 
a single scientific principle involved in 
the telegraph, it must be admitted on all 
hands that he played a most important 
part in its development." It will, there- 
fore, be necessary and not without in- 
terest, to trace the growth of these germ 
princii^les which, in their combined benefi- 
cence, have served to make all later life 
so much more healthful and comfortable, 
and have so materially increased the sum 
of human happiness. 

Experimental philosophy is generally 
considered as beginning with Bacon early 
in the seventeenth century. But the 



640 



FKO.M COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



first experimental work of consequence in 
the field of electricity ante-dates Bacon's 
time some years, and was conducted by 
William Gilbert, of Colchester, first 
physician to Queen Elizabeth, and a man 
of extraordinary learning and inventive 
genius. lie is commonly regarded as the 
creator of the science of Electricity and 
Magnetism, and it is to him that the 
science is indebted for its name. He 
constructed an electroscope consisting of 
a light needle resting on a point, and bj- 
its use discovered that the power of at- 
tracting light bodii s did not belong to 
amber alone, but was possessed by many 
other substances when they were properly 
excited. This remarkable man's studies 
and investigations covered the whole 
range of the physical sciences, and were 
not confined to the field of electricity. 
But as the latter was absolutely virgin 
territory, his labors and successes in it 
were more noteworthy than those in other 
fields. As the first experimenter in and 
founder of the science of Electricity, a 
summary of his achievements possesses 
lasting interest. In recapitulating Gilbert's 
contributions to physical science, Mr. 
Benjamin says : " He was the first to in- 
■\-estigate natural phenomena philosoph- 
ically and systematically, and by a true 
inductive method, for he interrogated 
nature by actual exiieriment and from 
particulars thus ascertained rose tO' cor- 
rect generalizations; to recognize elec- 
tricity (as distinguished fmrn mag- 
netism) as a new natural condition or 
force, and to study and nami; it; to ex- 
tract the facts and laws of magnetism 
from the existing mass of speculation, 
mysteries, and delusions, and to reduce 
them to a science; to suggest the cor- 
relation of gravit.v and magnetism with 
other natural forces, and a relationship 
between gravity, magnetism, and elec- 
tricity; to formulate a definite conception 
of the magnetic field of force, and to 
attenipt to show its extent; to suggest the 
re-aetion between two fields of force, and 
mechanical motion of the inducing bodies 
resulting therefrom; io reconnlzc ihai 
the curlh is a great magnet, capable of 



magnetizing iron and iron ore by induc- 
tion; to determine the magnetic polarity 
of the earth and in the directive tendency 
thereof to reveal the true reason for the 
vertieity of the compass needle; to dis- 
cover magnetic screening, conduction, 
and saturation, the compound magnet, 
the mutual attraction or induction of 
lodestone and iron, the polepieee or ar- 
mature, the effect of induction on soft 
iron, and magnetization by molecular dis- 
turbance; and to discover electrical charge 
and its permanence for a considerable 
period of time, and that it can be retained 
by covering the excited body with cer- 
tain substances. He invented the first 
electrical (as distinguished from mag- 
netic) instrument, the first electrical in- 
dicating device, the first magnetometei', 
filar susjiension, and the ordinary method 
of magnetization." 

Following the initiative experiments of 
(iilbert, new principles and new methods 
of manipulating electricity were rapidly 
discovered ; but our space will admit of 
notice of only the determining factors in 
the development. During the middle of 
the seventeenth centurj- many men were 
constantly e.xiierimenting, the most dis- 
tinguished of whom were Robert Boyle 
in England, and Otto von Guericke, the 
celebrated burgomaster of Magdeburg, in 
Germany. Boyle's work did not serve to 
determine new principles of marked 
value, but he developed many of the 
theories and confirmed the ijositions of his 
distinguished fellow-countryman, Dr. Gil- 
bert. Boyle was, however, active in the 
fcjrmalion of the Royal Society of Eng- 
land, which was originally composed of 
twenty-one persons who, in 1C60, regu- 
larly organized themselves into a society 
for the promotion of all kinds of experi- 
mental philosophy. Charles II. a little 
later greatly strengthened the society by 
conferring on it a royal charter and by 
himself becoming an active member. 
This organization became of the greatest 
importance in the advance of electrical 
science, as investigators from all parts of 
the world sent to it for consideration 
jiapers announcing the results of their re- 



THE STORY OF ELECTKICITY 



641 



searches or investigations, wliieh were 
then, if approved, published by the So- 
ciety, and so made jjublic. In this way 
the student in ahnost any part of the 
world was enabled to keep in touch with 
the w'ork of his fellows in other localities, 
thus receiving a profound stimulus to 
further research and being saved, doubt- 
less, many useless and false steps by the 
experiences of others. 

Otto von Guericke was a most intel- 
ligent and enthusiastic workman; and 
his researches covered the whole field of 
physics. His especial addition to the 
cause of electrical science, however, con- 
sisted in the establishment of the prin- 
ciple of electrical conduction, — the 
transference of electrification from an 
electrified body to one not electrified, and 
the appearance of the electrification in 
a long conductor at the end opposite to 
that at which it was produced ; in other 
words, the apparent instantaneous trans- 
fer of electricity from end to end of the 
line. He also discovered that if he rub- 
l>ed his sulphur globe with the dry palm 
i:f the hand, and then took the globe with 
him into a dark room and rubbed it, 
especially at night, " light would result, 
as when sugar is beaten," — a hint of the 
electric light. Von Guericke was the 
first, also, to recognize electrical repul- 
sion, as such, a direct suggestion of the 
identity of electrical attraction and grav- 
ity; and he constructed and successfully 
used the first machine for the production 
of electricity. Speaking of his globe von 
Guericke said : " There is likewise a vir- 
tue of sound in this globe for when it is 
tarried in the hand or is held in a warm- 
hand, and thus brought to the ear, roar- 
iiigs and crackings are heard in it." And 
in 1708, Dr. Wall, an English physician, 
refers to the same phenomenon. Rub- 
bing a large piece of amber, and seeing 
the sparks and hearing the noise, he said : 
'■ Now, I doubt not, but on using- a longer 
and larger jiiece of amber both the crack- 
ling and the light would be much greater; 
and it seems in some degree to resemble 
thunder and ligldning." 

About 1730, Stephen Gray, one of the 
41 



Pensioners of Grey Eriars' School, be- 
came greatly interested in the subject of 
electrical conduction. At the school he 
had few tools; but in the poker, fire 
shovel, hemi^en twine, etc., he found 
enough to enable him to establish certain 
principles which he afterwards elaborated 
and tested at the country houses of two 
wealthy men who had interested them- 
selves in him and his work. After three 
years of constant experimenting he con- 
cluded that the " electric virtue " may not 
only be carried from the tube by a rod 
or line to distant bodies, but that the 
same rod or line will communicate that 
virtue to another rod or line at a dis- 
tance from it, and by that other rod or 
line the attractive force may be carried 
to other distant bodies. He succeeded in 
extending the transmission over lines 
reaching twelve hundred feet, using silk 
supports; and it was in his experiments 
as to supports that he discovered and es- 
tablished the existence of " conductors " 
and "non-conductors." He was, more- 
over, led to believe that " there may be 
found out a way to collect a greater 
quantity of it, and consequently to in- 
crease the force of this electric fire, which 
by several of these experiments seems to 
be of the same nature with that of thun- 
der and lightning." 

One of the most indefatigable investi- 
gators of this age was Doctor William 
Watson, a leading member of the Royal 
Society. While he made no important 
discoveries, he carried the investigations 
of others far in advance of the point of 
the discoverer, and so threw much light 
on the general development of electrical 
knowledge. He did, however, as the re- 
sult of years of investigation advance a 
theory that has not been without influ- 
ence. He affirmed " the existence of an 
electrical ether, much more siibtle than 
the common air, and passing to a certain 
depth through all known bodies. It has 
the property of air, of moving light ob- 
jects, and is elastic, this fact being shown 
by its extending itself around excited 
electrics, by its increasing the motions of 
fluids, by the apparent influx of elec- 



642 



FKOil COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



trii'nl fire to all bodies, ami by its s'ivin^ 
violent shocks to the human frame. 
With this ether all bodies are normally 
charged. If, however, a body be excited, 
then the normal conditions are disturbed, 
so that the ether in the nearest unexcited 




BENJAMIN FRAKTCLIN. 

non-electric tends, by its elasticity, to 
move to the excited body, where it accu- 
mulates. In so doing it carries lifjht 
bodies with it, which accounts for elec- 
trical attraction." 

TJut investigators were satirized, ridi- 
culed, and lauiihed at for their devotion 
to science, and on all sides was heard the 
cry of the " practical man," — What is the 
use of all this labor and study? Whom 
can it ever benefit ? In 1746 Watson 
published his " Experiments and Obser- 
vations " in book form, and in the pref- 
ace urges the prosecution of similar in- 
vestigations by other men, while in reply 
to the prevalent cry, he says : " It must 
be answered that we are not so far ad- 
vanced in these discoveries as to render 
them conducive to the service of mankind. 
Perfection in any branch of philosophy 
is to be attained but by slow gradations. 
It is our duty to keep going forward ; the 
rest we must leave to the direction of 



that Providence which we know assuredly 
has created nothing in vain. Rut I make 
no scruple to iissert that notwitlistanding 
the great advances which have been made 
in this part of natural philosophy within 
these few years, many and great proper- 
ties remain undiscovered. Future philos- 
ophers -(some perluips even of the present 
age) may deduce from electrical experi- 
ments USPS entirely heneficial to society 
in general." 

It would have been impossible for so 
many-sided a man as Franklin not to 
have become intensely interested in elec- 
tricity and the experiments that were 
being made on the Continent as soon 
as he should learn of them. While vis- 
iting in Boston in 1746, a Dr. Spence, 
lately arrived from Scotland, exhibited 
to him some crude electrical experiments. 
Though Spence's appai'atus was meagre, 
and his skill the slightest, yet the subject 
being new to Franklin surprised and de- 
lighted him. Some years before, he had 
founded a circulating library in Phila- 
delphia which was incorporated in 1742, as 
the Library Company of Philadelphia. 
Of course practically all its books came 
from England, where it had as a friend 
rather than an agent one Peter Collinson, 
a merchant A\ho had extended business 
connections in America, and was also a 
member of the Royal Society. The re- 
lations between him and Franklin became 
most friendly and mutually helpful. Im- 
mediately after its publication, Collinson 
sent over to the library, and Franklin, 
a copy of Dr. Watson's book referred to 
above, with such tubes as Watson had 
described. Franklin at once became 
deeply enthusiastic, and began to perform 
all the experiments described in Watson's 
papere, inviting a few of his friends to 
share in his delight at the results obtained. 
Soon the fame of his experiments spread 
over the city and his house was crowded 
with curiosity seekers. Not caring to de- 
vote his time to a repetition of the old 
experiments for the pleasure of the 
curious, he had several tubes blown at the 
glass house which he presented to many 
who had become familiar wifh the pro- 



'{ 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



643 



cesses, inviting them to "divide a little 
this eneumbrance with him." Very shortly 
the most earnest inquirers drew closer to- 
pether, and Franklin, Ebenezer Kinners- 
ley, Thomas Ilopkinson. and Philip Sing 
united their efforts instead of each ex- 
perimenting in seclusion as had generally 
been the case. Out of this little company 
grew the American Philosophical Society, 
of which Ilopkinson was the first presi- 
dent. On March 28, 1747, Franklin wrote 
Collinson : " For my own part, I never 
was before engaged in any study that so 
totally engrossed my attention and my 
time, for what with making experiments 
when I can be alone, and repeating them 
to my friends and acquaintances who, 
from the novelty of the thing, come con- 
tinually in crowds to see them, I have 
during some months past, had little 
leisure for anything else." From that 
time on Franklin began to send the re- 
sults of his researches in letters to Col- 
linson, with some degree of regularity, 
and the papers were read before the Royal 
Society, where, at first, they were not 
favorably received, and none were con- 
sidered worthy of publication. Some of 
his reports were, however, published in 
London, and at the instigation of Buffon 
were translated into French ; and in Paris 
they were at once received with favor, 
with the result that the Royal Society 
reconsidered its position, and in " The 
Transactions " for 1751 gave a favorable 
account of Franklin's experiments up to 
that time, prepared by the same Dr. Wat- 
son whose book had first aroused Frank- 
lin's enthusiasm. Watson's report con- 
eluded with these words: " On the whole 
^fr. Franklin appears in this work in the 
light of a very able and ingenious man; 
that he had a head to conceive and a hand 
to carry into execution whatever he 
thought might conduce to enlighten the 
subject of which he was treating; and 
though there are in this work some few 
opinions in which the writer would not 
agree with him, he thought scarcely any- 
body better acquainted with the subject 
of electricity than Mr. Franklin was." 
To further atone for its early failure to 



recognize his worth, when Franklin vis- 
ited Europe in 17.55, he was received by 
the members of the Royal Society with 
evei-y honor, was elected a Fellow, the pay- 
ments of dues being remitted, the great 
Copley medal was bestowed upon him, 
and the Transactions of the Society were 
ordered sent to him, free of expense, dur- 
ing the remainder of his life. A most 
graceful and gracious recognition of the 
great man's ingenuity and wisdom, even 
if somewhat tardy. As we have seen, von 
Guericke, Dr. Wall, and Gray all had 
noted the " crackling and roarings " that 
accompanied electrical action in some of 
their experiments. Dr. Wall declaring that 
they " seemed in some degree to resemble 
thunder and lightning." It is not prob- 
able that Franklin was in any way famil- 
iar with the observations of these experi- 
menters, as the only work he had seen up 
to 1749 was Dr. Watson's. Y^et the 
identity of electricity and lightning early 
impressed itself upon him; and it is on 
experiments developing this theory and on 
making a practical application of the re- 
sults of his discoveries, that Franklin's 
great fame as an electrical discoverer 
rests. As early as November 7, 1749, he 
made the following memorandum in his 
note book, which shows the trend of his 
thought. " Electrical fluid agrees witli 
lightning in these particulars : 1. Giving 
light; 2. Color in the light; 3. Crooked 
direction; 4. Swift motion; 5. Being con- 
ducted by metals; (5. Crack or noise in 
exploding; 7. Subsisting in water or ice; 
8. Rending bodies it passes through; 9. 
Destroying animals; 10. Melting metals; 
11. Firing inflammable substances ; 12. 
Sulphurous smell. The electric fluid is 
attracted by points, — we do not know 
whether this property is in lightning. 
But since they agree in all the particulars 
wherein we can already compare them, is 
it not probable they agree likewise in 
this? Let the experiment he made!" In 
his " Life and Times of Franklin " Par- 
ton gives a curious letter from Franklin 
to Peter Collison, under date of April 29, 
1749. " Chagrined." he says. " a little 
that we have hitherto been able to pro- 



GU 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEK. 



duce nothing- in tliis way of use to man- 
kind; and the hot weather coming on, 
when cleetrieal experiments are not so 
ajj-reertble. it is proposed to put an end 
to them fill- this season, somewhat humor- 
ously, in a party of pleasure on the banks 
of Scliui/Jkill. Spirits, at the same time, 
are to be fired by a spark sent from side to 
side through the river, without any other 
conductor than the water; an exi^eriment 
which we sometime since performed, to 
the amazement of many. A turkey is to 
be killed for our dinner by the electrical 
shocb, and roasted by the electrical jack, 
before a fire kindled by the electrified 
holtlc; when the healths of all the famous 
electricians in England, Holland, France, 
and Germany are to be drunk in electri- 
fied bumpers, under the discharge of guns 
from the electrical battery." Franklin 
explains that " an electrified humper is a 
small thin glass tumbler, near filled with 
wine and electrified as the bottle. This 
when brought to the lips gives a shock, 
if the party be close shaved, and does not 
breathe on the liquor." 

The year 1752 was a marked one in the 
advance of electrical knowledge. Frank- 
lin's deduction as to the identity of the 
electrical fluid and lightning had greatly 
interested the French investigators, who 
at once began experiments to test their 
truth; with the result that on May 10 
M. d'Alibard, at Marley, succeeded in 
ih'awing electricity from the cluuds, as 
did another Frenchman in Paris a few 
days later. But their experiments were 
from rods not over seventy feet high, and 
did not carry assurance to Franklin's 
mind. They did. however, prove to him 
that he must act at once, or the truth 
of his theories would be established by 
others, and the honor fall to iheni. With- 
out taking anyone but his son into his 
counsels he determined to draw the elec- 
tricity directly from the clouds them- 
selves, which, if he succeeded, must for- 
ever settle the question. As the hot sum- 
mer season was well on, he had not to 
wait long for a thunder shower which 
should afford him the necessary oppnr- 
tunitv of testing his theorv. What this 



experiment meant to the Scientist has 
been little realized. He had seen the 
terrible effects of the lightning stroke; 
knew that men and animals had been re- 
peatedly killed, and had himself repeat- 
edly declared that if the electrical dis- 
charge was potent enough, it must be 
instantly fatal. And it was this force 
that he had now determined to bring into 
his own hand. Nothing was then known 
of the laws of conduction ; so that he had 
no means of estimating how much of the 
lightning would descend the cord of his 
kite, if it descended at all. " Every 
presumption," as one has said, " pointed 
to an outpour of living flame which 
would infallibly kill. And yet, if his 
theory was right, the electrical fluid should 
be drawn from the cloud and flow down 
with hannless vigor. No man ever con- 
fronted what he must have believed to be 
terrible danger with more superb heroism. 
No man ever so calmly, so philosophically, 
staked his life upon his faith." Mr. 
Benjamin has so picturesquely described 
this, one of the most notable of scientiti:- 
experiments, and one so closely connecteil 
with Franklin's fame in the popular mind, 
that we shall quote his words. " The 
great clouds roll up from the horizon, and 
the gusts grow fitful and strong. As 
Franlilin and his boy disentangled the 
kite from its cords and tail, and get it in 
position for ascent, the thunder mutters 
nearer, and the rain begins to patter upon 
the glass. A swishing blast comes over 
the meadows, the kite feels it and rises 
swiftly, swooping this way and that as 
the air currents catch it. The rain falI-< 
heavily, and the mist begins to close in. 
There is a friendly shed at hand and 
Franklin, drenched, takes refuge under it. 
The kite, heavy with water, is sailing 
sluggishly, cxcei^t when the gusts set it 
moving in spirals. A huge low-lying 
black cloud traveling over him suddenly 
shoots forth forked flame, and a crash of 
thunder shakes the very earth. The pour 
is now in sheets; again the blaze, again 
the rattling explosion. The kite is mov- 
ing upward, for Franklin is (juickly un- 
winding the cord. It is soaring int'^ the 



THE STOKY OF ELECTEICITY. 



645 



black mass from wliich the flashes are 
now rapidly coming, and iu "which it soon 
becomes invisible. Quietly Franklin is 
arranging the silk-ribbon and the key. 
This done, he watches the cord close to 
him. Has he failed? Suddenly he sees 
the little loose fibres of the twine erect 
themselves. He has not failed, but the 
moment has come. Without a tremor he 
advances his knuckle to the key. And 
then a little crack, a little spark, the same 
little crack and the same little spark 
which he had taken a hundred times from 
his glass tube — and the great discovery is 
complete, his name is immortal. As the 
kite dashes through the masses of vapor 
hurrying over him, he touches the key, 
and again and again the conquered light- 
ning returns, as it were, a caress — even 
submitting to be caged in the Leyden jar 
like the common electricity from his 
rubbed' globe. And as the storm abates, 
the thuniler dies away on the horizon, the 
clouds sweep off toward their ancient 
enemies, the mountains, and the kite 
moves lazily in the blue; while on the 
thankful, upturned face of the man 
gleams the glad sunshine which he had 
thought never to behold again." 

In 1749 Franklin had published a work 
entitled " Opinions and Conjectures con- 
cerning the Properties and Efl'ects of the 
Electrical Matter, and the Means of Pre- 
serving Buildings, Ships, etc., from Light- 
ning, arising fromi Experiments and Ob- 
servations made at Philadeljihia." Two 
great topics of this treatise were receiving 
practically all of Franklin's attention and 
thought at this time. He had made a 
miniature lightning-rod conduct harm- 
lessly away the electricity of an artificial 
thunder-storm, and described the experi- 
ment in his work. The study of the in- 
fluence of points in attracting the electric 
fluid thus became of intense interest to 
him ; and it seemed to him only necessary 
to establish the identity of the electricity 
manufactured by his instruments and that 
of the clouds, to develop a principle that 
should be of lasting benefit to his fellow- 
men. Accordingly he suggests in a second 
part of his paper experiments that might 



set at rest all questions as to this identity, 
and later performed his own experiments 
and determined the question for himself, 
as narrated above. Then followed the 
practical application of his principles to 
the protection of public and private build- 
ings, ships, etc.; until lightning rods be- 
came almost as much a part of material 
for house or barn building-, as did beams 
or lathes. In " Poor Richard's Almanac " 
for 1753, one may read : " It has pleased 
God and His goodness to mankind to dis- 
cover to them the means of securing their 
Habitations and other Buildings from 
Mischief by Thmider and Lightning. The 
Method is this: Provide a small iron rod 
(it may be made of the rod-iron used by 
Nailers), but of such a length that one 
end being three or four feet iu the moist 
ground, the other may be six or eight feet 
above the highest x^art of the building. 
To the upper end of the rod fasten about 
a foot of brass wire, the size of a com- 
mon knitting- needle, sharpened to a fine 
point. The rod may be secured in the 
house by a few small staples. If the house 
or bam be long, there may be a rod and 
point at each end, and a middling wire 
along the ridge from one to the other. A 
house thus furnished will not be damaged 
by lightning, it being attracted by the 
points, and passing through the metal into 
the ground without hurting anything." 
These positions of Franklin were ridi- 
culed, and denounced. When it was de- 
manded why these jjoints possessed such 
peculiar power, he frankly confessed that 
he could not tell, " nor," he adds, " is it 
necessary that we should understand it. 
It is of real use to know that china left 
in the air unsupported will fall and break ; 
but how it came to fall, and why it breaks, 
are matters of speculation. It is a 
pleasure, indeed, to know them, but we can 
preserve our china without it." In his 
" History of Harvard College," President 
Quiucy relates that in Novem'oer, 1755, a 
shock of earthquake was felt in New Eng- 
land, and that a Boston clergyman 
preached a sermon on the subject, in 
which he contended that the lightning 
rods by accumulating the electricity in 



64:6 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



the eartli, had caused the earthquake; and 
in 1770 another Boston minister opposed 
the use of the rods on the ground that, as 
liglitning was one of the means of punish- 
ing- the sins of mankind, and of warning 
them from the commission of sin, it was 
impious to prevent its full execution. 
Not without reason does Franklin quaintly 
observe : " It is well we are not, as poor 
Galileo was, subjected to the Inquisition 
for philosophical heresy." 

During the two hundred years from the 
early experiments of Gilbert to the close 
of the eighteenth century, nearly all the 
characteristics of the electric force had 
been discovered, and its modes of action 
and reaction had been pretty well dis- 
closed; while hints of the great develop- 
ments that were to follow hud been ob- 
served. The history of electricity has 
been one of continual development and 
unfolding. As has been well said : " No 
one man, nor any generation of men, can 
be credited with all that is involved in 
any one of the great inventions or memor- 
able discoveries with which Science has 
enriched the world. All have built upon 
the labors of their predecessors, and to 
understand the completed work it is neces- 
sary to know something of the history of 
its various stages." Progress during the 
nineteenth century, marvelous as it 
seemed, was chiefly along the line of new 
and improved methods of producing and 
handling the phenomenal force rather than 
in original discovery. A very important 
advance in mechanical devices was the in- 
vention of the Leyden jar, in 1745, about 
the time Franklin became deeply inter- 
ested in the new science. This device was 
hit upon by three men at practically the 
same time, an experimenter named 
Cuneus, a monk named Kleist, and Pro- 
fessor Muschcnbroeck, of Leyden ; but as 
it was first exhibited and experimented 
with at Leyden the apparatus took the 
name of that city, by which it has ever 
since been known. As usually made the 
Leyden jar consists of a glass jar, with a 
wide mouth preferably, coated with tin- 
foil within and without, to within a few 
inches of the top. The mouth is regularly 



closed by a disk of diy wood, through 
which jiasses a wire reaching to the inner 
coating. The outer end of the wire 
usually terminated in a small metallic ball. 
Its essential feature is that it consists of 
two conducting surfaces, separated by a 
nonconductor; and in the jar, as first 
used by Muschenbroeck, the inner con- 
ductor was water, the place of the outer 
being taken by the moist hand of the 
experimenter. It is " charged " by con- 
necting either coating with the source of 
electricity, while the other is connected 
with the earth. Muschenbroeck described 
his discovery and its results as follows : 
" I wish to inform you of a new but ter- 
rible experiment, which I advise you on 
no account personally to attempt. I am 
engaged in a research to determine the 
strength of electricity. With this object 
I had suspended by two blue silk threads 
a gun barrel, which received electricity by 
a communication from a glass globe which 
was turned rapidly on its axis by one 
operator, while another pressed his hands 
against it. From the opposite end of the 
gun barrel hung a brass wire, the end of 
which entered a glass jar, which was 
partly full of water. This jar I held in my 
right hand, while with my left I attempted 
to draw sparks from the gun barrel. Sud- 
denly I received in my right hand a shock 
of such violence that my whole body 
was shaken as by a lightning stroke. The 
vessel, although of glass, was not broken, 
nor was the hand displaced by the commo- 
tion; but the arm and body were affected 
in a manner more terrible than I can ex- 
press. In a word, I believed that I was 
done for." The invention, or discovery of 
this jar, became the subject of universal 
wonder and interest among all the scien- 
tists of Europe, Everywhere, and in 
curious ways, its influence was the object 
of countless experiments. The Abbe 
Nollet entertained the French King by 
transmitting the discharge through one 
hundred and eighty of his guards, " who 
were all so sensible of it at the same 
moment that the surprise caused them all 
to spring up at once." But this test was 
far surpassed in every respect by that 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



G47 



conducted by the Carthusian monks in 
Paris. A line of monks nine hundred feet 
long was made " by means of iron wires 
of proportionable length between every 
two. The eifect was that when the two 
extremities of this long line met in con- 
tact with the electrified vial, the whole 
company at the same instant of time gave 
a sudden spring, and equally felt the 
shock." This instantaneous " spring " of 
several hundred Carthusian monks must 
have been as entertaining a sight, as it 
was conclusive evidence of the marvelous 
vivifying force of electricity. In Eng- 
land the Leyden jar received prompt 
recognition. Sir William Watson added 
an outside metallic coating, and by its aid 
was enabled to fire gunpowder and other 
inflammables. In company with a number 
of Fellows of the Royal Society he experi- 
mented to determine the velocity with 
which electricity was transmitted through 
metallic conductors, and suceeetled in 
sending it through more than twelve 
thousand feet of wire, and concluded that 
the transmission was instantaneous. 
While many and various uses were made 
of the Leyden jar at this time, the 
greatest immediate value was that by 
means of it the recognition of an electric 
circuit was first established. 

But little more of consequence was de- 
veloped in the science of electricity down 
to the nineteenth century, which might 
well be called the Electrical Century, so 
marvelous, varied, and vastly beneficent 
were the applications and extensions of the 
principles already established. In 1795 
Tiberius Cavallo published a " History of 
Electricity," in three volumes, giving a 
quite complete and detailed account of 
all that was then known of the subject, 
and expressed serious doubt whether more 
cuuld be accomplished. " In short," he 
says, " nothing contributed to make Elec- 
tricity the subject of the public attention, 
and excite a general curiosity, until the 
capital discovery of the vast accumula- 
tion of its power, in what is commonly 
called the Leyden phial, which was acci- 
dentally made in the memorable year 1745. 
Then, and not till then, the study of 



electricity became general. Since the time 
of this discovery, the prodigious number 
of electricians, experiments, and new facts 
that have been daily produced from every 
corner of Europe and other parts of the 
world, is almost incredible. Discoveries 
crowded upon discoveries; improvements 
upon improvements ; and the Science ever 
since tliat time went on with so rapid a 
course, and is now spreading so amazingly 
fast, that it seems as if the subject would 
be soon exliausted. and electricians arrive 
at an end of their researches. But, how- 
ever, the ne plus ultra is, in all proba- 
bility, as yet at a great distance, and the 
young electrician has a vast field before 
him, highly deserving his attention and 
promising further discoveries, perhaps 
equally or more important than those 
already made." 

Galvani and Volta are two names that 
have become permanently identified with 
the subject of electricity. Galvuni was 
Professor of Anatomy at the University 
of Bologna, and in 1786 was actively en- 
gaged in an investigation of the effect of 
atmospheric electricity on animal organ- 
isms, using the hind legs of recently killed 
frogs as delicate electroscopes. He was 
surprised, however, during these investi- 
gations to find that when, as he be- 
lieved, no electrical currents were passing- 
through the legs of the frogs, they were 
convulsed just as he knew they would be 
if subjected to such electrical currents. 
One day he happened to hang a bundle of 
frog's legs bound together by a copper 
wire against an iron railing, when he ob- 
served that if a part of the exposed verte- 
brae or backbone of the frog touched the 
iron, tlie legs were powerfully convulsed. 
Galvani believed that he had at last dis- 
covered the "vital force " for which he, 
in common with other anatomists, had 
been searching, as he thought nervous 
fluid existed in the animal, and passed 
from nerve to muscle through the con- 
ducting path offered by the iron; and 
though he afterwards recognized that the 
movements were due to electricity, he still 
believed that the electricity was produced 
by the frog itself. Hence arose the term 



()48 



TKOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWER. 



" Animal Electricity," or. as some callc(l 
it, Galvanism, a name wliieh liclJ its own 
until quite recently. Galvaiii's experi- 
ments and discoveries excited a most 
lively interest among all scientists, and 
especially in the mind of Alexander Volta, 
Professor of Natural Philosophy in the 
University of Pavia, Italy. At first he 
accepted Galvani's conclusions that the 
])henomena manifested in the action of 
the frog's legs were due to a vital fluid. 
But continued experimentation jiroved to 
him that wliat (lalvani liad clisclosed was 
not a vital fluid nor animal electricity, 
liut an entirely new source of electricity ; 
that the convulsions of the frog's legs were 
due to electricity produced by the mere 
fiintact of dissimilar metals. He found 
that two different metals were essential 
to tlie successfxil performance of the ex- 
l>eriment with the frog's legs, and he at- 
tributed the appearance of electricity to 
the disturbance of the electric equilibrium 
brought about by their contact; and he 
enunciated the general proposition that, 
whenever two different metals are placed 
in contact, one will become positively and 
the other negatively charged. This was 
the first statement of what came to be 
known as the " contact theory " of the 
Voltaic cell. When, however, the chemical 
action of the voltaic current was studied 
what is known as the " chemical theory " 
was advocated by many, who believed the 
scat of the electromotive force of the coll 
was in the chemical aflinity existing be- 
tween its elements. The conflict between 
the adherents of these two hypotheses has 
continued down to the present day; and 
the conclusion of the most conqjetent 
writers is that the real seat of the electro- 
motive force of a voltaic battery is not yet 
known, though the chemical theory has 
undoubtedly come to be the more generally 
accepted. 

The result of Volta's study of the phe- 
nomena presented by Galvani's experi- 
ments was the invention of what is, prob- 
ably, the best known of all electrical 
instruments, the Voltaic battery, or 
" pile." It was the direct outgrowth of his 
reflections upon his " Contact theory." 



Believing that electrical separation takes 
place when two dissimilar metals come in 
contact he argued that the effect of a 
single pair should be magnified by increas- 
ing the number. Yolta made his dis- 
covery public in a letter to the Eoyal 
Society, which was read before that body 
June 26, 1800. After reviewing some 
minor experiments and the results ob- 
tained, he said: "The prineijial of these 
results, which includes nearly all the 
others, is the construction of an apparatus 
which resembles, so far as its effects are 
concerned, that is by the commotion which 
it is capable of making one feel in the 
arms, etc., the Leyden batteries, and still 
more the fully-charged electric batteries. 
It acts, however, without ceasing, and its 
charge re-establishes itself after each ex- 
plosion. It operates, in a word, by an in- 
destructible charge, by a perpetual action 
or impulse on the electric fluid. I will 
here give you a description of this appa- 
ratus. I obtain several dozen small round 
plates or disks of copper, brass, or better 
of silver, an inch in diameter, more or 
less; for example coins, and an equal num- 
ber of plates of tin, or what is still better 
of zinc, of the same shape and size, ap- 
proximately, having care only that we can 
conveniently arrange them one over the 
other in the form of a column, I prepare 
besides a sufficiently great number of 
disks of card-board, or cloth, or some other 
spongy material, capable of imbibing and 
retaining considerable water or other 
liquid; for it is necessary for the success 
of the e.xijeriment that they should be well 
moistened. Having these x^ieces con- 
veniently arranged and in good condition, 
that is to say the metal disks clean and 
dry an<l the non-metallic disks sufficiently 
moistened with water, or what is still 
better, salt water; they are then lightly 
pressed in order to prevent the liquid from 
running out. I have only to arrange them 
as desired, and this arrangement is simple 
and easy. I place on a table or other base 
one of the metallic plates, for example, 
one of silver; on this first, I then place 
a second of zinc; on this, second I place a 
moistened disk; then another plate of 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



G4!) 



silver, followed immediately by another of 
zinc, to. which I can make succeed a 
moistened disk. I then continue in the 
same manner, coupling a plate of silver 
with one of zinc, and always in the same 
direction ; that is to say, always the silver 
above, the zinc below, or vice versa, ac- 
cording as I have commenced, interposing 
between each two of these disks a moist- 
ened disk." The separate or alternating 
plates or disks are firmly pressed together 
and placed inside a suitable frame. This 
instrument was called the Voltaic pile, 
from the fact that the plates were thus 
piled on one another. It was also called 
a battery from the similarity of the ar- 
rangement, from an electrical point of 
view, to the Leyden-]'ar battery. The 
Voltaic battery, however, possesses the 
power of continually recharging itself on 
being discharged, and thus producing a 
continual discharge, flow, or current of 
electricity so long as certain necessary 
conditions are preserved. Volta later 
modified the form of his apparatus by 
placing the two dissimilar metals in cups 
of water and then joining them together 
by metallic conductors, thus putting his 
battery in a shape which it has retained, 
practically, to the present day. 

The early nineteenth century is marked 
by the appearance in the scientific world 
of an Englishman destined to take the 
foremost place among his fellow-workers, 
Humphrey Davy. Appointed experimen- 
tal chemist of the Royal Institution, 
London, in 1801. he immediately began a 
series of splendid discoveries which made 
the Institution, founded a short time be- 
fore by Count Rumford, famous, estal)- 
lished his own reputation, and made him 
more widely known than any other scien- 
tist of his age. Davy studied the " pile " 
in its theory and operation, but rather 
with a view to its use in chemical experi- 
ments than electrical, and early saw in it 
a means of i^rodueing decomposition. 
After extensive experimentation he at- 
tacked the so-called "fixed alkalies," whose 
composition was unkiaown, and soon had 
discovered and produced the metal bases 
of potash, sodium, barium, strontium, 



calcium, and magnesium. The effecting of 
these decompositions marks an epoch in 
the history of physical science. Of so 
much importance was it that Davy's ex- 
periments were repeated and advanced 
upon by the most eminent chemists of the 
day, with the result that for twenty years 
almost the sole use of the electric current 
was for purposes of decomposition. 

During previous experimentation the 
heating power of electricity had been 
noticed, but not much attention had been 
given to this phase of the subject. It 
early interested Davy, however, and it is 
afiirmed that he produced the electric light 
from carbon as early as 1802. So remark- 
able were the results that he achieved with 
his small battery of two hundred and fifty 
cells, that the enthusiasm of patrons of 
science enabled him to continue his re- 
search with the use of one of the most 
powerful batteries ever constructed, which 




HUMPHREY DAVY. 

was erected in the Royal Institution and 
consisted of two thousand cells, with a 
total surface of one hundred and twenty- 
eight thousand square inches. The metals 
of this battery were copper and zinc, and 
the liquid was a mixture of water and 



G50 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



nitric and sulphuric acids. Before the 
members of the Royal Institution, in 
1810, he made the first production and ex- 
hibition of the electric current and the 
electric light on a large scale. This 
momentous exhibition was described by 
Davy as follows : " When pieces of char- 
coal about an inch long- and one-sixth of 
an inch in diameter were brought near 
each other (within the thirtieth or 
fortieth of an inch) a bright spark was 
produced, and more than half the volume 
of the charcoal became ignited to white- 
ness; and, by withdrawing- the points from 
each other, a constant discharge took place 
through the heated air. iu a space equal 
to at least four inches, producing a most 
brilliant ascending arch of light, broad 
and conical in form in the middle. When 
any substance was introduced into this 
arch, it instantly became ignited; platina 
melted as readily in it as wax in a com- 
mon candle ; quartz, the sapphire, mag- 
nesia, lime, all entered into fusion; frag- 
ments of diamond and jjoints of charcoal 
and plumbago rapidly disappeared and 
seemed to evaporate in it, even when the 
connection was made in a receiver ex- 
hausted by the air pump ; but there was no 
evidence of their having previously un- 
dei'gone fusion." Davy's apparatus con- 
sisted essentially of two parts, — the 
l)atteiy, as previously described for the 
generation of electricity; and the lamp, 
or carbon rods, for converting the energy 
of the current into heat and light. Here 
was the prophesy of the electric light of 
the twentieth century, though it was to 
take many years, filled with the labor of 
many men, to bring it to the present stage 
of perfection. It does not appear, how- 
ever, that Davy or others made any special 
effort to advance upon his achievements 
in this line for several years; as students 
of electricity were too much engrossed in 
the multitude of interesting problems 
that were constantly presenting them- 
selves for investigation, to consider the 
practical applications of any of their ex- 
I^erimental discoveries. 

Ever since the days of Gilbert, who first 
made any scientific study of the magnet 



and magnetism, the subjects had received 
more or less continuous attention, though 
the brilliant discoveries in electricity and 
its marvelous applications secured for it 
the closer observation of all students. It 
would hardly have been possible, however, 
that the many close resemblances between 
the two classes of phenomena should have 
escaped observation. As Colonel Menden- 
hall, in his " Century of Electricity." sums 
the matter up: "Both had been known 
from the earliest times; both exhibited at- 
traction, both repulsion, and under de- 
cidedly similar conditions. In both cases 
the law of attraction and repulsion wa^ 
that of inverse squares. But nearly all 
bodies were known to be capable of 
electrification, while hardly more than one 
or two could be magnetized. Electrifica- 
tion could be produced under almost all 
circumstances, and electricity made to 
appear where none apparently existed be- 
fore. Magnetism had to be borrowed ; and 
although the touching or inducing magnet 
lost none of its power in establishing 
polarity in a piece of steel; and while it 
was possible, by proper manipulation and 
combination, to produce a magnet of 
greater strength than that used as a 
source, there was no known process by 
means of which the condition of magneti- 
zation could be created from the begin- 
ning." One of the most interesting- and 
fruitful results of all these long years of 
experimentation, and especially of the 
work of Rumford, Davy, and their asso- 
ciates, was the rapid development in the 
minds of the foremost scientific men of 
the idea of ilie unity of the forces of 
nature. A marked result of this convic- 
tion was the belief in the close relationship 
between magnetism and electricity, not- 
withstanding their many apparent differ- 
ences; and conditions were ripe for one 
of the epoch making discoveries of the 
nineteenth century, which fell to the lot 
of Jean Christian Oersted, Professor of 
Physics in the University of Copenhagen. 
Like many others he had become firmly 
convinced of the unity of the forces of 
nature, and had often said the relation- 
ship between magnetism and electricity 



THE STOKY OF ELECTKICITY. 



651 



^vould one day be determined, a consum- 
mation he ardently labored and experi- 
mented to establish. He was a brilliant 
lecturer whose class-rooms were crowded; 
and it was in the midst of one of his 
lectures, with his students all about him, 
that an inspiration seized him. A 
battery of great power was on the table 
before him, and nearby was a suspended 
magnetic needle. Telling his hearers 
what he was about to try, he seized the 
wire joining the two poles and placed it 
parallel and over the needle, but not so 
as to touch it. Instantly the needle 
swung out of position; and one of the 
most remarkable discoveries of modern 
science became an accomplished fact. 
Oersted at once began to work up the 
experimental part of his discovery, which 
he published to the world in 1820. 

Andre Marie Ampere, who was born at 
Lyons, France, in 1T75, early in the 
eighteenth century was a deeply inter- 
ested student of physical science in Paris. 
On the 11th of September, 1820, he 
learned of Oersted's discovery ; and on the 
18th of the same month, just a week later, 
he read a paper before the Academy in 
which he made public his experiments con- 
firming and extending those of Oersted, 
and also announcing the immensely im- 
portant discovery that magnetic effects 
could be i^rodueed from the current with- 
out the use of the magnet; that parallel 
wires through which currents were pass- 
ing in the same direction attracted each 
other. He also showed that movable con- 
ductors through which electric currents 
are passing, attracted or repelled other 
active movable conductors according to 
the direction in which the currents flowed 
through both conductors, thus opening up 
a new branch of electricity called electro- 
dynamics, or that branch of the science 
which treats of the force which one elec- 
tric current exerts on another. Consider- 
ing that all these experiments and de- 
ductions and principles were conducted 
and evolved in just seven days, it is safe 
to say, in the words of a distinguished 
electrical student, " that the science has 
at no other time advanced with such 



tremendous strides as during that memor- 
able week. On this joint work of Oersted 
and Ampere the whole structure of 
modern electricity may be said to rest; and 
with the establishment of this, its almost 
ample foundation, their names will ever bo 
inseparably connected." 





|H| 




r \^^^H 




BCas^j^^^^^^^ 




mBHI 


wK^^M 


^m 




1^1 



MICHAEL FaKADAY. 

The next great discovery of importance 
was made by Faraday of whom Professor 
John Tyndall has said : " Take him for 
all in all, I think it will be conceded that 
Michael Faraday is the greatest experi- 
mental philosopher the world has ever 
seen." Many before him had endeavored 
to obtain electricity from magnetism, but 
without success. Faraday reasoned " that 
if a wire carrying an electric current acts 
like a magnet, as Oersted has shown, then 
such a wire should be able to produce 
electric currents in conductors placed near 
it. Moreover, since electric currents pro- 
duce magnetism, so magnetism on its part 
should be able to produce electric cur- 
rents." For some time he was unable to 
substantiate his position; but on August 
29, 18.31, he made the discovery and es- 
tablished the truth of his hypothesis. 
This discovery made possible the dynamo- 
electric machine, the induction coil, the 



(J52 



IIIOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



electric motor, and the alternating current 
Iransfonnci'. The instrument used to se- 
cure these great results "was extremely 
simple, consisting only of a disk so 
mounted that it could be revolved between 
the poles of an electro-magnet and having 
the axis of the disk and its edge connected 
witli a galvanometer. When the disk vpas 
turned, the needle moved, showing the 
presence of induced currents. " This was 
the first dynamo-electric machine, the 
parent of all that are to-day flooding with 
light the cities and towns of the civilized 
world." By liis various experiments 
Faraday, and the Frenchman Arago at 
about the same time, established the im- 
portant fact that not only could a current 
of electricity influence a magnet, but it 
was also capable of producing magnetism. 
As Colonel Mendenhall says, "the 1<mIi- 
stone as a primary source of magnetism 
was dethroned, and the cell of Volta 
crowned in its stead." 

A further notable step in advance was 
the production by W. Sturgeon, in Eng- 
land, of what is generally known as the 
electro-magnet. His discovery was a 




JOSEPH HENEY. 

simple one, but of great value; and con- 
sisted in the observation of the fact that 
soft iron remains magnetic while under 
the influence of magnetizing force, and 
that it loses its magnetism as soon as it 



is removed from the influence of this 
force. Placing a bar of soft iron inside 
the hollow coil through which an electric 
current was jjassing, he found that the 
strength of magnetism produced was mul- 
tiplied to an astonishing degree. More- 
over, a magnet of this character possessed 
tlie valuable property of immediately ac- 
quiring its magnetism as soon as the 
current passed through the coils, and of 
immediately losing it as soon as such 
current ceased to pass. Sturgeon pro- 
posed the name of electro-magnet for such 
forms of magnet to distinguish them from 
the permanent steel magnets. 

But though the immense practical value 
of Sturgeon's discovery was at once 
recognized, it was also seen that a far 
greater development of the principle was 
necessary before it could be of much 
practical use. At this point one of the 
most noted of America's scientists be- 
comes the leading actor in the long drama 
of electrical development. Joseph Henry 
was bom at Albany, IST. Y., in 1799, and 
was educated, as his condition would per- 
mit, at the public schools, though his 
father dying while Heniy was still young, 
he was obliged to earn his own living at 
an early date. At the age of fifteen he 
was apprenticed to a watchmaker and 
silversmith, and became very active in a 
local dramatic club, where his success in 
many parts led him to decide upon an 
actor's life. During- an illness, however, 
he read Dr. Gregory's " Lectures on Ex- 
perimental Philosophy, Astronomy, and 
Chemistry," which so interested him that 
he determined to devote his life to 
scientific pursuits. L'pon his recovery he 
secured private instruction during the 
evenings from the teachers of the Albany 
Academy; and later, after having secured 
a small sum of money by teaching, he took 
up a regular course of instruction at the 
Academy. In 1825 he was appointed an 
engineer on the survey of a road to run 
through the state of New York from 
the Hudson river to Lake Erie; and the 
following year was made Professor of 
mathematics at the Albany Academy. He 
at once began the series of brilliant exper- 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



"653 



iments in electricity which, as has been 
said, " have linked his name with that of 
Franklin as one of the two most original 
investigators in that branch of science 
that this country has ever produced." In 
November, 1832. he removed to Prince- 
ton, where he had been called to fill the 
chair of Natural Philosophy at the Uni- 
versity. In 1846 he was elected first secre- 
tary, and then director, of the new Smith- 
sonian Institution; and the organization, 
equipment, and development of that great 
scientific establishment occupied his chief 
attention until his death. He was later 
nominated to the chair of Natural Phil- 
osophy at the University of Pennsylvania, 
at more than double the salary he was re- 
ceiving at Washington ; and efforts were 
made to induce him to return to Prince- 
ton, in 1853, as president of the College. 
But " none of these things moved him." 
He had devoted his life to scientific in- 
vestigation, and not to money making; 
and he remained as true to his purpose as 
the magnet, on which he labored so long 
and earnestly, is true to the pole. As 
Professor Simon Newcomb said of him : 
" He never engaged in au investigation or 
an enterprise which was to put a dollar 
into his own pocket, but aimed only at the 
general good of the world." He was the 
leading sj)irit in the establishment of the 
National Lighthouse system, and a mem- 
ber of the Light House Board from its 
organization in 18.j2 until his death. 
Through his entire career in Washington 
he acted as confidential adviser to the 
government on scientific matters, and the 
composition of commissions for techni- 
cal purposes was generally referred to 
him. He died in Washington, in 1878, 
after a life filled with arduous labor and 
helpful service ; one of the truly great men 
of whom the public scarcely ever hears, 
but whose persistent efforts towards the 
advancement of mankind along all lines 
make all life richer and fuller, and a 
nation truly great. 

As will be remembered. Oersted discov- 
ered that when a wire was stretched over 
the magnetic needle it was deflected. Very 
shortly afterward Schweigger, experi- 



menting along the same lines, found that 
if the wire be bent and brought back 
under the needle and at the same distance 
from it, the effect on the needle of the 
current passing through the wire will be 
doubled. If another loop around the 
needle be made its effect will again be mul- 
tiplied, so that by making many turns of 
the wire the instrument becomes sensible 
to currents which are exceedingly feeble. 
It thus becomes a galvanoscope, and is of 
the greatest value in electrical experi- 
ments for the detection of minute cur- 
rents; while the galvanometer was but 
a step in advance upon the principle of 
the galvanoscope. Galvanometers are em- 
ployed for the purpo.se of measuring the 
strength of an electric current by the de- 
flection of a magnetic needle. In ex- 
tremely sensitive galvanometers the num- 
ber of separate turns of the wire reaches 
many thousands. Such instruments, how- 
ever, have a high electric resistance, and 
are, therefore, suitable only for measur- 
ing small currents produced by high elec- 
tro-motive forces. Frequently, however, 
when very large currents are to be meas- 
ured, the galvanometer coil consists of but 
a single turn of a good conducting wire. 
When no current is passing through the 
galvanometer coils its needle, when at 
i-est, occupies a position parallel to the 
plane of the coil. On the passage of the 
currents the needle tends to place itself at 
right angles to the length of the conduct- 
ing wire of the galvanometer eoils. From 
the amount of its deflection, measured in 
degrees on a graduated scale over which 
the needle moves, the strength of the cur- 
rent may be determined. 

In his work upon the electric magnet 
Professor Henry introduced, or started 
with, the principle suggested by Schweig- 
ger. But instead of insulating the iron 
core by varnishing or otherwise, and wind- 
ing a single spiral of wire about it, he 
insulated his wire by covering it with silk, 
and then made many turns of the wire 
about the core. Continuing his investi- 
gations and experiments without interrup- 
tion by 1829 he had exhibited electro- 
magnets possessing greater power than 



(354 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



any before known, and had brought his 
new method to a high degree of perfee- 
tion. By 1831 he had constructed a mag- 
net, the iron core of which weighed less 
than sixty pounds, which was capable of 
sustaining a ton weight; and hiter an- 
other which carried thirty-six hundred 
pounds. It was, in fact, the development 
of Henry's " intensity " magnet which 
made the electric telegraph a certainty ; 
and in 1831, in a paper published in Pro- 
fessor Silliman's " American .Tournal," he 
suggested its use for that puii^ose. 
" Neither the electro-magnet of Stur- 
geon," he says, " nor any electro-magnet 
ever made previous to my investigation 
was applicable to transmitting power to a 
distance." And to demonstrate the fact, 
he constructed that same year the first 
electro-inagiietie telegraph, transmitting 
signals through a wire more than a mile 
in length, and causing a bell to ring nt 
the farther end of the wire. 

Few decades have been richer in 
scientific development in any particular 
branch, than was that between 1820-1S30 
in electricity. As Mendenhall has well 
said : " It will be seen that in the decade 
following Oersted's discovery the science 
of electro-magnetism grew with wonderful 
I'apidity. In the beginning the Danish 
philosopher had shown the existence of a 
relation between electricity and magnet- 
ism of which the world had before been 
ignorant. Within ten years a ton of 
weight was sustained by means of a bat- 
tery less powerful than that which had 
first enabled him to deflect his delicately 
suspendetl needle. The possibility of pro- 
<lueing motion and doing work at a dis- 
tance by means of the newly discovered 
principle was clearly recognized and dis- 
tinctly announced by many physicists, 
and particularly by Joseph Henry. This 
application of electro-magnetism to the 
jn-oblem of telegraphy was suggested by 
many, and the ingenious in several coun- 
tries set themselves at work to accomplish 
the desired end. In spite of the appear- 
ance of many unexpected diflieulties, be- 
fore another decade passed the thing was 
really done, and through science the 



world was put in possession of all inven- 
tions destinetl to create a new industry', 
which, by its influence upon the human 
race, distinguished the nineteenth cen- 
tury above those that j^receded it more 
than all else." 

But before the electric telegi'aph coulil 
be made a commercial possibility another 
great invention was necessary in addition 
to that of the electro-magnet; and that 
«'as a battery capable of supplying for a 
practically indefinite time an electric cur- 
rent of approximately constant strength. 
As we have seen, the magnet had been sup- 
plied by the inventive genius of Henry; 
and in 1836, Professor J. D. Daniells, of 
London, succeeded in producing a battery 
which overcame all the evils resulting 
from chemical action in the cells of 
previous batteries, and so made certain a 
current of constant strength to any cir- 
cuit with which it is connected. Tliis 
Daniells battery is the parent of all those 
now in common use. though it has been 
improved upon and made more effective. 
But its invention made clear to the watch- 
ful eyes of scientists the fact that new 
fields were then opened for the practical 
application of the electrical force, and 
that not the least of these was the inven- 
tion of an electric telegraph that should 
be available for long distance communi- 
cation. 

^lany interesting and learned works and 
treatises have been written on the sub- 
ject of the invention of telegraphy, and 
the claims of many men have been ad- 
vanced as its inventors. As has been said 
previously in this chapter, however, no 
one person can in any true sense be con- 
sidered as the originator of the idea nor 
of its application. For centuries experi- 
menters have made their advanced steps 
in the science, and a large proportion of 
them have foreseen a use of the current 
and some form of conductor for purjjoses 
of communication between distant points, 
and of transmission of power. Many in- 
genious theories, most of them containing 
germs of the future development, were 
advanced by experimenters previous to the 
nineteenth century, when the only mode 



THE STOKY OF ELECTKICITY. 



655 



of production of a current was by friction. 
But a distinct impetus was given to the 
movement by the invention of the Voltaic 
cell in the last decade of the eighteenth 
century; while the discovery of Oersted, 
in 1820, and that of Sturgeon shortly 
after, turned the attention of all students 
Ifoward the communication of intelligence 
by electricity. It was recognized that 
none of the many effects that an electric 
discharge or current is capable of pro- 
ducing lends itself so readily to the trans- 
mission of telegraphic signals as do the 
attractions and repulsions produced by 
electro-magnets. Oersted himself was 
early in the field, though the first prac- 
tical application of his discoveiy was 
made by Ampere. The latter's theory was 
that if the needle could be deflected by an 
electric current, if this could be accom- 
plished by a wire or wires of great length, 
and if these movements of the needle 
could be converted into a code by means 
of which letters or words could be ex- 
pressed, then the eleetro-maynetic tele- 
graph was possible. His scheme was to 
employ a number of wires to deflect a 
number of needles. This Needle Telegraph 
was the first to be developed, and long 
held the field on the Continent and in 
England. Its earliest forms required a 
wire for each needle and as many needles 
as there were letters in the alphabet and 
numerals; but the system was later sim- 
plified so that but one wire was necessary. 
Our space forbids any detailed account of 
the various experiments and successes 
made by European scientists; and it is 
the less necessary as the Morse, or Amer- 
ican system, easily came into most gen- 
eral use, and has since practically dis- 
placed all others. 

Samuel F. B. Morse was born at 
Charlestown, Mass., April 27, 1791, the 
son of the Rev. Jcdediah Morse, whose in- 
terest in geography and the text-books on 
that subject, won for him the title of the 
" Father of American Geography." Young 
Morse graduated from Yale College in 
1810, where his interest in electricity was 
first aroused by the lectures of Professor 
Jeremiah Day, and by those cf the elder 



Silliman on chemistry and galvanism. In 
1809 he wrote : " Mr. Day's lectures are 
very interesting; they are upon elec- 
tricity; he has given us some very fine 
experiments, the whole class, taking linlil 
of hands, form the circuit of communica- 
tion, and we all received thy shock ap- 
parently at the same moment. I never 




S. F. B. .MORSE. 

took an electric shock before; it felt as 
if some person struck me a slight blow 
across the arms." Art, however, claimed 
his most serious attention. He devoted 
much time even in college to painting; 
and his ambition to become a painter soon 
became fixed. He began his studies under 
Washington Allston, whom he accom- 
panied to London in 1811, where he was 
soon after admitted to the Eoyal Acad- 
emy. He made rapid progress in his work 
under Allston and Benjamin West, and 
in 1813 exhibited in the Royal Academy 
a colossal work entitled the " Dying Her- 
cules," which was classed by critics as 
among the twelve best pictures exhibited, 
while the plaster model that he made to 
assist him in painting his picture gained 
the gold medal of the Adelphi Society of 
Arts. Being obliged to return to the 
Unit^ed States in 1815, he opened a studio 
in Boston ; but, while visitors udmired his 
work exhibited, his orders were verv few. 



G5G 



FEOM COLOXY TO WOULD POWER 



In 1S18 lie went to Charleston, S. ('.. 
where his reception was quite different, 
orders for portraits fairly pouring- in upon 
him. exceeding, it is said, more than one 
hundred and fifty at one time; and the 
following: winter he could write to his 
old friend and teacher, W^ashington Alls- 
ton. " I am painting from morning till 
night and have continual applications." 
Among other orders he received a com- 
mission from the city to paint a portrait 
of James Monroe, then President of the 
United States, which, when completed, 
was placed in the city hall of Charleston. 
In 1823 he removed to New York, where 
he opened a studio on " Broadway, oppo- 
site Trinity Churchyard,'' and where con- 
tinued success as a portrait painter at- 
tended him. One of his first sitters was 
the distinguished .I'urist, Chancellor Kent. 
Soon after this he jiainted a picture of 
Fitz-Greene Halleck, which is now in the 




MORSE S ORIGINAL APPARATIS. 

Astor Library, and a fnll-length ])ortralt 
of Lafayette, for the city of New York. 
In 1829 he again visited Europe for the 
purpose of study, remaining abroad about 
three years, most of the time being spent 
in Paris and the art centres of Italy. 
October 1. 1832, Morse sailed from Havre 
for New Y'ork on the packet-ship " Sully." 



having as a fellow-passenger Dr. Charles 
T. Jackson, then twenty-seven years of 
age. and fresh from the laboratories of the 
most eminent French physicists, where he 
had made special studies in electricit,v 
and magnetism. Jackson later became 
one of the most noted scientists of his 
day. Very early in the voyage discus- 
sions of electrical questions came up. and 
Jackson detailed the recent experiments 
of Ampere with the electro-magnet. There 
is much uncertainty as to the information 
that was shared b,v the travelers on this 
voyage, the friends of Morse and Jackson 
taking antagonistic positions. Morse is 
reported to have asked whether the veloc- 
ity of electricit.y was retarded by the 
length of the wire; to which Jackson re- 
plied that " electricity jjasses instantane- 
ously over any known length of wire." 
" Then," said Morse. " if the presence of 
electricity can be made visible in an.v 
liart of the circuit, I see no reason why in- 
telligence may not be transmitted in- 
stantaneously by electricity." The idea 
is reported to have taken full possession 
of him, with the result that before leav- 
ing the vessel he had devised the "dot- 
and-dash " alphabet, and the electro-mag- 
netic and cheinical recording- telegraph 
essentially as it now exists was planne<l 
and drawn, though the working model was 
not produced until 1835. By 1834 Dr. 
Jackson had constructed and successfully 
worked and exhibited among his friends 
a telegraphic apparatus along the same 
lines as those Morse followed, and ver.v 
^inlihlr to the model which the latter 
patented a year later. Priority of inven- 
tion was always claimed by Jackson and 
liis friends. 

Following his return to New Y''ork. 
Morse's trials and disappointments for 
several years were many. He at once 
secured a room at the corner of Nassau 
and Beekman streets, which he used 
as studio, workshop, bed-chamber, and 
kitchen. Here he first cut his models, 
then making the moulds and castings, and 
giving them finish and polish with the 
graver's tools. He did not at once make 
any public exhibition of his achievements. 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



057 



jjartially, at least, for the reason set forth 
in a letter to a friend. " Up to the 
autumn of 1837," he wrote. " my tele- 
graphic apparatus existed in so rude a 
form that I felt reluctance to have it seen. 
My means were very limited, so limited 
as to in-eclude the possibility of construct- 
ing an apparatus of such mechanical 
iinish as to warrant my success in ventur- 
ing upon its public exhibition. I had no 
wish to expose to ridicule the representa- 
tive of so many hours of laborious 
thought. Prior to the summer of 1837, at 
which time -Mr. Alfred Vail's attention 
became attracted to my telegraph, I de- 
pended upon my pencil for subsistence. 
Indeed so straitened were my circum- 
stances that in order to save time to carry 
out my invention, and to economize my 
scanty means, I had for months lodged 
and eaten in my studio, procuring my 
food in small quantities from some 
grocery, and preparing it myself. To con- 
ceal from my friends the stinted manner 
in which I lived, I was in the habit of 
bringing my food to my room in the even- 
ings, and this was my mode of life for 
many years." 

In December, 1837, Morse made a 
formal appeal to Congress for aid in con- 
structing a line of telegraph from Balti- 
more to Washington. The House Com- 
mittee on Commerce, to which the matter 
was referred, eventually took favorable 
action on the appeal, but the matter got 
no further. Chairman Smith of the Com- 
mittee, however, became interested in the 
subject, and formed some kind of a part- 
nership with Morse, so that he was en- 
abled to visit Europe in the hope of get- 
ting patents there, and exciting an in- 
terest in his invention. There he found 
his rivals, Wheatstone in England and 
Steinheil in Germany, receiving govern- 
ment support in their work, and his ef- 
forts to obtain practical recognition were 
of no avail, though his apparatus was ex- 
hibited under the auspices of the Royal 
Society erf London and the Academy of 
Sciences of Paris, and he was received 
with honor by the scientists of each coun- 
try. In May, 1839, he returned to New 
42 



York, " without a farthing in my pocket," 
as he wrote Mr. Smith, " and have to bor- 
row even for my meals; and, even worse, I 
b.ave incurred a debt of rent by my ab- 
sence." Then followed the four darkest 
years of his life. In abject poverty, and 
in such want that he frequently went en- 
tire days without food, he persisted in his 
appeals to Congress year after year, only 
to be ridiculed and laughed at by its 
members. " Morse's Telegraph " was the 
standing joke of the Committees. At last, 
however, a bill granting him thirty thou- 
sand dollars for the construction of the 
line between Washington and Baltimore 
was passed by the House, February 23, 
1842. It was, however, held up in the 
Senate ; and on the last day of the session 
Morse's friends urged him to go to his 
room, and so spare himself the disappoint- 
ment which seemed inevitable as a result 
of the Senate's inaction. But late at 
night on March 3, the bill was rushed 
through the Senate ; and while Morse was 
at breakfast the next morning, having no 
doubt another year of delay and perhaps 
worse was before him. Miss Ellsworth, 
daughter of the then Commissioner of 
Patents, rushed into the room and told 
him the joyful news. The young lady 
claimed at once the fulfillment of the in- 
ventor's promise that, if the bill was 
finally passed, the first message should be 
transmitted to her, — a promise Morse care- 
fully kept, as the first message over the 
completed line was sent to her, in the 
memorable words which she herself sug- 
gested, " What God hath wrought." 

Naturally the weaiy inventor and sup- 
pliant was inspired with new life, and 
energetic action was at once taken toward 
beginning the novel undertaking. Un- 
fortunately a mistake was made in the 
plans at the start, and nearly a year and 
the bulk of the thirty thousand dollars 
were wasted in attemiits to place the wires 
underground. The principles of conduc- 
tion and insulation were not then well 
enough understood^ to overcome difficul- 
ties this course presented ; and at last 
wires strung on poles were passed between 
the two cities. On May 24, 1844, the day 



658 



PEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



chosen for the first pubKc exhibition, Mr. 
Morse invited Government officials and 
friends to assemble in the chamber of the 
United States Supreme Court, while his 
assistant, Mr. Vail, was in charg-e at Bal- 
timore. The message " What God hath 
wrought " was transmitted to Baltimore 
by Mr. Morse, and at once repeated back 
b.v Mr. Vail, and the work was completed. 
The strip of paper on which this first mes- 
sage was printed was claimed by Gov- 
ernor Seymour of Connecticut, on the 
ground that Miss Ellsworth was a native 
of Hartford, and is now preserved in the 
Hartford Atheuffium. Thus was estab- 
lished one of the most beneficent utilities 
which the inventive genius of man has 
ever devised for the enlightenment and 
happiness of mankind. — unspeakably rich 
not only in its own ministrations but also 
in those which it portended. Its recep- 
tion was not, however, hailed with iiar- 
ticular delight by those who were to be 
benefited by its service. It is popularly 
supposed that the public is ever ready to 
receive and welcome a meritorious inven- 
tion; and sui'h as believe in this theory 
will note with interest the rush to use the 
ilorse telegraph. When the line from 
Baltimore to Washington was opened tr> 
public use, a rate of one cent for four 
words was established for messages; and 
the receipts for the first four days reached 
the astonishing total of one cent! Then a 
startling increase of twelve cents occurrtMl 
in one day, and after a little time a max- 
imum of one dollar and thirty cents in 
one day was reached ! 

While, as has been said, ^lorse coulil 
not claim the original inveniion of any 
scientific principle involved in the tele- 
graph itself, he unquestionably played the 
most important part in the development 
and right application of those principles, 
while his ingenious invention of the 
method of reconling message? had never 
been equaled. In Eurcjpe all investiga- 
tion and experiment had been directed 
toward the perfection of the needle system. 
Morse was awake to the advantages of the 
electro-magnet and the ease with which it 
coidd be made to leave a permanent record 



of the message. The simple armature 
with its to-and-fro motion, fitted with a 
style which marked the long or short lines 
ou a moving slip of paper, and the alpha- 
bet composed of these dots and dashes 
were the evidences of his genius. The 
value of his system is best measured by 
the fact that it has already taken prece- 
dence over all ethers in use in the world. 
Not that it came from the master's hand 
in a perfected form. While all the essen- 
tial features of the original system still 
hold the field many important modifica- 
tions have been introduced in modern in- 
struments and methods. Not the least in- 
teresting of these is the fact that the reg- 
ister for printing the signals as they were 
received has fallen into disuse. Early 
operators found that it was not only possi- 
ble to read from the sound of the armature 
as it moved from side to side, but also 
that it was a vastly more expeditious and 
convenient method than reading from a 
printed slip, so that the ear has become 
the receiving instrument instead of the 
eye. 

No language can measure the benefi- 
cent: influence of tliis great achievement 
of the American inventor, — an achieve- 
ment illustrative not only of the quick 
wit and active intelligence of the Ameri- 
can mind, but also of the indomitable per- 
severance and bull-dog tenacity with 
which one holds to and presses to maturity 
and acceptance an idea or purpose that 
has once taken possession of his mind. 
Reference has been made to the intense 
mental and physical sufferings through 
which Morse passed for ten years. But 
these did not end with the completion, 
and established success, of the line be- 
tween Washington and Baltimore. He 
offered his line to the United States Gov- 
ernment for one hundred thousand dol- 
lars, which was declined. The patents and 
the Morse system then became the prop- 
erty of a joint-stock company called the 
Magnetic Telegraph Company. Gradually 
the use of the telegraph was -spread all 
over the United States, though in the face 
of stubborn oiiposition. Morse's patents 
were violated and assailed, his honor and 



THE STOEY OF ELECTKICITY. 



65LI 



integrity impeached, and for a time rival 
companies destroyed all the profits from 
the enterprise. But after a series of vex- 
atious lawsuits his rights were estab- 
lished by the United States Supreme 
Court. As early as 1869 the following 
statement was made by the Western 
Union Company, the most important cor- 
poration in its line in the world : " Nearly 
all the machinery employed by this Com- 
liany belongs to the Morse system. This 
telegTaph is now used almost exclusively 
everywhere, and the time will probably 
never come when it will cease to be the 
leading system of the world. Of more than 
a hundred devices that have been made 



in Twenty-second street, New York city, 
where his winters were passed until his 
death in 1872; after which a tablet of 
stone was set into the house with the in- 
scription " In this house S. F. B. Morse 
lived for many years, and died." After 
his success had been established foreign 
liotentates vied with each other in con- 
ferring honors and orders upon him. At 
the instance of Napoleon III. representa- 
tives from France, Austria, Sweden, Eus- 
sia, Sardinia, The Netherlands, Turkey, 
Holland, the Papal States, and Tuscanj' 
met in Paris, in 1858, to decide upon a 
collective testimonial to the distinguished 
American inventor, and as a result of 




ORDERS CONFERRED UPON MORSE. 



to supersede it, not one has succeeded in 
accomplishing its purpose, and it is used 
at the present time upon more than 
ninety-five per cent of all the telegraph 
lines in existence." 

After his many years of self-denial and 
disheartening delays and ridicule, fortune 
at last smiled upon Morse and his later 
years were passed in comfort, while new 
honors were continually heaped upon him. 
About 1850 he was in a position to pur- 
chase an estate on the Hudson, near 
Poughkeepsie, where he dispensed a most 
liberal hospitality, entertaining distin- 
guished artists, and notable visitors to the 
United States. Later he purchased a home 



their deliberations voted him a gift of 
four hundred thousand francs. On his 
return from abroad in 1868 he received 
an invitation to a banquet from his fel- 
low citizens which read : " Many of your 
fellow countrymen and iiimierous friends 
desire to give a definite expression of the 
fact that this country is in full accord 
with European nations in acknowledging 
your title to the position of the father of 
the modern telegraph, and at the same 
time in a fitting manner to welcome you 
to your home." A banquet was given on 
December 30, 1868, and was presided over 
by Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice of the 
Supreme Court. In 1871 he was further 



6GU 



PKO.M CULONY TO WOKLJJ i-OWEE. 



honored by the erection in Central Park of 
a bronze statue of himself, of heroic size. 
Ills last ijublif service was tlie unveiling- 
of the statue of Benjamin Franklin in 
Printing- House square, Januai-j- 17, 1873. 
It was deemed especially tilting he should 
do this for, as w-as said in the address : 
" The one conducted the lightning- safely 
from the sky; the other conducts it 
beneath the ocean, from continent to con- 
tinent. The one tamed the lightning, the 
other makes it minister to human wants 
and human iirogress." 

During the early years of the connner- 
cial use of the telegraph its business in- 
creased, after being once well established, 
with wonderful rapidity. At that time 
only one message could be sent over a wire 
at one time. The best telegraph operators 
(■an hardly keep up a speed of over fifty 
words a minute for a half-hour. The 
Morse alphabet averag-es three signals for 
each letter, and the average length of a 
word is about si.x letters. Fifty words, 
therefore, would mean about nine hundred 
signals, or fifteen each second; and the 
strain upon an operator of sending or 
noting- so many signals for even a brief 
period is most wearing. Although the 
idea was at first ridiculed, it was not long- 
before it was asserted that two messages 
could be sent in cpjxjsite directions over 
the same line, at the same time; and in 
1872, Mr. Joseph B. Steams, of Boston, 
devised a system that brought the sim- 
ultaneous transmission, or duplex teleg- 
raphy as he called it, into common use. 
But the inventive genius never rests. It 
was but a short time before it was shown 
that four messages, two in each direction, 
could be sent over the same wire at the 
same time ; and the quadi-uple system suc- 
ceeded to the duplex. Then followed the 
Multiplex system. As of all developments 
there have been many exhibitors in the 
field, so there have been of this last. One 
of the best known is the " Synchronous 
System," invented by Delany, by which 
the division of a single telegraph line has 
been carried so far as to successfully es- 
tablish thirty-six separate divisions of the 
line, so that thirty-six separate messages 



may be sent over it, in each direction, at 
the same time. This service would require 
thirty-six operators to transmit and the 
same number to receive at each end of 
the line, or one hundred and forty-four in 
all. But at the ordinary rate of speed at 
which an expert operator can transmit 
Morse characters it has been found most 
practicable to limit the division of the 
line to the establislunent of six separate 
Morse circuits in each direction. 

The transmission of messages over long- 
distances on land having been proved 
feasible and profitable the question natu- 
rally arose, "Why not under the sea? " As 
early as 1842 Morse had experimented 
w-ith a cable between Castle Garden and 
Ciovernor's island in New York harbor, 
with results that proved clearly the prac- 
ticability of such undertaking; and he 
had repeatedly expressed his conviction 
that a " telegraphic communication might, 
with certainty, be established across the 
Atlantic Ocean." As early as 1839 sub- 
marine cables were tried; but as the in- 
sulating- material used consisted simply of 
cotton or hemp, coated with asphaltum or 
tar. such wires could be capable of trans- 
mitting signals for a short time only. 
Nor were any of the many attempts to es- 
tablish such service successful until 
Gutta-percha was used as an insulating- 
material. The first submarine wire prop- 
erly insulated, used in the United States, 
was laid under the Hudson river between 
Jersey City and New York, in 1848. The 
wire was, however, given no protective 
covering- and so quickly became useless. 
The first strictly submarine cable was 
laid under the English Channel between 
Dover and Calais in 1850; but as it was 
also um^rotected, consisting of a single 
strand of copper wire covered w-ith 
gutta-percha, it worked but one day. But 
the following year another was laid, the 
conductors being protected by an armor of 
heavy wires on the outside, -^vhieh -n'as suc- 
cessful. Before relating- the history of 
such cables, it will be well to get a clear 
idea of just what a submarine cable, such 
as is laid under the ocean consists of. 
This information Dr. E. J. Houston has 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



661 



stated very clearly iu his interesting work 
entitled, " Electricity in Every-day Life." 
" The submarine cable," he says, " con- 
sists of a central conductor, formed of a 
number of strands of copper wire, and in- 
sulated by gutta-percha applied in several 
sucessive layers. On the outside of the 
gutta-percha is placed a layer of hemp, 
known technically as the bedding. This is 
provided for receiving the outer, or pro- 
tective, envelope, generally formed of iron 
wires, and called the armor, or shield. A 
submarine cable, therefore, consists of 
four distinct parts : viz., the central con- 
ducting wire, or core; the insulating ma- 
terial surrounding such core; the bedding 
of hemp; and, finally, the protective en- 
velope. The core is now invariably made 
of several strands, it being considered 
that there is less danger of entire con- 
tinuity being lost by an accident to the 
cable. The size of the core will depend 
on the length of the cable and the speed 
with which the messages are to be trans- 
mitted through it, — a small long core hav- 
ing a much lower speed, or rate of trans- 
mission than a short, thick core. The sub- 
marine cables consist of two distinct 
parts; the part which is to be laid in deep 
water of the ocean, which is called the 
deep-sea cable; and the part to lie in the 
water nearer shore, called the shore-end 
cable. Since tlie latter is exposed to the 
action of the waves on a rocky bottom, 
which might injure the cover by abrasion, 
it is necessary to provide for this part of 
the cable a heavier sheathing or armor 
than for the deep-sea cable. This dif- 
ference in weight may be nearly six and 
a half times greater in the case of the 
shore-end cable, the weight of each in the 
case of one particular cable being twelve 
tons to the nautical mile for the shore- 
end and one and four-fifths tons to the 
nautical mile for the deep-sea i^art of 
the cable." Of the cable of 1857, which 
was lost after about five Imndred miles 
had been paid out. Sir William Thomp- 
son wrote : " As much iron as would niake 
a cube of twenty feet side was drawn 
into wire long enough to extend from the 
earth to the moon, and bind several times 



around each globe. This wire was made 
into one hundred and twenty-six lengtlis 
of twenty-five hundred miles each, and 
spun into eighteen strands of seven wires 
each. A single strand of seven cop])er 
wires of the same length, weighing in all 
one hundred and ten grains per foot, was 
three times coated with gutta-percha, to 
an entire outer thickness of two-fifths of 
an inch; and this was served outside with 
two hundred and forty tons of tarred 
yarn, and then laid over with the eighteen 
strands of iron wire in long, contiguous 
spirals and passed through a bath of 
melted pitch." 

There is, of course, no essential piin- 
ciple imiidied in cable telegraphy that is 
not found in land systems. So far as the 
sending of messages was concerned the 
only questions that were raised w-ere 
whether communication could be estab- 
lished through a cable long enough to 
cross the Atlantic Ocean ; and whether 
any satisfactory material could be found 
for insulating the wires. In cables that 
had been previously laid across bays or 
channels the wires were simply covered 
with hemp or cotton, which was saturated 
with tar, asphaltum, or other insulating 
materials then known. But these scon 
lost their insulation, frequently after only 
a day or two of exposure. Experiments 
were constantly being made to find a 
more perfect insulating material, but 
without efFect, until in 1842 an English 
surgeon stationed at Singapore, who had 
been experimenting upon the properties 
of a new substance, afterward known as 
gutta-percha, forwarded specimens of the 
material to the Society of Arts in London, 
at the same time recommending it as 
useful in making splints and other sur- 
gical appliances. It was soon discovered 
that one of its most striking properties 
was its high insulating powers; and its 
value as a covering for submarine con- 
ductors was quickly realized. But for the 
timely discovery of this most useful ma- 
terial, the use of submarine cables must 
have been jiostponed for many years. 

About 18.53 Cyrus W. Field, who had 
recently retired from active business. 



GGl 



FROM COLONY TO \YOELD POWEE. 



though but thirty-four years of age, be- 
came much interested in a pro])Osition to 
kiy an Atlantic cable that slmuld unite 
the new ami the old world: and it is to his 
indefatigable energy and perseverance 
that the world owes the success of the 




CYRUS W. FIELD. 

subniarine cable, as it was to Morse's per- 
sistent endeavor that it owes the most per- 
fected system of telegraphy. As a busi- 
ness man, Mr. Field first consulted the 
highest authoritie.s< as to the practicability 
of the scheme. Morse assured him that 
it was entirely possible to establish tele- 
graphic communication through cables of 
the required length; and Lieutenant 
Maury, then the highest authority on 
oceanology, advised him as to the physical 
( onditions that would probably be en- 
countered. In a letter to Mr. Field. Maury 
pointed out the fact that the greater part 
of the distance between Newfoundland 
and Ireland, about sixteen hundred miles, 
was occupied by a plateau eminently 
suited to receive a cable. Moreover the 
surface of this plateau is not covered with 
rocks of granite, but with a fine ooze made 
up of countless microscopic shells. Con- 
tinuing, Maury says: "I do not pretend 
to consider the question as td the possi- 
bility of finding a time calm enough, a sea 
smooth enough, a wire long enough, a 
ship big- enough to lay a coil of wire six- 
teen hundred miles in length ; though I 
have no fear but that the enterprise and 
ingenuity of the age, whenever called on 
with these problems, will be ready with 
a satisfactory and practical solution of 



them. I simply address myself at this 
time to the question in so far as the bot- 
tom of the sea is concerned; and as far 
as that goes, the greatest practical diffi- 
culties will, I apprehend, be found after 
reaching soundings at either end of the 
line, and not in the deep sea. ... A 
wire laid across from either Newfound- 
land or Labrador will pass to the north of 
the Grand Banks, and rest on that beauti- 
ful plateau to which I have alluded, and 
where the waters of the sea appear to be 
as quiet and as completely at rest as at 
the bottom of a mill-pond." 

With these assurances Mr. Field at 
once began the task of organizing a com- 
pany, and securing capital for the great 
undertaking; and by 18.57 he had so far 
advanced the project that the necessary 
cable was manufactured and stowed in the 
holds of two ships, one the Niagara, an 
American, the other, the Agamemnon, an 
English vessel. The vessels met in 
Valencia Bay, Ireland, on August 5, 1857. 
and it was decided that the Niagara 
should lay the first half, from Ireland to 
mid-ocean, when the ends should be 
spliced and the Agamemnon lay the re- 
maining half. On August 11, when 
aljout four hundred miles from the Irish 
coast, the cable suddenly parted and 
dropped into the deep sea ; and this effort 
was abandoned. Nothing daunted, liow- 
ever, by this great loss and disappoint- 
ment, the Company determined to increase 
its capital stock and continue the work; 
with the result that the same vessels were 
again equipped and started upon their 
work. This time, however, it was de- 
cided to meet in mid-ocean, splice the 
cable ends, and then each vessel pay out, 
one going to the east and the other to the 
west. All went well until the Agamemnon 
had laid about two hundred miles of cable, 
when it was found that the cable had 
again parted, only about twenty feet from 
the stern of the vessel. The cable was 
cut from the stern of the Niagara, and 
both vessels proceeded gloomily on their 
return. Again American enterprise and 
pluck prevailed, in the person of Mr. 
Field : and money was secured for a third 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



663 



trial. On July 29, 1858, the same vessels, 
witli the necessary amount of new cable, 
again met in nnd-ocean, spliced the cable 
ends, and began paj'ing- out, sailing in op- 
posite directions. This time success 
crowned the efforts of the i^ersistent pro- 
moters of the enterprise, the Niagara 
reaching Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, 
August 5, 1858, and the Agamemnon ar- 
riving in Valencia Bay at about the same 
time. Naturally the successful comple- 
tion of the great enterprise was heralded 
on both continents with exultant joy. 
Everywhere the wildest enthusiasm yre- 
vailed. Public meetings and illumina- 
tions were the order of the day. Con- 
gratulatory cablegrams were at once ex- 
changed between the two governments, — 
the first message being sent by Queen 
Victfiria and the second by President 
Buchanan. Steadily the public interest 
increased, and no praise was too great for 
Mr. Field and his fellow workers. When 
the celebrations were at their height, how- 
ever, after seven hundred and tliirty mes- 
sages had been sent, with a total of over 
ten thousand words, the cable utterly 
failed, and had to be abandoned, at a 
loss of upwards of one and a quarter 
million dollars. 

There was at once a frightful revul- 
sion of popular sentiment. Instead of 
the honors and praises which had been 
showered upon Mr. Field, he was de- 
nounced in the severest terms, his honor 
and integrity questioned, and it was 
openly and frequently charged that the 
whole affair was a stock-jobbing scheme, 
many going so far as to declare that there 
had never been any messages sent across 
or under the ocean. Naturally the whole 
matter had to lie in abeyance for a time; 
but Mr. Field was not so disheartened as 
to be diverted from his purpose. He was 
simply more determined that a cable 
should be successfully laid and opcrateiL 
During the years immediately following 
the lamentable failure of 1858, he made 
several trips across the ocean to interest 
English capital in the enterprise, as the 
approach of the civil war and the general 
skepticism regarding the whole proposi- 



tion made it impossible to gain material 
supi>ort in this country. Meanwliile the 
British Board of Trade had appointed a 
Committee, made up of the most eminent 
electrical engineers of that country, to in- 
vestigate the whole proposition. Fortu- 
nately their report was most favorable. By 
1805 the determined efforts of Mr. Field 
had been so far successful, that on July 
15 of that year the Great Eastern sailed 
from Valencia Bay, with a complete out- 
fit of cable embodying the latest improve- 
ments that could be suggested, whicli she 
iH'gan paying out. All went comparatively 
well until eleven hundred and eighty-six 
miles had been paid out when a serious 
fault occurred. In the effort to take a 
Ijortion of the sunken cable aboard ship, 
the cable broke and sunk to the bottom 
of the ocean. Efforts were made to 
grapple for it, and it was caught several 
times, and once even raised in sight above 
the water when it again fell and was lost. 
And again the enterprise had failed, at 
a total loss of something like three million 
dollars. But it was at once decided to 
make another attempt to lay a new cable 
from shore to shore, and to pick up and 
complete the laying of the cable of 1865. 
Again the Great Eastern was fitted out 
with new cable which was successfully laid 
from shore to shore ; and on July 27, 180(5, 
telegraphic communication was estab- 
lished between the two continents which 
has since been maintained without inter- 
ruption. The cable of 1865 was then re- 
covered from the bed of the ocean, success- 
fully spliced, and connected with the New 
foundland shore. thus making available two 
serviceable cables between England and 
America. And the great work was com- 
pleted, a monument to the untiring zeal, 
indomitable faith, and invincible pluck of 
one man. It is needless to speak of the 
value of the service thus rendered to the 
world, which cannot be measured even in 
imagination. All men of every race and 
nation have been brought into close rela- 
tions by ocean cables, and distance has 
been annihilated. As the great English- 
man, John Bright, said of Mr. Field: 
" He is the Columbus of modem times. 



664 



IKOiM COLU.XY TO WOKLJJ I'OWEK. 



who, by his cabk', has moored the new 
woi-ld alongside the old." Within the 
brief space of a half century ocean cables 
have been laid in all parts of tiie world, 
and the globe may now be girdled not in 
forty days, but in less than a quarter of 
an hour. A recent publication of the 
Bureau of Statistics of the United States 
Treasury Department contained the fol- 
lowing information upon this subject. 
" The submarine telegraphs of the world 
number 1750. Their aggregate length is 
nearly 200,000 miles. Their total cost is 
estimated at $275,000,000; and the num- 
ber of messages annually transmitted over 
them at more than 0,t)00.000. All the 
grand divisions of the earth are nov.' con- 
nected by their wires, and from country 
to country, and island to island, the 
thoughts and words of mankind are in- 
stantaneously transmitted. Beneath all 
oceans the universal language which this 
system has created flows uninterruptedly, 
and man talks as face to face with his 
fellowman at the antipodes. Darkest 
Africa now converses daily with en- 
lightened Europe or America, and the 
great events of the morning are known in 
the evening throughout the inhalnted 
world. Adding to the submarine lines the 
land-telegraphic system by which they are 
connected and through which they bring 
interior points of the various continents 
into instantaneous communication, the 
total length of telegraph lines of the world 
is 1.180,000 miles; the length of their 
single wires or conductors is over 3,!S00.- 
OOO miles; and the total number of mes- 
sages annually sent over them about 400,- 
000,000, or an average of more than 1,- 
000,000 messages each day," 

The most useful of r.ll the electrical de- 
vices, however, inasmuch as it touches the 
personal or home life of so many people, 
is the Telephone; and it is a happy illus- 
tration of the fact that the enthusiastic 
experimenters in electricity, though the 
deiinite object of their study and work 
may be established by another, do not, 
therefore, discontinue their experimenta- 
tion and investigation, but simply turn 
it in other directions and then prosecute 



their researches along the new lines as 
earnestly as they had previously followed 
the old. All the leading claimants for 
priority of invention of the Telephone hail 
originally become interested in the subject 
ihrough an ambition to work out a suc- 
cessful system of telegraphy; and, a satis- 
factory system having been developed by 
others, they simply changed the course of 
their thought, or its object, and continued 
to experiment. " There is, probably," 
says Professor Houston, " not a single 
])iece of electric apparatus that contains 
so many elements of the marvelous as 
does the articulating or speaking tele- 
phone. It is marvelous in the simplicity 
of its construction; it is marvelous in its 
operation, condjining as it does a dynamo- 
generator driven by the voice of the 
.-.peaker, and an electro-magnetic motor 
that so acts as to exactly reproduce the 
spoken words, and all this with apparatus 
of the simplest type; finally it is mar- 
velous in the simplicity of its action, be- 
ing of such simple character that it 
requires absolutely no training or skill 
for its use. All that one is required to 
do is to speak or to listen. It is able to 
transmit any language that is spoken, no 
matter what may be the character of its 
phonetic elements, provided a fairly clear 
articulate speech is employed. It will 
operate as well for an uncultured savage 
as it will for the most accomplished 
electric engineer." So familiar have we 
of to-day become with the instrument, so 
much a part of the natural and necessary 
furniture of the home or office does it 
.seem, that it is difficult to realize that 
thirty years ago it was just being in- 
stalled in the larger cities; and still more 
difficult to conceive how we ever " lived, 
moved, and had our being " without it. 
Like the greater part of such discoveries, 
it is difficult to determine where or to 
whom the honor of original invention be- 
longs. As early as 1837, Dr. Charles 
Page, of Salem, Mass., had proved that a 
bar of iron could be made to emit sounds 
when rapidly magnetized and demagnet- 
ized, and tliat the pitch of the sound de- 
pended on the rapidity with whicli the 



THE STOKY OF ELECTRICITY. 



665 



changes were made. Following the lines 
of Page's experiments, whose receiver he 
is said to have used, Philip Reiss, in 
Germany, produced an instrument in 
18(30, which he called a Telephone, and 
which it is generally claimed by scientists 
did transmit articulate speech; and the 
majority of students are disposed to award 
him the honor of priority of invention. 
But however that may be, the simple fact 
is that Alexander Graham Bell was the 
iirst to establish his claims as the inventor 
of the Telephone, which have been main- 
tained until the present time, and recog- 
nized and established by the Supreme 
Court of the United States. Bell had for 
several years been a student of vocaliza- 
tion, and had introduced into this country 
his father's system of instruction for 
deaf-mutes, later becoming a professor of 
vocal physiology in Boston University. 
lie was for years interested in the sub- 
ject of transmission of sound by elec- 
tricity, and had devised many forms of 
apparatus to accomplish this end. His 
application for a patent was filed at Wash- 
ington, February 14, 1S76; and a few 
hours later, on the same day, Elisha Gray. 
M-ho was to prove Bell's most active com- 
petitor, made aijxjlicatlon for a patent on 
a similar device. Bell exhibited a work- 
ing model of his telephone at the Cen- 
tennial Exposition at Philadelphia, in 
1S7G, which, though very imperfect, 
proved that the problem of "talking by 
telegraph " had been solved. Improve- 
ments were, however, veiy rapidly made 
so that the first line for commercial pur- 
poses was set up in 1877. The Telephone 
is too common an instrument, and in too 
general use, to need any description, 
though its principles may not be ■under- 
stood. As has been said by a leading 
electrical writer, " Nothing like it in 
simplicity of construction, combined with 
complexity of operation, is to be found in 
any other human contrivance." It is an 
interesting combination of a dynamo- 
electric machine and a motor, tha two 
being identical in construction; and its 
working is based upon the fact that when 
sound is produced, energy is expended in 



the operation. " When a word is spoken, 
the energy necessary to its utterance first 
apx>ears as a series of waves of compres- 
sion and reaction in the air, where most 
of it is finally transformed into heat." 
Solid bodies may be made to vibrate by 
the sound of the human voice, and by a 
suitable contrivance it may be made to do 
work in running a machine, though al- 
ways, of course, of little magnitude. 
" In the telephone," says Professor ilen- 
denhall, " the sound of the voice is made 
to do work; this is converted inio the 
energy of an electric current; and this, 
in turn, is reconverted into mechanical 
energy, resulting in sound." The original 
Bell Telephone consisted of a long wooden 
or ebonite handle, down the centre of 
which ran a permanent bar-magnet, hav- 
ing at one end a small coil of fine insu- 
lated wire wound about it. The ends of 
the wire coil are led through the handles 




stereograph CopijrigliUti I'.'i)^ hii I'uih'rivuod il- J'lulcr- 

irnnil, V. 1". 

ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL. 

to two terminals for connection with the 
line wires. Very near the wire-wound pole 
of the magnet is firmly fixed by its edges 
a thin circular iron plate, covered by a 
f\ninel-shapcd mouth piece. When at rest 
the iron plate is concave, its centre teing 



6G(; 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



attrac-teil towanl the pole of the magnet. 
When one speaks into the mouthpiece the 
sound wave.s agitate the plate, causing its 
centre to move inwards and outwards. 
These movements of the plate affect the 
mag-netism of the magnet, exciting elec- 
tric currents of Yai-T,-ing strength in the 
wire coil. These currents passing through 
the line wires to a similar telephone ex- 
cite the coil in it, and in tuni affect, the 
magTietism of the distant magnet which 
attracts or releases the plate near its pole, 
causing undtilations of the air exactly re- 
sembling those set up by the speaker's 
words. Various improvements have, of 
course, been introduced since Bell's first 
telephone was perfected, esiiecially in the 
way of transmitting instruments, by means 
of which variations of current strength of 
much greater intensity are transmitted 
over the line, yet retaining the character- 
istics necessary for the reproduction of 
speech. In 1S7S, an Englishman, Pro- 
fessor Hughes, discovered that if a piece 
of carbon is allowed to rest lightly upon 
another, and an electric current is jiassed 
from one to the other in a circuit in 
which there is a Bell telephone receiver, 
the latter will respond to the faintest 
sounds in the vicinity of the carbons. 
This arrangement is called a " micro- 
phone," which has now become an import- 
ant feature in the successful telephone. 
Mr. Edison later invented a transmitter in 
which a small disk or button of soft car- 
bon, prepared from lamp-black, is used 
for the same ends as achieved by the 
microphone. Our space does not admit of 
even a reference to the many improve- 
ments of this wonderful little instrument; 
and, fortunately, they are too well known 
and understood to make such reference 
necessary. No other of all the applica- 
tions of the electric force has done so 
much to make the life of the mass of men 
and women happier and more comfort- 
able. It is not alone that the greater part 
of the business of life can be conducted 
without leaving one's office or home, thus 
avoiding an enormous amount of travel, 
and saving a vast amount of time; but for 
social purposes the telephone is th(> most 



beneficent of inventions. The amouiit of 
comfort and cheer that is brought into 
the rooms and the lives of the invalids and 
tlie great communitj" of the " shut-in " by 
tliis ever handy communicator with the 
friends without, can never he estimated. 
Since the perfecting of the long distance 
service, too, communities hitherto isolated 
luive been brought into close touch with 
the active world from which they were 
separated. In mining camps high up in 
the mountains of the far West, a hundred 
or more miles, perhaps, from any settled 
community, tha telephone keeps alive the 
social sentiment and breaks the monot- 
on.y of camp life. The great farms and 
ranches of the West, too, where the utter 
desolation and weariness of the life not 
infrequently made women insane, are now 
very generally connected with tlie civilized 
life from which they were shut off. Where 
less than a decade agO' no human being 
lither than members of one's family might 
be seen for week after week, now the 
lonely people can take down the receiver 
and have a long taUc with friends at a 
distance, which tends to annihilate space, 
and to bring them in reality within the 
range of social and civilized life. In the 
use of the telephone the United States 
has far out-run any other nation. Accord- 
ing to the census of 1900 there were 14,- 
474.777 " homes " in the United States, 
and 16,239,797 families. On January 1, 
1908, the number of instniments belong- 
ing to the Bell Telephone Company hi the 
hands of licensees was 7,544,105; and the 
number belonging to independent com- 
panies wais 3,500,000, malting a total of 
11,044,105 telephones in use in the 
(■(iuntry; so that, making allowance for 
duplication of instruments in business 
offices and for other special uses, it would 
seem safe to affirm that at least- every 
other family throughout the entire LTnited 
States has availed itself of the unlimited 
and beneficent service of this tireless 
servant of humanity. According to the 
latest reports the number of telephone 
messages per annum in the LTnited 
States is 9,000,000.000; in Great Britain 
and Ireland, 723,246,388; in Germany, 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



667 



1,207,446,753; and iu France, 205,085,37-1:, 
showing- very clearly liovv mucli more gen- 
erally the telephone is used in this than in 
the other great countries of the world. 

In leaving the field of Telegraphy and 
Telephonj' for that of electric lighting, 
heating, and power, we enter a different 
territory, with its own peculiar adaptation 
of electrical principles and devices. Here 
the dynamo and the motor become the 
most effective agents, the voltaic battery 
not being able to produce the currents 
needed unless built upon a scale that 
would be too costly for commercial pur- 
poses. The dynamo is a mechanically 
driven machine, for which a water wheel, 
or, more commonly, a steam engine fur- 
nishes the power. Its general construc- 
tion consists of an armature, or core of 
iron wound with copper wires. When this 
armature is rotated close to the poles of an 
electro-magnet by a steam engine, a cur- 
rent is set up. This armature is whirled 
around its axis at a rate of from 350 revo- 
lutions per minute in the giant dynamos 
of Edison, to 3,000 or even 4,000 revolu- 
tions in small laboratory machines. By 
fixing on the same axle or shaft as that 
of the armature a commutator, or device 
for rectifying- the current, and allowing 
copper brushes to rest lightly on this ro- 
tating- conunutator, and connecting wires 
with the brushes, a direct current may be 
led off, and the greater part of the energy 
received from the steam engine may be 
delivered to a motor at a distant point, or 
to a light circuit, or to heating apparatus, 
or applied to any jjurpose for which the 
current is useful. Two forms of current 
may be produced by the dynamo, — the 
direct, where the machine is supplied with 
a commutator, — or an alternating current. 
The latter is a current which is turned in 
one direction and then in the opposite, 
alternating commonly at the rat« of 7,200 
times a minute, while the direct current 
acts only in one direction. When two or 
three alternating currents are combined 
and transmitted to a distance on wires 
the combination produces what is known 
as a di-phase, tri-jAase or. in general, a 
poljijhase current. Alternating currents. 



by the use of transformers for raising or 
lowering their pressure, can be delivered 
very considerable distances at slight loss, 
whereas the direct current is limited in 
quantity, pressure, and distance. This fact, 
that the alternating- current can be sent to 
greater distances than the direct, has led 
to great expansion of territory by users 
of alternating- current dynamos, until 
practically all companies have adojjted the 
same general plan of generating current 
with alternators of the polyphase type at 
central stations, and transmitting- it at 
high pressure to substations, from which 
it is sent out under lower pressure, or 
used to charge batteries for storage. 

Not the least interesting- of these im- 
proved processes for the transmission of 
electrical force is its transfer to long dis- 
tant points. In such cases tri-phase cur- 
rents of very high pressure are sent out 
from the central station. At the receiv- 
ing end of the line " step-down transform- 
ers " are connected, one to each phase, so 
as to lower the pressure for use in an 
apparatus called a rotary-converter, which 
is employed to change the alternating 
currents to the direct currents required 
for local service at the far distant points. 
A marked illustration of this process is 
the generation of power at the water falls 
in the Sierra Nevada mountains of East- 
ern California, whence it is transmitted 
more than two hundred miles to supply 
the city of San Francisco with light and 
power. Spokane, Washington, has a most 
remarkable water power in the very heart 
of the city. Within a distance of fifteen 
hundred feet the Spokane river falls more 
than five hundred feet, over a series of 
steep rapids and two falls, the lower' of 
which is nearly one hundred feet. At this 
lower fall is a central electric power sta- 
tion from M'hich all the pow-er is trans- 
mitted to the mountains of Northena 
Idaho, more than one hundred miles, to 
work the famous Coeur d'Alene mines, — 
which produce more than half the lead 
used in the United States, — light all the 
towns and camps of the district, etc. This 
central station also supplies the power for 
the electric trolley lines of the city, and 



6G8 



FRo:yr colony to woeld power. 



for a ]iiie running ilown the eastern part 
of the state to Colfax and Moscow, Idaho, 
the entire circuit covering about three 
hundi-cil miles. 

Tiiis electric transmission of energy is 
bascil on the fact that when an electric 
current, generated by an ordinary dy- 
namo-electric machine, is passed through 
(he circuit of a similar dynamo, this 
latter is caused to rotate, becoming an 
electro-motor. In other words, the elec- 
tric energy of the first dynamo is con- 
verted into mechanical energy by the 
s(>cond, so that the second dynamo can be 
employed to drive the machinery, just as 
could a steam engine or water wheel. In 
the case of the electric transmission of 
energy, however, the distance between the 
generator and the motor may vary from 
short distances to several hundred miles, 
as has been shown. " The remarkably 
high efficiency and low cost of the elec- 
tric motor," says Dr. Houston ; " the read- 
iness with which it can be controlled both 
as regards speed and power; the fact that 
it can be automatically made to take from 
the line wires or conductors only the 
amount of current required for the work; 
together with the numerous mechanical 
advantages it possesses, have enabled elec- 
tric transmission successfully to compete 
with other methods of transmission, not 
only at king- distances, but have even en- 
abled it to successfully compete with 
transmission by belt shafting- ami pidleys 
in nianufaetories where the electrical gen- 
erator is situated in the same building." 
Since the electric transmission of power 
is only rendered possible by the existence 
of the electric motor, it is apparent what 
an imiiortan: factor this machine has be- 
come in the development of the rises of 
electricity. It is not, in fact, a new de- 
vice, as it was used in a small way for pro- 
jjclling boats as early as ls;30. But the 
batteries of that day were too expensive to 
admit of any extended use of electricity as 
a motive power. It was the discovery that 
a reversed motor became a djniamo, and 
the perfecting of the dynamo, that made 
the present development possible. AVliile 
the fact that the same machine is capable 



of acting as a generator and a motor was 
known as early as 1840, it was not until 
the Vienna Universal Exposition of 1873 
that the knowledge became general. Dur- 
ing this exposition a Gramme dynamo 
electric machine was driven as a motor by 
means of the current produced by a 
second Gramme dynamo. Though a con- 
siderable showing of electric motors was 
made at the Electrical Exhibition at 
Philadelphia in 1884, they came into 
practical use very slowly. From the cen- 
sus of 1890 it appeared that only four per- 
cent of the manufacturing power used in 
this country was electrical. During the 
decade between 1890 and 1900, however, 
everj'thing changed, and the day of elec- 
tricity dawned, the increased use of dy- 
namos during the ten years being about 
nineteen hundred per cent. The census of 
1900 showed that <luring the period 
covered by it, the railroads alone installed 
about two million horse power of motors 
on cars, and about one million of horse 
liower of dynamos to run them ; while the 
increase has been even more than pro- 
portionally great during the years since 
that census was taken. 

It is a far reach from the rush-light 
and pine knot to the arc and incandescent 
light. First the rush-light, then the 
candle, then the kerosene lamp, improved 
by the Argand burner, then coal gas with 
the later improvement of the Welsbach 
burner, and then the brilliant lights of 
to-day. which almost rival the sun- 
light. The incandeseent light takes its 
name from the red-hot carbon filament 
inclosed in the glass bulb from which air 
has been e.xhausted. The basic principle 
of this form of lighting is the fact that 
electricity heats a poor conductor. The 
thread-like filament in the glass bulb is of 
some form of carbon, or carbonized ma- 
terial; and when the key is turned and a 
current admitted to the filament its poor 
conducting qualities make the passage of 
the electric current so difficult that the 
filament becomes red-hot instantly. One 
of the great difficulties in developing the 
light has been to secure proper material 
for the filaments. Until Edison took the 



THE STOEY OF ELECTlilClTY. 



669 



matter up no such success had been 
achieved as would tend to give the liglit 
commercial value. His first efforts were 
with various forms of platinum and other 
metallic wires. He made his platinum 
conductors in the shape of spirals because, 
as is well known, the loss of heat is much 
less in the form of a close spiral than with 
the same length of straight wire. But 
this was not a success as the life of the 
lamps was very short when sufficient cur- 
rent was sent through the spirals to pro- 
duce high incandescence. In 1879 he 
made his first horseshoe carbons of car- 
bonized paper, which it was believed then 
solved the electric light problem. But the 
life of this lamja also proved very brief, 
as the paper carbon was rapidlj' destroyed. 
In 1880 he took out a patent for the use 
of bamboo fibres as filaments. In the pro- 
duction of the delicate thread the bamboo 
was cut into strips, which vpere then car- 
bonized by prolonged exposure to heat 
while out of contact with the air. The 
straight filament was then bent into a 
horseshoe form and placed inside a glass 
globe containing a vacuum. But even 
these lamps burned out quickly and it was 
feared by many scientists that the diffi- 
culty could not be so overcome as to make 
commercial lighting of this class practi- 
cable. More attention was, however, then 
given to the globe, in which a more posi- 
tive vacuum was created with the result 
that a lamp was eventually produced with 
a life under normal conditions of upwards 
of one thousand hours. The carbons 
chiefly used to-day are known as squirted, 
or structureless carbons, which have suc- 
ceeded metals or carbonized cardboard, or 
bamboo. As the little filament in the 
globe of the incandescent lamp is so con- 
stantly before the majority of peojjle, it 
cannot be without interest to know what 
it is and how it is made, and we cj^uote 
Dr. Houston on this point. " When ordi- 
nary raw cotton is placed in a solution of 
zinc chloride, a substance obtained by 
dissolving zinc in hydrochloric acid, the 
cotton is dissolved, and a sticky, jelly-like 
mass is obtained. By forcing this ma- 
terial through a small hole in a plate, and 



leading the thread which comes out into 
a vessel filled with alcohol, it soon sets or 
hardens sufiiciently to enable it to be 
handled. When this thread is carefully 
washed, and wound on a large drum and 
dried, it produces a material strongly re- 




Stereograph Copyrighted 1907 by Underwood £ Under. 

wood, X. y. 

THOMAS A. EDISON. 



sembling catgut. The dried thread is 
then cut into suitable lengths and carbon- 
ized while out of contact with air, thus 
producing the carbon filaments." 

The success of the incandescent electric 
lamp is abundantly evidenced by the 
enormous and steadily increasing sales. 
Even tbe census of 1900 showed that 
more than twenty-five million incandes- 
cent lami)s were manufactured in the 
United States during that year, of which 
more than twenty million were of sixteen 
candle jjower. This enormous output, to- 
gether with imisrovements in manu- 
facture, has resulted in a reduction in the 
selling price from seventy-five cents or 



G7(J 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



one dollar that was charged for them 
about ISiJO to about fifteen cents, which 
is the average price of a lamp to-day. 

Earlier in this chapter reference was 
made to Davy's production of the arc 
light before the Royal Institution in 1810. 
In his experiment, as there described, all 
the principles involved in the prodaction 
of this form of light were complete, im- 
provements only having been made along 
various lines. In producing the arc light 
a very much stronger electric current is 
used than for the incandescent, which is 
directed through the two opposite finger- 
like carbons of an arc lamp. If the car- 
bons touched each other the current wouli 
pass through both without making any 
light; but they are placed a short distance 
apart and the lamp is provided with 
a mechanism for keeping them at 



the current in any lamp for any reason, 
that lamp is automatically cut out of the 
series, and the current continues to flow 
without interruption to the other lamps 
of the circuit. Some idea of the exten- 
sive use of the. arc lamp may be obtained 
from the fact that in 1900, according to 
the statistics oi the last census, one hun- 
dred and seventy-five million carbon rods 
for arc lamps were produced in the 
United States alone. 

A form of the arc light with whose 
effects the (lublic is familiar, though not 




the same distance as they burn. The 
electric current jumps this slight 
^pace between the carbon points, pass- 
ing in the form of an arc or curve of 
light from one to the other. In thus 
passing through the air it becomes, as 
one has said, " a veritable streak of 
lightning." In general use, arc-lamp 
circuits may be from fifteen to 
twenty miles in length, the electric 
current passing successively through as 
man.y as one hundred or more separate 
lamps. In these constant-current arc- 
lamp circuits it is necessary to employ a 
device that will afford a continuous path 
for the current past any lamp that might 
fail to feed properly, or whose carbons 
might be consumed. To meet this need 
an automatic cut-out has been invented 
by means of which, in case of stoppage of 



SKAl.Tin li;HT OS \l:>--FI. \t sk\. 

with the processes, is what is called the 
focussing lamp. Such are the search- 
lights used on war vessels, the lamps used 
for the illumination of lighthouses, for 
scenic effects in theatres, headlights of 
locomotives, and for various other pur- 
poses. As in these lamps it is desired 
that all the light shall be thrown in one 



THE STOKY OF ELECTKICITY. 



G71 



direction only, the cai'bons are not placed 
vertically over one another as in ordinary 
arc lights, but are inclined away from the 
direction in which the light is to be pro- 
jected, so that the rays of maximum inten- 
sity shall issue in a more or less horizontal 
direction. These lamps are generally in- 
closed in a cylindrical projector box, in 
the rear of which is jjlaced a reflector 
made of silvered coi^per or glass, — of the 
latter in the case of all high-class pro- 
jectors. Some of these focus lamjjs are 
very large and have marvelous illumina- 
ting power, the one on Mt. Lowe, near 
Pasadena, California, for example, hav- 
ing three million candle power, and is 
visible, owing to its elevation, for more 
than one hundred miles. 

In 1817 a Swedish chemist, Berzelius, 
discovered selenium, while engaged in the 
distillation of sulphuric acid and iron. 
Its properties were experimented with for 
several years but without important re- 
sults initil in 1873, May, a telegraph 
operator at Valencia, discovered that in 
its crystalline form selenium had less re- 
sistance, — that is, was a better conductor 
of electricity, — when exposed to the light 
than in the dark, a quality that has been 
made to produce many important results. 
A selenium cell is now made by winding 
a pair of conducting wires about a glass 
tube. Selenium powder that has been 
fused is then packed in the spaces of the 
wires and the whole combination baked at 
the temperature of boiling water for 
about twelve hours, by which time the 
selenium has so crystallized as to become 
extremely sensitive to light. The selenium 
cell made it possible for Professor Bell to 
use beams of light instead of wires for the 
transmission of sound in a telephone, or 
photophone, as the new instrument was 
called. But one of its most practical uses 
is in the automatic lighting of buoys that 
are necessary to mark the channel in a 
harbor. The old method of lighting was 
dangerous, tediims, and subject to failure. 
These buoys were formerly lighted by gas 
under pressure, as in the Pintsch light 
used on railway trains. Before selenium 
came into use, each light tank was filled 
with gas and it was allowed to burn until 



it went out, and an attendant came along 
and replenished it. With the application 
of the selenium cell, the gas is automati- 
cally shut off during the day. As soon as 
dawn brings light enough to act on the 
selenium cell of the buoy, its resistance 
is reduced and a magnet brought into 
operation that closes the gas valve ; and as 
darkness increases toward night the re- 
sistance of the selenium is increased and 
the current reduced, so that by means of 
a relay magnet it ojierates in the oppo- 
site direction, opening the gas valve. The 
light may either be turned low, or put out 
altogether, in which case it will bo re- 
lighted at night by an electric spark. The 
selenium cell has also found an interesting 
use in astronomical work. The cell is so 
much more sensitive than the eye to the 
action of light that it has been employed 
in the observation of eclipses and in re- 
cording light changes which the eye could 
not observe; and Professor Barnard, of 
the Lick Observatory, has employed 
selenium in a device for automatically 
detecting comets. 

The legion of devices to which elec- 
tricity has given rise, for the comfort and 
convenience of mankind, cannot be hinted 
at in a work like this. How true this is 
may be illustrated by the fact that the 
catalogue of one well-known supply house 
lists over two thousand separate and dis- 
tinct articles, ajjart from the larger elec- 
trical machinery. We shall, however, note 
a very few of the important and interest- 
ing applications of the electrical force, 
availing ourselves of the more complete 
resumes of such extended uses whicli Mr. 
C. H. Cochrane has made in his interest- 
ing work, " Modern Industrial Progress." 

The application of electricity to the serv- 
ice of various characters on steam rail- 
ways is of exceeding interest. All the 
fast trans-continental trains, limiteds, 
now have in the baggage car a dynamo, 
which supplies the train with light. 
From the powerful searchlight of the loco- 
motive, — which can be seen for many miles 
along a straight track, and which makes 
the engineer's course for a half mile ahead 
as clear at midnight as at noonday, — to 
the incandescent lamp at the head of each 



61 



FEO.M COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



bci-th in the sleepers, everywhere a bright, 
cheerful light helps to make the journey 
on such trains at night a pleasure, while 
a vast number of electrical devices have 
well-nigh robbed it of all its dan;;ers. 
Over many of the great trunk lines, es- 
pecially Ijctween the large cities, one is 
often astonished to note how smoothly the 
trains run. Formerly there was a more 
or less severe jolt as the wheels of the 
cars went over the spaces between rails. 
Now by an electric machine the rails are 
easily and (luickly welded together, so 
that one continuous rail from New York 
to Chicago could be made, if it was de- 
sirable. This, of course, secures an almost 
absolutely smooth and even running of 
the car. In the automatic block signal 
system, too. is an application of vast in- 
terest to every traveler. In most cases a 
mile of track, sometimes twu miles, rep- 
resents a block. As soon as a train enters 
the block, its wheels and axles form an 
electrical connection between the two 
rails, on the ground, which are charged 
with a current for operating signals. 
When a train makes this connection an 
electro-magnet is de-energized, forcing a 
semaphore arm to take a stop-position 
which notifies any following train that 
there is already one in that block. As the 
train passes out of the block, the electro- 
magnet is energized and the semaphore 
arm is pulled to the upright, or " all 
clear " position. 

One traveling over the country to-day 
and seeing every where an established 
electric trolley system in all the larger 
cities and towns, and competing with the 
steam railroads for interurban traffic, 
finds it .difficult to realize that when the 
young' num who reached his majority and 
cast his first vote in 1908 was born, no 
such conveniences for travel were in ex- 
istence. We were still riding- behind bony 
and %vorn-out horses in the small and rude 
boxes that served as ears on all street rail- 
ways. The first electric ears seemed un- 
canny, and filled us with wonder and awe, 
until Dr. Holmes so clearly explained 
their philosophy in his poem entitled 
"The Broomstick Train": 



" Since then on many a car you'll see 
A broomstick as plain as ijlain can be: 
On every stick there's a witch astride, — 
The string you see to her leg is tied. 
Slie will do a mischief if she can. 
But the string is held by a careful man. 
And whenever the evil-minded witch 
Would cut some caper he gives a twitch. 
As for the hag, you can't see her. 
But, hark ! you can hear her black cat's 

purr. 
And now and then as a car goes by 
You can catch a gleam of her wicked eye. 
Often you've looked on a rushing train. 
But just what moved it was not plain. 
It couldn't be those wires above. 
For they could neither push nor shove; 
Where was the motor that made it go — 
You couldn't guess, hut noiv you know." 

Many of these interurban lines now run 
regular trains of cars as perfectly 
equipped and appointed as the finest Pull- 
mans, frequently with parlor cars at- 
tached, and, in one or two instances, with 
regular sleeping cars. Electricity is thus 
encroaching upon the field of steam daily. 
The great manufacturers of steam loco- 
motives are now all producing po'verful 
electric engines; and these are being 
rapidly adopted for certain "hauls" by 
all the leading steam railroad corpora- 
tions. The great New York Central Rail- 
road Company, whose central station in 
New York city upwards of five hundred 
passenger trains enter and leave every 
twenty-four hours, has already electrified 
its entire service to points varying from 
twenty to thirty miles from the city, the 
steam engines being changed at such 
points for iiowerful electric motor engines. 
The Pennsylvania Railroad Company has 
recently awarded contracts for the elec- 
trification of its New York and New Jer- 
sey terminals, the first section to be from 
Harrison, N. J. to Jamaica, Long Island, 
including the tunnels under the rivers; 
while the Illinois Central Railroad Com- 
pany is proceeding with the electrification 
of its Chicago terminal system. The 
whole trend of development is in one di- 
rection. The practicability of the use of 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



673 



electricity for all passenger traffic, at 
least, is no longer questioned, nor its su- 
periority as a motive power over steam. 
The enormous expense involved in the 
change of power over the entire course of 
the great trunk line systems, however, will 
probably check any rapid advances. A 
most ingenious application of electricity 
to the service of railroads is not jDopu- 
larly known. Doubtless many readers of 
the daily papers have smiled as they have 
read of the " tours of inspection " of rail- 
road officials who travel over lon^ dis- 
tances of their road in their private cars, 
attached to the fast express trains. "A 
critical inspection," this, one is inclined to 
remark. But what the average man does 
not know is that probably attached to the 
same train is another car, known as 
" Dudley's Dynagraph Car," which is 
equipped with every sort of an electrical 
device for testing the condition of the 
tracks, etc. These devices automatically 
trace curves on moving' strips of paper 
which show minutely the condition of 
every foot of the track over which the car 
passes, at the same time marking the 
rails with paint at every uneven place. 

Wireless telegraphy occupies a itnique 
position and can hardly be classed with 
the applications of electric principles that 
have been recorded above. \Vhat elec- 
tricity is, no one knows. It is called a 
" force," because scientists cannot better 
describe it; and they talk of its flow, its 
current, etc., simply because it is neces- 
sary to express in familiar terras the 
action of this so-called force. When we 
enter the field of wireless telegraphy we 
come in touch with another phenomenon 
of nature in the form of a supposititious 
substance or form of so-called matter 
which scientists have named Ether. Xo 
one can prove its existence, nor tell what 
it is, nor describe its proiDcrties. Yet its 
supposition becomes necessary when one 
passes to the consideration of certain 
phenomena. It is described as a " hypo- 
thetical medium which is assumed to per- 
vade all space, the interior of solid bodies 
not excepted, and is regarded as pos- 
sessing extreme tenuity and elasticiiv, and 



as being the medium of the transmission 
of light and heat, these forces being trans- 
mitted by vibrations or undulations of 
ether." When the ether is disturbed, 
vibrations are set up. Some of these 
vibrations come to our senses as light, 
and some of them we know as electricity, 
and when the disturbance is sufficiently 
violent, heat is manifested. The existence 
of these etheric waves was discovered 
by Heinrich Hertz, of Carlsruhe, and have 
since been called Hertzian waves. For 
years experimenters in the electrical field 
had operated by means of wires, choosing 
good conductors, as copper, to convey 
currents and transmit thought, light, and 
motion to distant points. During the lat- 
ter part of the nineteenth centurj', how- 
ever, many began to experiment with the 
Hertzian waves; and Marconi, who was of 
the foremost experimenters, was soon able 
to demonstrate that if the sender and re- 
ceiver were tuned alike, and the instru- 
ments delicate enough, he could use the 
etheric waves to carry his messages. Mar- 
coni was born at Bologna, Italy, in 1874. 
his father being an Italian and his mother 
Irish born, and was educated at Leghorn 
and Bologna universities. lu 1890, when 
only sixteen years of age, he began his 
experiments on his father's estate, to dem- 
onstrate the truth of his theory that the 
electric current could be made to pass 
through any substance, and if started in 
any given direction, to follow an un- 
deviating course without need of a wire 
or other conductor. He early invented an 
apparatus for wireless telegraphy which 
attracted the attention of Sir W. H. 
Preece, the chief electrician of the Eng- 
lish Postal Telegraph, who tested the in- 
vention with marked success in Eng'land. 
After various successful public exhibi-. 
tions in Italy and England, he came to 
the United States in 1900, where he made 
some remarkable records in reporting 
election returns. Down to December, 
1901, the greatest distance covered by the 
wireless apparatus was two hundred miles. 
During that month Marconi left his wire- 
less station at Poldhu, in Cornwall, and 
went to Newfoundland. He had left in- 



674 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



structions that after the time for his ar- 
rival at Signal Hill, St. John's harhor, 
the letter " S " should be signaled from 
Poldhu daily from 3 to 6 P. M. No one 
except his confidential assistants knew of 
his plan. He was confident that w ith a 




stereograph Copi/rigJiled by Underwood i- Vndenvood, 

N. Y. 

WILLIAM MARCONL 

certain amount of electrical energy sent 
out from Poldhu, the ether waves should 
be strong enough to affect a coherer at St. 
John's. But he felt he could not afford 
to let the world know if he failed. As it 
is necessary to have an elevated wire to 
receive the Hertzian waves, he tried first 
sending one up in a balloon, and later at- 
tached to kites; and on December 12. 
1901, he succeeded in keeping his kite 
elevated above four hundred feet for more 
than four hours, during which time the 
letter "S " was recorded on the i\Iorse in- 
strument twenty-five times; and the 
youthful inventor and discoverer had 
demonstrated the feasibility of wireless 
telegraphy. In February, 1902, he made an 
interesting and novel application of his 
principle b.y receiving messages while on 



board the steamship Pliiladelphia, bound 
for New York, from Poldhu up to 1.5.")1 
miles of the distance from England, and 
signals up to 2099 miles. On January IS, 
190.'!, Marconi sent from Cape Cod the fol- 
lowing message to King Edward, which 
was successfully transmitted twenty-five 
hundred miles: 

" His Majesty King Edward VII.. Lon- 
don, by Marconi Transatlantic Wireless 
Telegraphy :. In taking advantage of the 
wonderful triumph of scientific research 
and ingenuity which has been achieved 
in perfecting a system of wireless teleg- 
raphy, I extend, on behalf of the Ameri- 
can people, most cordial greetings and 
good wishes to you and to all the people 
of the l>ritish Emijire. 

Theodore Roosevelt. 

Washington, D. C." 

As a result of a warning from the 
Anglo-American Cable Company that he 
was interfering with their franchise in 
telegraphing from St. John's Marconi 
had sometime before removed his receiv- 
ing station from that place to Glace Bay, 
( 'ape Breton Island, and had also estab- 
lished another station at Wellfleet, Mass., 
on Cape Cod. In .sending the message of 
President Roosevelt, Marconi had in- 
tended it should be transmitted through 
the Glace Bay station. But while commu- 
nicating with Glace Bay, the operator there 
advised Marconi that he had just heard 
from Poldhu that the instrument there 
had received tho message at the time Mar- 
coni was transmitting it for receipt at 
Glace Bay. This remarkable performance 
convinced all doubters that there was no 
limit to the distance that might be cov- 
ered by this system, and that its practical 
service was established beyond question. 

Many other inventors have, as is usual 
in such cases, disputed Marconi's claims 
to original discovery; but, as in the case 
of Morse and the first telegraph, Marconi 
has so far outstripped all others in the 
success of his application of wireless prin- 
ciples that few question the propriety of 
his claims. As a most eminent authority. 
Professor Elihu Thompson, has said: "T 



THE STORY OF ELECTEICITY. 



675 



believe Marconi is entitled to all the credit 
he has been given for wireless telegraphy. 
Tie has done all the practical work and de- 
veloped the theory. Others have theo- 
rized on it, but Marconi has put the thing 
to practical use. I have given the matter 
a good deal of study, and I am convinced 
that Marconi deserves all he has got." A 
Swedish electrician, Axtel Orling, how- 
ever, who has operated with an English 
engineer, J. T. Armstrong, has devised an 
entirely different system. The high masts, 
coherers, and insulation coils required for 
the successful operation of the other sys- 
tem are dispensed with and a remarkably 
simple apparatus substituted. It can all 
he inclosed in a box eight inches square 
by four in height, and weighs but six 
pounds. The case includes a battery of 
eight volts, very little power being re- 
quired. Two iron stakes are driven into 
the ground to a depth of eighteen inches 
find are twelve feet apart. A wire being 
tied to each stake is carried to the posi- 
tive and negative poles of the battery and 
attached by contact screws. The operator 
puts a telephone receiver to his ear and 
can hear messages sent by similar appa- 
ratus from a distance of twenty miles or 
more. An application of this apparatus 
has been tested in miniature by Orling 
and Armstrong which is fertile in possi- 
bilities. A model submarine boat about 
six feet in length was equipped with the 
apparatus and its movements were di- 
rected from the shore. The operating in- 
strument on the craft is made to control 
the rudder instead of a Morse key, and 
the man on shore operates a little steering 
wheel that is connected with the earth, by 
the sending apparatus. The bow and stern 
of the iron boat act as positive and nega- 
tive poles, and the water carries the cur- 
rent even better than the ground. The 
rising and diving of the boat may be di- 
rected as readily as the right and left 
steering. What those experiments of 
Orling and Anderson may mean, as they 
claim they do, in case of naval battles, has 
been well summed up by Mr. Cochrane 
in his work above referred to: "The ex- 
periments show the practicability of di- 



recting a submarine boat of good size 
from the deck of a battleship; or, a tor- 
pedo may be substituted for a submarine 
boat and steered under water to the hull 
of an enemy and there exploded. A har- 
bor or coast may be protected with sub- 
marine mines of dynamite, each earrj'ing 
an apparatus tuned so that it can be set 
cff only by its appropriate wave. The en- 
gineer on .shore has a chart of the mines 
and a set of apparatus each one tuned to 
a corresponding mine. When a vessel of 
an approaching fleet rides over a mine, ho 
touches off the approjariate receiver, and 
the enemy is no more. There are no wires 
rmining down to the beach, as with the 
systems now in use, to warn the enemy of 
the probable nearness of mines, conse- 
quently no safety can be assured by send- 
ing a party ashore to cut such wires. The 
enemy can avoid the danger only by keep- 
ing away from the mines or capturing the 
headquarters of the operator, and, as he 
may be in any house within twenty miles, 
that is out of the question." 

It is, of course, impossible in the space 
of this article to more than mark the gen- 
eral outline of the development of the 
Science of Electricity, and touch upon 
some of its most salient features and in- 
teresting achievements and possibilities. 
A most notable service has recently been 
rendered by the wireless system of teleg- 
raphy, however, which should receive 
notice, and which will go far toward 
widely extending its adoption. It has. 
moreover, set at rest all question as to the 
range of its usefulness, even in ways that 
had not suggested themselves to the peo- 
ple. Early on the morning of January 
23, 1909, the great White Star liner Re- 
puhlic was steaming through a heavy fog 
bound for the Mediterranean with a large 
number of passengers. When about 
twenty-five miles east of Nantucket is- 
land, at about four o'clock A. M.. another 
large ocean steamer, the Florida, bound 
for New York, suddenly came out of the 
fog and rammed the RepvMic about mid- 
ship, cutting a fearful gash in her side. 
Fortunately the White Star ship was 
fitted with the wireless system; and at 



G76 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



4.10 A. M. the operator at the Siasconset 
station on the shore of Nantucket re- 
ceived a message whicli read " C. Q. D." 
— tlie most imperative message an oper- 
ator can get, — tlie distress signal of a ves- 
sel in collision or other serious danger at 
sea. Instantly, traveling at the rate of 
180,000 miles a second, a message went 
from the Siasconset operator which read : 
" C. Q. D. Here. Sc. G.," which meant 
" Distress signal received at Siasconset 
wireless station. Go ahead." Hardly more 
than a moment later the following reply 
came from the imperiled vessel : " Were 
struck hy an unknown boat ; engine- 
room filled; passengers all safe; can 
stay afloat; latitude 40.17; longitude 70. 
Uppuhlic." The regulations of the ilar- 
coni Company require that an operator, 
whenever he shall receive the " C. Q. D." 
signal of a ship in distress, shall, imme- 
diately upon ascertaining her locality, 
send out word of the ship's condition and 
location to every vessel and station within 
a radius of two hundred miles. Conse- 
quently the Siasconset operator at once 
prefaced his message with the alarm sig- 
nal, and then carefully repeated the one 
that had come from the Bepulilic. All 
this liad taken hardly more time thaii one 
will use in reading the account. The op- 
erator had not long to wait before mes- 
sages from land and sea began to pour in 
upon him. From Boston came the v:cl- 
come report that the revenue-cutter 
Greshain had the news and was leaving 
port. The revenue-cutters Mohawk and 
Seneca replied that they had picked ni> 
the message while cruising along the coast, 
and were off for Xantucket light. Li a 
sliort time it was known that eight dlf- 
fei-ent vessels were steaming under high- 
est pressure toward the Repuhlic. TCot 
much later this message came in from 
the big Baltic of same line as the Bc- 
piihlic: "Baltic one hundred ami fifteen 
miles east of Ambrose channel going to 
assistance of Bepuhlic." At noon the 
great Cunard liner Litcania added her 
cheer b.y reporting: " Sixty-five miles east 
of Nantucket. Hope to reach Repuhlic at 
4 P. M." 



It has for a long time been demon- 
strated by statistics that a person is no- 
where so safe as when traveling on the 
ocean. But the experience of the Ee- 
puhlic makes clear that even the minimum 
of risk has been reduced, so that those 
who would be most secure from the dan- 
gers that beset our mortal existence under 
prevalent conditions must at once plan to 
" go down to the sea in ships," and so 
tnjoy a safe and exhilarating life. Few 
events have more profoundly affected the 
popular mind than did this collision and 
its romantic incidents. Immediately a 
demand was made by Boards of Trade and 
influential civic bodies that all ocean ves- 
sels carrying passengers should at once 
be fitted out with the wireless apparatus, 
and carry an efficient operator. A bill was 
also introduced in the House of Eepre- 
sentatives within forty-eight hours after 
the accident to secure the same wise pro- 
tective measures. Such an object-lesson 
moved public sentiment more potently 
than weeks of argument or volumes of 
theories could have done. 

The story of Aladdin's wonderful lamp. 
as recounted in the Arabian Nights, seems 
to have become as real as the facts of 
history. As will be remembered, Aladdin, 
the son of a poor widow, came into posses- 
sion of a priceless talisman in the form 
of a magic lamp. When its owner rubbed 
the lamp, a Genie instantly appeared and 
asked: "What wouldst tliou have? I 
am ready to obey thee as the slave of the 
lamp. I and the other slaves of the lamp ; " 
and, no matter what the demand, as the 
story goes on, it was instantly obeyed. 
Nothing was beyond its marvelous powers. 
If Aladdin so demanded he was trans- 
])orted beyond the summits of the highest 
mountains in China. If he so desired he 
could hear the faintest whispers, even 
though uttered hundreds of miles away. 
At his command the choicest riches of the 
physical world were laid at his feet, night 
was turned into day, both time and space 
were annihilated. Surely this would 
seem an allegorical representation of the 
story of electricity. Instead of the rub- 
bing of the lamp we have the rubbing of 



THE STORY OF ELECTRICITY. 



G77 



the piece of amber and the whole sucees- 
siou of blessings to the human race have 
followed and are evidently destined to be 
multiplied in the future. For the uni- 
verse has yet greater secrets to unfold ! 
First the telegraph by wire; then girdling 
the earth by the cable; then wireless teleg- 
raphy; and who shall say that the next 
stej) shall not be — Telepathy — and the 



time be not far distant of which the poet, 
Stephen Phillips, has recently sung: 

" In that day shall a man out of uttermost 

India whisper 
And in England his friend shall hear; 
And a maiden in English sunshine have 

sight of her lover 
And he behold her from far Cathay." 



JjIV. 
INTERNATIONAL COURTESIES. 



Founder's Day at Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg. — Address of \V. T. Stead. — " Outlook for 
Peace." — "You Have Only to Hang Twehe Newspaper Editors." — Inrtuence of More 
Intimate Relations Between Peoples. — ^" Little Things that Make for Peace" — The Life and 
Death of George Peabody a Link Between tlie English and American Peoples. — Editorial 
Utterances. — The Geneva Arbitration. — The French Gift of Bartholdi Statue. — -Description 
of Statue. — Educational Reciprocit}-. — Work of I'Alliance Francaise. — Exchange of 
Lecturers by Harvard and The iSorbonne. — ^ Lectures of Charles F. Beach at University of 
Paris Law School. — Work Extended to Other French Universities. — German Emperor and 
American Ambassador Discuss Exchange of Professors Between L'niversities. — Emperor 
Invited President Nicholas Murray Butler to Discuss Subject at Informal Dinner. — " The 
Theodore Roosevelt Professorship" at University of Berlin — Gift of .Tames M. Speyer to 
Columbia to Found Similar Chair. — English and American Universities. — Opinion and 
Eflforts of Baron Kentaro, of Japan, Along Same Lines. — Cecil Rhodes and His Ambitions. 
" A Good Understanding Between England, Germany, and United States, Will Secure Peace 
of tlie World; and Educational Relations Form the Strongest Tie." — Tlie Rhodes Scholar- 
ships. — Bryce and " The American Commonwealth." — Hannis Taylor and ''The English 
Constitution." — " God Hath Created of One Blood All Nations of ilen." 



" Tho stranger, as many languages testify, is apt to be the enemy. The chief reason why he is dreaded 
and hated is tiiat he Is not known. Acquaintance allays suspicion and promotes sympathy and kindness." — 
Washington gladdkn. 



T the eleventh annual celebration of Founder's Day at the 
Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg, Pa., in April, 1907, on 
which occasion Mr. Carnegie gathered to the love-feast as 
his guests all the distinguished men of Europe and America 
whom he could influence, Mr. W. T. Stead, the veteran 
London journalist and founder of the Review of Reviews, 
made a notable address which was enthusiasticall.v re- 
ceived. Among other things, he said: "I have made a 
journey through ten countries for the iiu^iose of find- 
ing out what is the next step toward international peace. 
I have seen and talked confidentially with three kings, two 
(]nccns, one jsrince regent, one imperial chancellor, and all the jirime ministers, 
ambassadors, and public men worth seeing. I found them all unanimous on two 
points; the first one was, that in whatever country I found myself, "the people of 
that country, whether they were the subjects or citizens, rulers or ministers, were 
quite clear that they in that country were the most devoted to peace of all the people 
of the world. None of them would answer for the other nine countries, but for their 
nwn, whether it was the Kaiser, or our own King, or the President of the French 




INTEENATIONAL COUETESIES. 



G7y 



Republic, the President of your own Re- 
public, they were all absolutely sure that 
the people at the head of which they stand 
are absolutely devoted to Peace." 

" On the second point they all agreed 
also. The unanimity is quite as great in 
the one case as in the other. They all 
agreed that the greatest, if not the only, 
danger to the peace of the world lay in 
the existence of a large number of violent, 
unscrupulous, and irresponsible newspa- 
pers, which were constantly engaged in 
mischief making. The Imperial Chan- 
cellor of Germany, Prince Von Bulow, said 
to me : ' The Emperor is for peace ; the 
King is for peace; the parliaments are for 
peace; the ministers are for peace; only 
the newspapers are for war. We diplo- 
matists have to spend our time in running 
around with pails of water to put out the 
fires which the newspapers kindle.' Some 
years ago, when in St. Petersburg, I met 
Gen. C. Von Schweinitz, the German 
Ambassador at the Russian Court. He 
said to me, ' Mr. Stead, I hear you are 
anxious to preserve peace ? ' ' Yes,' said 
I. ' I can give you a prescription which 
will secure the peace of the world for all 
time.' ' Oh ! give it to me, quick.' ' It 
is veiy simple,' said he. ' You have only 
to hang twelve newspaper editors, and let 
me choose the editors. I would begin with 
the editor of the Cologne Gazette, and 
the second man I would hang would be 
the editor of the London Times.' " 

" The other day I was in Washington, 
and an eminent American statesman told 
me that the newspapers in the new world, 
as in the old, rendered the task of the gov- 
ernment in maintaining peace very diffi- 
cult. ' Have you any remedy ? ' I asked. 
' Alas,' he said, ' I see no remedy except- 
ing the use of the electrocution chair.' " 

The popular oijinion has generally pre- 
vailed that rulers and high state officials 
are the prime movers in war, either to 
gratify diseased ambitions, or for political 
aggrandizement, or, basest of all, merely 
for some commercial advantages and 
financial gain, or to take advantage of the 
distress of a weaker power and so secure 
additional territory, or at least exact 



tribute money; and that the people, moved 
by the intense force of the sentiment of 
loyalty, follow their lead blindly, ignorant 
of the true causes of the movements, 
though knowing well that they alone must 
bear the needless burden of debt and 
misery which war entails. But since 
through the vastly increased means of 
cunnnunieation of every character nations 
have become more interdependent, even 
for the necessaries and comforts of life; 
and the destructiveness of the engines of 
war has been so terribly multiplied, as 
well as the expense of prosecuting the 
war, it is undoubtedly true that, as Mr. 
Stead has said, the conditions have 
changed, and rulers and people alike de- 
clare for peace unless the passions of the 
people are wickedly inflamed by unprin- 
cijiled leaders of opinion whose God is 
gain, and who care not what millions may 
suffer, so long as they get an increase of 
influence or riches. It is, iserhaps, im- 
possible to silence these powers without 
violence to some of the dearest principles 
of liberty, as the freedom of the press and 
freedom of speech, — principles that have 
become fii-nily established only after a 
century of the bitterest strife and the 
martyrdom of many heroic men. But 
there is another method by which the same 
ends may be secured, though it may be 
slow and halting in its progress; and that 
is, to bring the peoples themselves of the 
diiferent nations into such close relations 
with each other, and to establish such a 
mutual understanding between them, that 
the cry of the war vultures shall fall on 
deaf ears, and they themselves shall be- 
come recognized as the loathsome, ab- 
horred, accursed creatures they really are. 
As was said further in the address re- 
ferred to above : " It is written, ' Blessed 
are the peacemakers, for they shall be 
called the children of God;' but I say 
unto you, cursed are the mischief makers, 
for they are verily and truly the children 
of the devil." 

For fully a hundred years, through good 
or through ill rej^orts, chiefly through ill, 
many noble men and associations have 
been struggling to secure permanent 



680 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLU POWEE. 



bases for peace between all nations, their 
efforts culminating- in The Hague Con- 
ferences, the great, permanent Peace 
Tribunal, and the legion of arbitration 
treaties that have been made binding dur- 
ing the past few years. But all the time 
there have been silent forces at work 
touching the hearts of the common people 
of the different nations, which have al- 
ready become most potent, and which are 
destined mightily to supplement the 
actions of parliaments and conferences. 
It is some of these events and movements, 
not in themselves peace measures, which 
we have classed as " International Cour- 
tesies." or " Little Things that make for 
Peace." that we consider in this chapter. 
We can. of course, mention but a few of 
many; but all tend to teach the people of 
each country that the people of other 
countries are men of like passions with 
themselves, actuated by the same love of 
home and family, the same desires for 



people of the United States was very bit- 
ter toward the government and people of 
England; and the public speaker or states- 
men who would gain the loudest applause 
had only to denounce in the fiercest terms 
the nation that had shown so little sym- 
riathy for us in our great struggle to main- 
tain the union, or, in other words and in 
popular language, " to twist the British 
lion's tail." Yet only four years after the 
war. while political passions in both coun- 
tries were at a white heat over the settle- 
ment of the "Alabama Claims." George 
Peabody died in London, — an American 
b,v birth and training who had maintained 
loyal allegiance to his native land through 
more than thirty years of residence in an 
adopted country, yet had won the highest 
esteem of his British associates by his 
generous, noble. Christian life; and when 
after his death the gracious command of 
the Queen of England ordained that his 
remains should lie in state in Westmin- 




THE MONARCH BEARING THE REMAINS OF GEORGE PEABODY TO AMERICA. 



peaceful and harmonious lives, and the 
same disinclination to consciously do an 
unkindness or injury to any neighbor oi 
fellow man. 

It is unquestionably true that at the 
close of our civil war the sentiment of the 



ster Abbey, and then, in response to his oft 
expressed wish to be buried in his native 
town, should be borne to the American 
shores on the newest and finest vessel of 
the great British navy, a sympathetic 
chord was touched in the hearts of mil- 



INTERNATIONAL COURTESIES. 



681 



lions of people on both sides of the Atlan- 
tic, and one touch of sorrow made both 
countries kin. There were no jjolitics nor 
policy in the Queen's act ; it was the im- 
pulse of a noble woman to honor the 
memory of a noble, large-hearted, gen- 
erous man ; and there was not a person in 
either country capable of appreciating an 
exalted sentiment whose heart was not 
softened, — and things could never be quite 
the same again. The resultant mental at- 
titude was so well expressed editorially by 
one of the leading London papers, " The 
Telegraph," that we quote from it : " They 
(the American people) w'ill say that we 
have done ourselves and them virtue and 
honor in thus reverencing the consum- 
mate humanity which was in this king of 
givers; and it will hapiien, as we have said 
before, that the dead body of George Pea- 
body will complete the work done by his 
living hand and heart. There will arise 
out of this funeral voyage of the Queen's 
new iighting ship a thought calculated to 
fake the trade away from fighling ships 
altogether; a feeling which advances civ- 
ilization with a voiceless charm of im- 
pulse. Men will be set to meditating, on 
both sides of the Atlantic, how much 
wiser, better, and higher is the spirit of 
peace than the spirit of war, and, above 
all, liow shameful and strange in the eyes 
of civilization the spectacle would he if 
the land that sent home George Peahodi/'s 
remains and the land which received the 
' noile heart that heats no more ' should 
ever again handy words of menace or 
hatred." 

It need hardly be said that these lofty 
sentiments were fully appreciated and re- 
ciprocated by the American iieople, — an 
appreciation that was voiced in the press, 
in the many orations and sermons the sad 
event occasioned, as well as in several 
poems of merit. The closing stanzas of 
one of these, a responsive note to Eng- 
land's thought, were as follows : 

" England, we take him from thine arms; 
We thank thee for thy reverent care; 
If thou and we were ever friends 
Wo should be so beside his bier. 



'■ Ilis memory should be a spell 

To banish spleen and bitterness. 

Have kindlier thoughts of us, — for he 

Was tender unto thy distress. — 

" As we have kindlier thoughts of thee 
Because of honor done to him; 
For while we weep, we turn to see 
That English eyes with tears are. 
dim." 

When three years later the questions 
concerning the depredations of the Ala- 
bama and other confederate cruisers which 
had brought Great Britain and the United 
States to the very verge of war were 
peacefully settled by arliitration, and that 
great precedent of arbitration was es- 
tablished from wliich we may well be- 
lieve the two countries will never again 
depart, who shall say how much of tlie 
spirit of peace and amity that prevailed 
at the Geneva Conference had its source 
in the fact that the hearts of the people 
of the two countries had been attuned to 
more perfect harmony by a common grief, 
and had come more etfectually to realize 
the truth that they were " of one flesh," 
through their contemplation of the vir- 
tues of a life in which each claimed a 
part. 

It was doubtless the appreciation of 
the truth that even the most idealized 
friendship must sometimes give expres- 
sion to itself to retain its full vitality 
that sugg-ested to a few prominent Erench 
gentlemtai the idea of giving voice in a 
material way to the ancient regard of their 
country and its people for the sister Re- 
public on this side of the Atlantic. For 
more than one hundred years hardly a 
shadow of discord had been east upon the 
friendly paths which the two Republics 
had followed; and the recollection of the 
invaluable services rendered by France to 
the colonists when struggling for their 
independence has ever been cherished by 
their descendants, and has been made the 
subject of countless notable recognitions 
in prose and verse. As one writer has well 
said: " Before our nation was, the demo- 
cratic idea had been for many years ex- 
isting and expanding among the French 



682 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



people; cruslied again and again by ty- 
rants it ever rose, renewed, and fresh, for 
the insuperable conflict. Through all 
their vicissitudes the people of France 
have upheld, unfalteringly, their ideal, — 
Liberty, Equality. Fraternity. Our own 
Republic exists to-day because France 
helped us when England sought to crush 
us." While, therefore, there seemed less 
need of tangible evidence of regard and 
kindly feeling from the French people 
than from any other, it was a gracious 
sentiment that prompted them to make a 
practical demonstration of their hearty 
sympathy with the people of the United 
States in their rejoicing that the new 
nation, whose eveiy aspiration for greater 
liberty they had so warmly cherished and 
(■ncouraged, had for one hundred years of 
unbroken progress manifested clearly and 
convincingly to all men the inherent 
vitality and virtue of Republican institu- 
tions. The design is said to have origi- 
nated with M. Laboulaye, a noted pub- 
licist and ardent admirer of the United 
States, who had spent some time in this 
covmtry studying its institutions and the 
workings of its constitution, and who had 
written much on these subjects for the 
cidightenment of the French people. His 
proposition was enthusiastically received 
and endorsed by his fellow members of 
the Franco-American Alliance, an associa- 
tion of gentlemen whose membership in- 
cluded such names as de Noailles, de Toc- 
queville, deWitt, Martin, and deRemusat ; 
and tile idea quickly took form in the de- 
termination to appeal to the people of 
France to contribute in small sums toward 
the erection in the United States of a 
monument which should worthily sym- 
bolize the dominant ideal of both repub- 
lics, — Liberty. What was considered an 
adequate sum, two hundred and fifty thou- 
sand dollars, was quickly raised; and the 
distinguished French artist and sculptor, 
M. Bartholdi, who had entered with en- 
thusiasm into the project, was commis- 
sioned to design and execute the work. 
The plan had been communicated through 
the American Minister at Paris to the 
United States, and the gift was condi- 



tioned upon the furnishing of a suitable 
site and pedestal by the people of this 
country. Within a short time the people 
contributed two hundred and fifty thou- 
sand dollars for the erection of a suitable 
base, and the South end of Bedloe's is- 
land, in New York harbor, was selected as 
a site. 

Bartholdi had designed a heroic statue 
of a woman, holding a lighted torch in her 
Iiand, which should represent the idea of 
" Liberty Enlightening the World." For 
ten years sixty men besides Bartholdi and 
his immediate assistants (among whom 
was Eiffel who later designed the famous 
Eiffel Tower) worked upon the great 
figure. The material of which it was con- 
structed was three-fifths iron and the bal- 
ance copper, and completed it weighed 
over one hundred tons. It was shipped 
to this country in three hundred and fifty 
pieces, which were put together upon the 
great foundation of granite that had been 
prepared for it, the pedestal alone being 
one hundred and seventy-seven feet in 
height. The completed statue measured 
one hundred and fifty feet from the base 
to the top of the extended arm and torch, 
making the entire elevation of the torch 
three hundred and twenty-seven feet 
above mean tide-level. In itself by far 
tlie tallest statue in the world, on its ped- 
estal it. overtopped all otliers by at least 
two hundred feet. The figure is that of 
a handsome, proud woman, the head 
crowned with a diadem, whose right arm 
is raised and holds aloft a blazing torch, 
while the left hand and arm enfold a 
tal)let on which is inscribed the date of 
the Declaration of Independence. The 
left foot is slightly advanced aud supports 
the main weight of the body. The peplus 
and tunic with which the body is lobed 
fall in graceful and ample folds from the 
shoulders and waist to the feet; and the 
sweep of the tunic's folds as they fall, as 
if spread out by the force of the wind as 
the woman advances, make a base of the 
most solid character, giving to the whole 
statue an appearance of solidity and 
firmness, and in reality a stability that 
the fiercest hurricanes could not disturb. 



INTERNATIONAL COURTESIES. 



683 



One may get a better impression of the 
colossal size of the figure from such facts 
as that in the head, which is fourteen feet 
high, forty persons can stand 'with ease 
at one time; while the flame of the torch 
^yi^ accommodate fifteen ijeople, without 



minister, to the United States in the per- 
son of the Minister to Erance, Mr. Mor- 
ton; and the dedicatory exercises in the 
United States, on October 23, 1886, were 
attended with elaborate ceremonies. There 
was a great military and civic parade in 




THE BAHTHOLDI STATTTE. 



crowding or stooping. A gallery is built 
just above the hand, at the base of and 
around the torch, from which visitors 
secure an unequaled view of the harbor 
and the cities of New York, Brooklyn, and 
of all the surrounding counti-j-. The torch 
is illuminated at night by the most 
powerful electric lights, which can be 
seen for more than thirty miles, so that 
the first light the incoming vessels sight 
is from liberty's torch; and as every ves- 
sel entering the harbor by day passes in 
view of the statue the earliest greeting 
that the traveler or immigrant receives on 
approaching the new world is an expres- 
sion of the highest ideal of American 
thought, government, and institutions, 
which is Liberty, — social, civil, and politi- 
cal ; or as the French people would express 
it, in the sentiment of their historic 
watchword, is Liberty, Equality, FraterT 
nity. 

The statue was first formally presented 
by M. Ferdinand de Lesseps, in the ab- 
sence of ]\L Jules Ferry, the French prime 



New York city, after which thirty-seven 
steam-vessels bore the most distinguished 
guests and national and state officials to 
Bedloe's island. The exercises were 
opened with prayer, which was followed 
by an eloquent and scholarly address by 
Senator William M. Evarts, in the course 
of which he announced the presentation 
of the statue to the United States by 
France. The face and shoulders of the 
figure which had been covered by tri- 
colored flags were then unveiled amid the 
terrific din of cannon from the forts in 
the harbor, steam whistles, and bells. 
President Cleveland then accepted the 
statue on behalf of the American people 
in a dignified address, reciprocating 
cordially the sentiment of the French peo- 
ple, and prophesying permanency for the 
kindly relations that had existed between 
the two peoples for so many years, of 
which the noble statue they were then 
dedicating would ever stand as an elo- 
quent reminder. And it is certai?! that by 
this courteous attention and generous 



G84: 



FROM CULUXY TO WOKLIJ POWEK. 



action of the French people, fhey and the 
people of the United States, almost un- 
conseiotisly, perhaps, were knit a little 
more closely together, and the possibility 
of political misunderstanding and strife 
was pushed farther into the background 
than it had ever been before. 

Wo have for some years been ac- 
customed to reciprocity treaties between 
our own and other countries for the pur- 
pose of removing obstructions to inter- 
national commerce. But the reciprocity 
treaties that have been quietly negotiated 
between universities of this country and 
those of the principal countries of Europe 
are not so well known or understood by 
the people. While the politicians have 
haggled and disputed over the commercial 
treaties, and an omniscient and omnipo- 
tent Senate has either smothered or emas- 
culated the majority of them, the scholars 
of the various countries have worked in 
beautiful harmony with the result that we 
already have, and are to luive in the 
future, reciprocal relations in higher edu- 
cation with nearly all the greater institu- 
tions of learning of Europe, — a movement 
devoid of politics, and in which alleged 
statesmen have no part, yet which will 
surely and rapidly bring the best thought 
and the highest aspirations of the peoples 
of these countries into such intelligent 
and affectionate union that the art of 
diplomacy will find a constantly restricted 
field for its activities, and will, we trust, 
in the not distant future become one of 
the "lost arts," never to be rediscovered 
nor resurrected. The beginning's of this 
form of international reciprocity are to be 
found in the work of I'Alliance Fran- 
qaise. With its headquarters in Paris, 
this institution has for many years carried 
cm everywhere an active propaganda in 
behalf of tho French language, literature, 
and civilization. It has been very active 
in this country; and several years ago 
French professors under its patronage 
began to come to the United States to 
lecture in their own language at Harvard 
University, and elsewhere. Inspired by 
this work, with which he had become ac- 
quainted while a student at Cambridge, 



ilr. James II. Hyde, in 1903, established 
the foundation for an annual course of 
lectures at the Sorbonne, Paris, by a 
Harvard professor. This course was 
inaugurated in the summer of 1904 by 
Professor Barrett Wendell, who gave a 
series of lectures that attracted wide 
attention, on the general subject of Ameri- 
can ideals as disclosed in American lit- 
erature. The second course was given 
the following year by Professor Santa- 
yana on American philosophy; and the 
work IS being carried on in regular 
course each year by different members 
of the Harvard faculty. By way of 
reciprocity, similar work is now done each 
year at Harvard by a professor from 
the Sorbonne, — on each foundation the 
lecturer speaking in his own language. A 
distinguished French scholar who has 
especially interested himself in this and 
other movements tending to draw the peo- 
ple of the different nations more closely 
together, is Baron de Coubertin. He was 
the inspiring spirit and liberal leader in 
the revival of the Olympic games: has 
established French prizes at Princeton, 
Tulane, Leland Stanford, and California 
Universities; and has written and spoken 
persistently and devoted his enthusiasm, 
time, and money to the furtherance of the 
cause of closer international relations 
outside the field of political endeavor. 

In 1004 the Faculty of Law of the Uni- 
versit.v of Paris invited Charles F. Beach, 
Jr., one of the leading lawj'ers of New 
York, a thurough student of Corporation 
law and Equity jurisprudence with ex- 
tended experience as a practicing lawyer 
along both lints, to give in the Paris 
School a course of lectures on American 
law. Mr. Beach had graduated in law 
both from Columbia and the University 
of Paris, and so was founded in both 
Common and Roman law, and eagerly 
entered upon his work in Paris during the 
University Session of 1904-5. The first 
year's course was such a pronounced suc- 
cess that at its close Mr. Beach was urged 
to continue the work the next winter, 
which he did, broadening the scope of his 
subject by introducing a treatment of 



INTERNATIONAL COURTESIES. 



685 



American institutions as well as law. 
That year, too, he was urged to repeat his 
lectures at the University of Lille; and 
in 1907 his field was still further en- 
larged hy the inclusion of the Universities 
of Bordeaux and of Toulouse, showing a 
steadily increasing interest among the 
students of the French universities in the 
study of American social and political 
life, as well as of its law. Owing to the 
technical language that must so largely 
pervade lectures on law, Mr. Beach de- 
livered his main lectures in the French 
language, closing each with a general talk 
of about fifteen minutes in English. 
When it is remembered that the Uni- 
versity of Paris has annually upwards of 
fifteen thousand students, and that more 
than five thousand are registered in the 
law department alone; and further that 
these students come from every state of 
Europe and the far East, it will easily be 
realized that Professor Beach's work must 
vastly influence the unification of thought 
of many peoples. 

At his oflicial diplomatic reception on 
New Year's Day, 1904, the German Em- 
peror, in conversation with the American 
Ambassador, suggested the desirability of 
an exchange of professors between German 
and American universities as a means of 
promoting a better understanding between 
the two peoples and a wider knowledge of 
their respective histories and institutions. 
For some reason the matter was allowed to 
lie dormant for the time. But in the 
summer of 1905 President Nicholas 
Murray Butler, of Columbia University, 
went abroad, spending two weeks of his 
vacation in quiet seclusion with Professor 
Burgess, of the same university, at Wil- 
helmshohe, Prussia. During this period 
the Emperor came to the castle at Wil- 
helmshohe, and gave President Butler a 
most informal interview, at which he de- 
tailed to his Majesty his plans. The 
Emperor was greatly pleased to find that 
his suggestion of the year before had been 
so keenly appreciated, and invited both 
President Butler and Professor Burgess 
to dine informally with him at a later 
day, when he would also have present Dr. 



Althotf, the head of the Prussian Ministry 
of Education; and at that second meeting 
all final arrangements were made and the 
matter closed. It was determined that a 
professorship of American history and in- 
stitutions, to be known as the Theodore 
Roosevelt Professorship, should be estab- 
lished at the University of Berlin by and 
under the direction of Columbia Univer- 
sity, the incumbents to be appointed by 
the Prussian Ministry of Education, with 
the sanction of the Emperor, upon nomi- 
nation by the Trustees of Columbia. The 
plan of the work covers definite treat- 
ments not only of the subject of American 




Photograph Underwood d- Underivoodt N. y. 

EMPEROR WILLIAM II. OF GERMANY. 

history and constitutional law, but also 
of the fundamental and prominent prob- 
lems and movements in this country in 
economics and sociology, the industrial 
problems, edncation, and later a consider- 
ation of American contributions in the 



686 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tield of the Arts and Sciences. Provision 
is also made by which the courses may 
be repeated in other German nniversitics 
if the faculties so request. The reciprocal 
foundation of a chair at Columbia for 
corresponding courses covering German 
institutions and movements was made 
possible by the liberality of Mr. James 
Speyer, of New York, who gave fifty 
thousand dollars to endow the professor- 
ship. These lectures are naturally de- 
livered in German at Berlin, and in Eng- 
lish at Columbia. The first to occupy the 
chair at Berlin upon the Columbia 
foundation was Professor John W. Bur- 
gess, the head of the department of 
Political Science and Constitutional Law 
at Columbia, whose course of lectures and 
instruction covered the field of American 
political history. 

An interesting feature of the work on 
the Speyer foundation has been the estab- 
lishment at the University of Berlin of 
an American library. A start was made 
by sending from New York one thousand 
volmnes on American history and social 
and political questions, which will be in- 
creased from time to time until a repu- 
table collection is made. A separate room 
has been set apart for these books in the 
University library, and they are separately 
catalogued. 

It is not alone these actual achieve- 
ments along the line of reciprocal educa- 
tion that are impressive : but also the fact 
that all leaders of public opinion and 
statesmen of other countries are waken- 
ing to the immense significance of the 
movement and are anxious that their 
people shall share in its beneficence. 
Italy has already formed important con- 
nections of a similar character with in- 
stitutions in the United States, France, 
and Germany. Between English uni- 
versities and American there is hardly the 
same need of interchanges as between our 
own schools and those of Continental 
nations, since English and American in- 
stitutions, civil, political, religious, and 
educational are more nearly alike than are 
our own and those of any other nation. 
Many interchanges have been made, how- 



ever, between American and British uni- 
versities, with the happiest results. In fact 
the first suggestion of any step in this 
direction was made as far back as 1864, 
when Mr. Henry Yates Thompson, a 
graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, 
England, proposed to endow a lectureship 
at that University, the lecturer to be ap- 
pointed each year by the President and 
Fellows of Harvard University, and the 
course and instruction to cover the broad 
field of the history, literature, and insti- 
tutions of the United States. The Cam- 
bridge authorities, however, declined the 
gift. Thompson afterwards came to this 
country and laid his plans before the 
President and Fellows of Harvard, by 
whom they were considered. A proposal 
to effect the purposes arrived at by Mr. 
Thompson was made by the Harvard to 
the Cambridge authorities ; but after con- 
sideration the j)roposal was again rejected 
on the ground, as it was afterward 
learned, that Harvard was a " Socinian " 
institution. 

Even South America has been attracted 
by this movement. Not long ago Dr. Carlos 
Pellegrini, the eminent statesman of the 
Argentine Republic, in conversation with 
the American minister, Mr. Barrett, said: 
" We have been having the opportunity 
of seeing many of your diplomatic and 
commercial representatives, but we have 
not seen any of your educational author- 
ities. We should like to learn more of 
your educational methods, and we should 
like to have you learn something of ours. 
An interchange in this resjaect is a con- 
sumjiiation devoutly to be desired. If one 
of your great men were to come to us on a 
visit of inspection he would get such a 
reception as has never before been given 
to anyone in South America." With this 
thought germinating in the minds of some 
of the leading men of the South American 
states, it will not be long before educa- 
tional reciprocity will be working in the 
southerly direction also, as their repre- 
sentatives are sure to find American edu- 
cators very responsive to the desires of 
those of other countries. 

While the Baron Kaneko Kentaro, a 



INTERNATIONAL COUETESIES. 



687 



member of the House of Lords of Japan, 
and the special representative of his na- 
tion to the United States during the 
Russian-Japanese war, was in this country 
he interested himself greatly in its edu- 
cational principles and methods. He was 
given the degree of Doctor of Laws by 
Harvard, and the subject of establishing a 
chair of Japanese at that University was 
favorably entertained by the authorities. 
In an article in one of the magazines, re- 
ferring to this subject, the Baron said : 
" Nothing, in my judgment, would be 
more gracious than this intellectual 
alliance. Nothing would untangle more 
effectually the sad knots of misunder- 
standings which are resulting from racial 
differences and racial prejudices. Nothing 
would ivorh so ivell in smoothing a path 
of friendly relations between the Nations 
as this viove. In fact, I look upon to-day 
as a golden age in which we may be per- 
mitted to bring about a scholarly alliance 
between East and West which, of neces- 
sity, would inaugurate a better day of 
friendly relations between the powers." 

During the past two or three years 
earnest and effective steps have been taken 
in England to establish reciprocal service 
between the great home universities and 
the higher institutions of the various 
colonies of the empire in all parts of the 
world. This plan is rapidly taking form 
as one of the institutions of the great 
educational system, and it will unques- 
tionably tend to bind the colonies in still 
more friendly union with the home gov- 
ernment and peoijle. Speaking of this 
movement one of the leading English 
statesmen recently said : " The real sig- 
nificance of this federation of universities 
is not its relation to education, though 
that is of immense importance; but its re- 
lation to a problem which has defined 
itself in our time, — the consolidation and 
unification of our Empire." 

Certainly no other evidence need be in- 
troduced to show that a new force mak- 
ing for peace and good-will toward all 
men has thus quietly become, and is be- 
coming, effective. Its birth was heralded 
by no pronunciamentos of Kaiser, King, 



or President, nor by the sounding of 
trumpets, and its growth has been as silent 
as the growth of the flowers; yet we be- 
lieve its results will prove the most domi- 
nant influence in ultimately establishing 
and making law the " Wishes " and the 




Photo. Copuriffhted by ./. K. Pnrdy, Boston. 
BARON KANEKO KENTARO. 

Conventions uttered by the Peace Con- 
ferences, and will also give to arbitration 
treaties their strongest moral support. 

When that remarkable man, the " Na- 
poleon of South Africa " as he was called, 
Cecil Rhodes, died, on the 20th of March, 
1902, at the age of forty-nine years, he 
left an estate of thirty million dollars. 
From early youth his mind had been filled 
with visions of the " Federation of the 
World," and of universal peace because 
there should be but one world power. 
" The greatness of this dream," says a biog- 
rapher, " is to be traced to a passage in 
Aristotle which clung to his mind like a 
burr. In his reading at O.xford he came 
across the remark of the ancient Greek 
philosopher that ' Virtue is the highest 



G88 



FROM COLONY TO WOELD POWEK. 



activity of the soul living- for tlie highest 
ohjeet in a perfect life.' To Rliodes this 
seemed to contain in a nutshell the wisdom 
necessary for the guidance of life. He 
used to paraphrase it so as to make it read- 
Hint the great thing at the heginning of 
life was to have an oliject sufficiently lofty 
Id iniil-c it wortli wJiile spending your 
whole life in obtaining it. And having 
got this master word, he was never at rest 
until he could discover the object sufB- 
ciently good to make it worth the dedica- 
tiim of a life. He found it after much 
hesitation, in the conviction which, once 
formed, he never varied, that the highest 
practical ideal was to leorl for fiie unity 
of the English spealing race, in order 
that, being united, it might extend over 
all tlie world tlie beneficent influence 
wliii-li ' tliis best of races' as he phrased 



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,v..iB 



CKCIL JciHN RHODES. 

it, exercised for Justice, Liberty, and 
Peace among the inhabitants of this 
planet." With this key one can get some 
better idea of, though he could never un- 
derstand, the character and nature of the 
man. Though apparently grasping and 



avaricious, and not squeamish as to the 
methods by which he got his wealth, he 
seems ever to have despised money in 
itself or for his own use, desiring to ac- 
cumulate it for the purpose of furthering 
the great Empire-making designs he ha<l 
conceived. And a few years before he 
died success seemed almost certain; for 
had it not been for the fatal mistake of 
the Jameson raid the chances were cer- 
tainly in his favor that he would estab- 
lish the sovereignty of Great Britain 
over practically all of Africa south of the 
Zambesi river. His was a life of mighty 
contrasts, yet all its force and energy he 
strove to exert in but one direction, and 
that looked toward peace and the happi- 
ness of all mankind ; and his last words, — 
" so much to do ; so little done," — were the 
cry of a broken heart, and were so charged 
witli pathos as to excite the warmest sym- 
pathy in every human breast. 

When his will was opened it was found 
tliat he had made a disposition of the bulk 
of the estate in accordance with tallvs he 
liad had with friends, and for the fur- 
therance of his life purpose. The scheme 
lie devised was a novel one, and was de- 
signed to bring into the closest relations 
the greatest possible numbers of picked 
young men from Germany, the United 
States, and the outlying dependencies of 
Great Britain. To this end he established 
a large number of scholarships at Ox- 
ford University, each yielding fifteen 
liundred dollars annually, which were to 
be given to selected young men in each of 
the districts named, and possessing which 
these men were to remain for three years 
associated with each other and witli the 
picked youth of England, at England's 
greatest university. "Eor," said Mr. 
Rhodes in his will, " a good understanding 
between England, Germany, and the 
LTnited States will secure the peace of the 
world; and educational relations form tlie 
strongest tie." As is well known two of 
these scholarships are allotted to each 
state and territory of the United States, 
and the privileges provided under them 
have now been available for about three 
years, so that at the present time there 



INTERNATIONAL COURTESIES. 



689 



are, and will be for the future, nearly 
three hundred American students enjoy- 
ing the advantages of Oxford, and be- 
coming familiar with English people and 
English customs and institutions. It has 
not been our purpose to speak of the life 
of ilr. Rhodes at length, nor to consider 
the practicability of his scheme. But it 
is unquestionably true that the working- 
out of his plans is furnishing another 
powerful argument in support of our 
thesis that the " little things " from the 
political standpoint, the quiet forces of 
friendly relations between peoples, are a 
more powerful leaven than diplomacy and 
statecraft. 

When in 1894, as a result of President 
Cleveland's position regarding the al- 
leged British aggressions in Venezuela, 
the " Jingx) " spirit broke loose in Great 
Britain and for a time war seemed immi- 
nent, one of the most potent of the many 
voices in England that demanded an ami- 
cable settlement of the question was that 
of the Hon. James Bryce. Knowing and 
loving his own country and its people, 
and hardly less familiar with and attached 
to the people of the United States, he 
realized that any war between the two 
nations would be a fratricidal contest, 
and a crime; and the later years of his 
life have been largely devoted to estab- 
lishing between the t^vo countries such an 
appreciation of our mutual interests and 
opportunities as should make the sugges- 
tion of unfriendly and hostile relations 
abhorrent to both peoples. So that when 
it was announced two years ago that his 
government proposed to send him as 
Ambassador from Great Britain to the 
United States the appointment was re- 
garded as one of the most fitting that 
could be made, and one tending to unite 
in closer bonds of friendship the two 
gTcat English-speaking races; and all in- 
telligent and thoughtful Americans ex- 
perienced a particular thrill of pleasure 
and satisfaction. Having, as a student, 
at the age of twenty-four, written one of 
the most important historical works of 
the nineteenth century — " The Holy 
14 



Roman Empire," — he took rank at once 
as a historical writer of the first order, 
and was so recognized by the foremost 
historians of the world. Turning, early 
in life, his attention and thought to this 
country and its people be began the long 




JAMES BRYCE. 

Ijcriod of study and investigation whose 
fruit was the publication in 1888 of 
" The American Commonwealth," a criti- 
cal yet friendly analysis of the National 
and State Constitutions of our country, 
and of their working as illustrated by the 
actual conditions that obtained in our 
national, state, and municipal life. Had 
a partial or unfriendly hand written the 
work it would, in many places, have been 
unpleasant reading; but all readers recog- 
nized the sympathetic student of actual 
conditions, and realized that even un- 
pleasant criticism was tempered by the 
most kindly regard, with the result that 
the author has come to be esteemed as one 
of ourselves, and his work has been ac- 
cepted and made the standard by all 
scholarly men and learned institutions, 
and has been honored with a sale almost 



690 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



equal to that of the popular novel of the 
clay. We believe it will be admitted by 
all well-informed and thouylitful men that 
Mr. Bryce and his great work have been 
most ijotent influences making for peace, 
and that they are influences that will in- 
crease in force for many years. It is a 
happy coincidence, too, that an American 
scholar has been able to reciprocate with 
marked success Mr. Bryce's courteous and 
friendly presentation of the truth regard- 
ing the growth and influence of the 
American constitutions and institutions 
as the Hon. Ilannis Taylor has done in 
his great work on " The Origin and 
Growth of the English Constitution." 
Since the day of the publication of its 
first volume this study of the English 
Constitution has taken first rank with all 
scholars in this country and Great 
Britain, and has now been given the same 
honor by English institutions of learning 
that American schools and colleges 
awarded to the " American Common- 
wealth," — that of being adopted as the 
standard work and text-book on the sub- 
ject of which it treats. And again " hands 
have been joined across the sea " that shall 
further insure the solidarity of the Eng- 
lish-speaking races. 



Believing that war is a crime, as well 
as a wicked, stupid, and senseless way of 
attempting to settle disputed questions 
(it has rarely ever settled them), it is 
pleasant to be able to chronicle so many 
movements that are silently creating a 
sentiment that will demand more reason- 
able methods of overcoming any friction 
that may occur between civilized nations; 
and it is not less pleasant to make clear 
how uniform is the sentiment among all 
thinking men that the surest means of 
securing the much-deeired end is the cul- 
tivation of the more intimate acquaint- 
ance of the peoples of the various nations 
with each other. For if they can be 
brought truly to realize " that God hath 
created of one blood all nations of men " 
the day will not be far distant when uni- 
versal peace shall be the normal condition 
under which all men shall live. 

" If I knew you and you knew me — 
If both of us could clearly see, 
And with an inner sight divine 
The meaning of your heart and mine, 
I'm sure that we would differ less 
And clasp our hands in friendliness; 
Our thoughts would pleasantly agree 
If I knew you and you knew me." 

(Nixon Waterman.) 



LV. 



EDUCATION IN THE COLONIES AND STATES. 



Education at tlie Time of tlie Great Reformation. — Tlie Renaissance. — Wyclif's Position. 
Liitlier's Appeal to tlie German ilagistrates. — " The True Wealth of a City is to Have Many 
Learned, Serious, Worthy, Well-educated Citizens.'' — Common Schools in Germany and Low 
Ccnintries in Sixtoculh Centuiy. — Contact of Pilgrim Fatliers with Dutch System While at 
Leydfn. — First School Established in Colonies of America. — Support of Dutch West Indift 
Company. — The Boston Latin School. — Massachusetts Law of 1647. — "The Great Clurrter 
of Free Education in the Commonwealth." — Early Schools for Boys Alone ; Girls Had Xo 
Siiare in School Privileges. — Graduates of English Universities in Colonies. — .John Harvard 
and the Founding of Harvard College. — Xo Knowledge of Harvard's Life. — $500 Offered for 
Five Lines of Authentic Information. — Present Status of University, and Its New President. 
— Foundation of William and Mary. — Elihu Yale and Yale College. — Tennent's "Log 
College " and Princeton. — Lottery to Raise Money for King's College. — Present Status of 
Columhia University. — Tlie "Dartmouth College Case." — Number and Resources of 
"Colleges, LTniversities, and Technical Schools" in the United States. — Rise of Academies 
and Notaible Preparatory Scliools. — Education of Women. — Growth of the High School 
System. — Horace Mann and the Massachusetts .State Board of Education. — Establishment 
of Normal Schools. — The National Educational Association. — Origin and Development of 
State Universities.^ Post-Graduate Work. — Women's Colleges; Vassar, Mt. Holyoke, 
Wellesley, Smith, Bryn Mawr. — The Chautauqua and Summer Schools. 



"The Schoolmaster is abroad! and I trust more to him. armed with his primer, than I do to the soldier 
In fine niilitarv array, for upholding and extending the liberties of his country." — Lord Bkotj«ham. 




OPULAR education has been the hand-maid of an en- 
lightened religion and was the first fruit of the great Ee- 
formation. The wonderful intellectual awakening which 
we call the Renaissance, the direct result of the settlement 
ill Europe, after the capture of Constantinople by the 
Turks, of Greek scholars bearing priceless Greek manu- 
scripts, and of the invention of printing, stimulated among 
the scholarly men of the period a thirst for higher learn- 
ing and broader culture; but the new light illumined only 
the student class, none of its rays penetrating- the gross 
mental darkness that enveloped the common people. All 
through the Middle Ages, and down to the sixteenth century, outside the monasteries, 
there were two sharply defined classes, — the nobility and gentry, whose whole life was 
given up to the excitements of war, the chase, or tournaments and feats of arms; 
and the serfs, who were little better than chattels, and confhied to the soil on which 
they were born. " Without books," says Compayre, " without schools, without any of 
the indispensable implements of intellectual labor, what could be done for the mental 



G92 



TKOil COLOXT TO WORLD POWEE. 



life? It took refuge in certain monas- 
teries; education flourished only in narrow 
circles, with a privileged few ; and the 
rest of the nation remained buried in au 
obscure night." And even in these " nar- 
row circles," the chief influence of the 
Renaissance was to centre all thought and 
study upon the Latin and Greek classics, 
and not to widen the confines of general 
learning by bringing within its range 
philosophy, ethics, history, and the physi- 
cal and natural sciences, the subjects 
which alone effectually touch and in- 
fluence the real life and practical thought 
of a peciple. 

A certain measure of liberty must bo 
the forerunner of a desire for learning. 
As one has said : " In order to comprehend 
the need of study, that greater liberator, 
one must already have tasted liberty." 
And it is to the Reformation, and not to 
the Eenaissance, that one must look for 
this renovating influence. When Luther 
struck at the autocracy, and denied the 
infallibility, of the Pope, he was making 
straight the way for the advent of the 
new princiisles of civil and religious 
liberty which were destined to transform 
all religious, intellectual, and su<nal life. 
As nearly two centuries earlier, Wyclif in 
England had foreseen that the only way 
to enlighten and uplift the masses of men 
was to give them, in their own tongue, the 
Gospel which makes all men free, so 
Luther made it his first duty to translate 
the New Testament into the language of 
the people. And having done this, he 
further saw that to give the spirit of the 
Christian liberty free course all the peo- 
ple, not a select few, must be taught to 
read so that each should be able to learn 
for himself, without dependence upon 
priest or church, the great truth of man's 
nobility as a child of the common Father, 
and to appreciate, in some degree, the in- 
finite worth of the individual soul. And 
how gloriously and nobly, yet tenderly, he 
plead with the civil authorities to assist 
in this work of emancipation ! " Dear 
Sirs." he wrote to all the councillors of 
Germany, " we annvially expend so much 
money on arquebuses, roads, and dikes ; 



why should we not spend a little to give 
one or two schoolmasters to our poor 
children? God stands at the door and 
knocks; blessed are we if we open to Him. 
Now the word of God abounds. O, my 
dear CJernwns, buy, buy, while the market 
is open. Busy yourself with the children; 
for many parents are like ostriches; they 
are hardened toward their little ones, and 
satisfied with having laid the egg, they 
care nothing for it afterwards. The 
lirosperity of the city does not consist 
merely in heaping up great treasures, in 
building strong walls, in erecting splendid 
mansions, in possessing glittering arms. 
If madmen fall upon it, its ruin will only 
be the greater. The true wealth of a city, 
its safety and its strength, is to have 
many learned, serious, worthy, well-edu- 
cated citizens." 

Luther naturally placed first in his 
order of instruction the teaching of re- 
ligion. " Is it not reasonable," he asks, 
" that every Christian should know the 
(lospel at the age of nine or ten?" After 
this he wished the languages taught ; but 
unfortunately he had not yet so far eman- 
cipated himself from the influences of his 
monastic training and of scholastic 
thought, as to realize that it is one's 
mother-tongue that should claim pre- 
cedence; consequently he recommends tlie 
learned languages, Greek, Latin, and 
Hebrew. The separation of the Latin, or 
classical school, from the common school.^ 
was to be the work of his immediate suc- 
cessors, Eatich and Comenius. Of the 
influence of Music Luther recognized the 
force, declaring that it "is a half -discipline 
which makes men more indulgent and 
mild;" and that "unless a schoolmaster 
know how to sing, I think him of no ac- 
count." But it was not alone that the 
great German reformer urged the neces- 
sity of an tniiversal education that later 
ages have been indebted to him. but also 
because he was the first to advocate the 
princiiile that the support of the schools 
shouhl be incumbent upon the munici- 
pality or the state, and that the civil 
authorities should require that the parents 
send their children to the schools. " It is." 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



693 



he urged, " my opinion that the authori- 
ties are bound to force their subjects to 
send their children to school. If they 
can oblige their able-bodied subjects to 
carry the lance, and the arquebus, to 
mount the ramparts, and to do complete 
military service, for a much better rea- 
son may they, and ought they, to force 
their subjects to send their children to 
school, for here it is the question of a 
much more terrible war with the devil." 
As a result of Luther's exhortations, 
and of the convincing force of his argu- 
ments, common schools sprang up all over 
Germany and the Low Countries during 
the sixteenth century, notwithstanding 
the sadly unsettled condition of political 
and social affairs which the Reformation 
movement had occasioned. This develop- 
ment was accelerated, also, by the intense 
religious enthusiasm of the community 
known as the " Brethren of the Common 
Lot," which became an active force about 
the year 1400. In the strictness of their 
lives, their community of goods, their in- 
tense devotion, and their tendency to 
mysticism they resembled the Moravians; 
but unlike the Moravians, they were 
characterized by an earnest cultivation of 
knowledge which they promoted wherever 
they went by the establishment of schools 
for primary and advanced education. By 
the end of the sixteenth century they are 
said to have established more than two 
hundred branch houses and schools, 
scattered over Northern Germany and the 
Low Countries; and it was largely due 
to these pioneers in learning that in 
the Netherlands, especially, — the home 
country of the order, — nearly every city 
and town had its public school, and the 
peasants of Holland could read and write 
well. As Motley has said : " It was a 
land of schools supported by the State; a 
land where every child went to school, 
where almost every individual inhabitant 
could write and read, while even the 
middle classes were proficient in mathe- 
matics and the classics and could speak 
two or more languages." Moreover the 
first instance, apparently, of direct super- 
vision of education by the state was the 



decree of 1582 of the Estates of Friesland 
that " the inhabitants of towns and 
villages should within the space of six 
weeks, provide good and able reformed 
schoolmasters ; and those who iieglected so 
to do would be compelled to accept the in- 
structors provided for them." And it was 
into this country, so devoted to the re- 
formed religion and to a system of com- 
mon schools supported by public taxation, 
that the Pilgrim Fathers came in 1609 
after leaving England where, as yet, the 
iilea of popular education had gained no 
foothold. It is not unnatural, therefore, 
that historians of the Dutch Republic and 
of the Low Countries charge to their 
eleven years residence in Holland the 
enthusiasm which the Pilgrims manifested 
for the establishment of schools and the 
spread of popular education, under the 
support and direction of the state, as soon 
as they had established a permanent settle- 
ment in the land to which they exiled 
themselves. 




MARTIN LUTHER. 

It is to Geneva, however, and not to 
Holland that other students trace the 
origin of public schools, though the fruit- 
ful cause of their establishment and 
nurture was the same, — the spread of the 
knowledge of the Scriptures, — whether it 
came to New England from Calvin or 



694 



FROM COLONY TO WOULD POVVEK. 



Luther. As John Fiske says : " One of 
the cardinal requirements of Democratic 
Calvanism has always been elementary ed- 
ucation for everybody. In matters of 
religion all souls are equally concerned, 
and each individual is ultimately respon- 
sible for himself, without dependence 
upon priests. Hence, it is one of the 
prime duties of a congregation to insist 
that all its members shall know how to 
read, and, if necessary, to provide them 
with the requisite instruction. In ac- 
cordance with this Calvinistio idea some 
form of universal and compulsory ele- 
mentary education sprang up during the 
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 
wherever Calvinism had become domi- 
nant. — in the Protestant parts of France 
and Switzerland, in Scotland, in the 
Netherlands, and in New England. Ob- 
viously, therefore, it might he held that 
free schools in New England were a 
natural development of Calvinism, and do 
not necessarily imply any especially close 
relation with Holland." And George 
Bancroft, in his " History of the United 
States," apparently settles the whole ques- 
tion by the dogmatic declaration : " The 
Common School System was derived from 
Geneva, the work of John Calvin ; intro- 
duced by Luther into Germany, by John 
Knox into Scotland; and so became the 
property of the English-speaking nations." 
But, impressive as this statement is, the 
facts hardly support it. For Luther's 
letters to the magistrates, urging them to 
establish public schools in every com- 
munity, and arguing that their right to 
tax the people for the support of such 
schools was as clear as their right to levy 
taxes for the protection of their cities and 
the maintenance of troops, was sent out 
in the year 1524, when Calvin was but 
fifteen years of age, and twelve years be- 
fore he first visitc<l Geneva. That letter 
showed clearly that Luther had already 
worked out the plan of a public school 
system, and had satisfied himself fully as 
to the practicability and legality of the 
municipal support; and it is evident that 
his inspiration did not come from Geneva, 
and that Calvin had no part in the con- 



ception of the work. Moreover, in 1836, 
on the occasion of the celebration of the 
t\vo-hundredth anniversary of the found- 
ing of Harvard College, the Hon. Edward 
Everett, in a notable oration, referring to 
the action of the ^Massachusetts General 
Court in voting £400 " toward a school or 
college," declared that this was " the first 
body in which the people, by their repre- 
sentatives, ever gave their own money to 
found a place of education. If there is 
such a thing as a precedent for such foun- 
dation as is this day commemorated, it 
must, of course, he in England." This 
naturally implies a careful investigation 
of the subject by the learned orator, and 
no such precedent having been found in 
English history he affirmed that on Sept. 
8, 1036, by the General Court of Massa- 
chusetts " this auspicious precedent was 
established of making the support of edu- 
cation a public charge." " This state- 
ment," says John Fiske (" Beginnings of 
New England ") " is incorrect, for before 
1609, when the Pilgrims began their 
sojourn at Leyden, the system of public 
schools paid for out of the municipal or 
parochial taxes, had become thoroughly 
established in the Netherlands; the:-e were 
not only public common schools, but 
evei-y city and many rural places had their 
public Latin schools." It seems clear, 
therefore, that neither Luther nor the 
Pilgrim Fathers owed to Geneva or 
Calvin their conception of a common 
school system ; and that it was not until 
several years after the Pilgrims had be- 
come established in the New World that 
this system though, perhaps, " introduced 
by John Knox into Scotland," became the 
property of the English nation, — the in- 
tercourse between England and Scotland 
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 
being far less free and familiar than was 
that between England and the Nether- 
lands. And it would seem no less clear 
that it was during their temporary so- 
journ of eleven years in Holland that the 
Pilgrims became acquainted with the 
principles an<l workings of the Common 
School system, and that they borrowed 
from that wondcrfid little country the 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



695 



idea which they used so effectively iu es- 
tablishing their educational foundations 
in the New World. 

It seems to admit of little question that 
the first public school established iu 
North America was that of the Reformed 
Dutch Church in New Amsterdam, which 
has maintained a continuous existence 
from 1633 to the present time. From the 
discovery by Henry Hudson, in 1009, of 
the noble river to which his name has 
been given, while taking part in the per- 
sistent search of all early navigators for 
the fabled northwest passage to India, the 
interest of the Netherlanders in American 
settlements became continuous and ag- 
gressive. The few early settlers on Man- 
hattan island were merely a handful of 
traders with the Indians; but gradually a 
more permanent settlement was estab- 
lished, which was later nourished and 
given greater stability by the Dutch West 
India Company, chartered by the States- 
General in 1G21, with a field of operations 
which embraced Africa, the West India 
Islands, and the continent of America, — 
it being especially charged with the care 
and colonization of the New Netherlands, 
as the country about Manhattan island 
and adjacent to the Hudson river had 
been named. After purchasing Man- 
hattan island from the Indians in 1624 
for the princely sum of twenty-four dol- 
lars, payable in merchandise on which an 
enormous profit was made, the Company 
in 1629 enacted a " Statute of Freedoms 
and Exemptions," to encourage the estab- 
lishment of colonies on their fertile river 
lands. By this charter the colonists were 
given freedom from taxation for a period 
of ten years, together with special privi- 
leges of land-holding (covering the Pa- 
troon System) and of self-government. 
In return for these liberal concessions the 
beneficiaries were enjoined as follows: 
"The patroons and colonists shall, in par- 
ticular, endeavor to find out ways and 
means whereby they may support a minis- 
ter and a schoolmaster; that thus the 
service of God and zeal for religion may 
not grow cool and be neglected among 
them;" and to accomjilish this purpose. 



" each householder and inhabitant should 
bear such tax and public charge as should 
be considered proper for their mainte- 
nance." At an early date in the history 
of the settlement it had been ordered 
that " no other religion should be publicly 
admitted in the new province except the 
lieformed as it was then preached and 
practiced bj' public authority in the 
TTnited Netherlands." Accordingly the 
first school was established under the 
auspices of that church, and has continued 
under its supervision, though maintained 
for the use of the general public. In 1633 
Wouter Van Twiller, the second Director- 
General of the new province, arrived from 
Holland, bringing with him the first 
schoolmaster, Adam Eoelandsen. This 
was a rudimentary school, teaching only 
reading, writing, and arithmetic, with 
the doctrines of the church. But in 165S, 
while the renowned Peter Stuyvesant was 
Director, the citizens petitioned " for a 
fit person as Latin schoolmaster, not 
doubting that the number of persons who 
will send their children to such a teacher 
will, from year to year, increase until an 
Academy will be formed, whereby this 
place to great splendor will have attained." 
The petition receiving favorable con- 
sideration the first classified school in New 
Amsterdam was established, its first prin- 
cipal. Dr. Alexander Carolus, being paid 
out of the public treasury five hundred 
guilders (about two hundred dollars) 
annually, besides which he was authorized 
to collect six guilders from each pupil, 
was allotted a house and garden, and was 
allowed to practice medicine. 

The salaries paid these colonial teachers 
were meagre in the extremie, though, of 
course, the great difference between the 
purchasing power of a dollar then and now 
must be considered. But the school- 
master's duties were rarely confined to 
teaching, as he was expected to take on 
certain minor duties connected with the 
church work, and frequently municipal 
functions. This was the custom in all 
the colonies. The Dutch teacher was also 
the grave-digger, the court bell-ringer, and 
church choir master; and it is evident 



696 



FliOM COLONY TO WOULD POWEK. 



fidiii a suit he brought in the courts to 
tolk'i-t a hiundi'v hill, that Roelandscu 
took in washing-. The New England 
" Town Book " enumerated the following- 
as the duties of the schoolmaster in IGCO : 

1 — To act as Court ifossenger. 

2-^To serve sunnnonses. 

3 — To conduct certain ceremonial serv- 
ices of the church. 

-i — To lead the Sunday choir. 

5 — To ring the bell for public worship. 

6 — To dig graves. 

Y — To take charge of the school. 

S — To jierform ulher occasional duties. 



JOHN COTTON. 

In view then of the nuinlicr and varied 
character of the duties the schoolmaster 
had to perform, it is not surprising to 
find that in Now Amsterdam, as early as 
1650, one William Vertens. apparently the 
first of a long- and nui.ier(ms succession, 
petitioned for "an increase of salar.v." 

In ir,30 .Tolm Winthrop with bis little 
comimny arrived in the New AVorld on 
the "Arabella," and proceeded to found 
Boston. Three years later another com- 
pany, arriving in the " GritRn,'" included 
the foremost of the early scholars of the 
colony. ,T(]hn Cotton, just frrsh from a 
successful pastorate in Boston of Old 




England. Cotton had been one of the 
foremost scholars of his time at Em- 
manuel College, Cambridge, and is 
thought by many to have been the in- 
spiring inliuence in the establishment 
of the first school in New England, the 
now famous Boston Latin School. How- 
ever this may be, on the twenty-third 
day of April, 1635, the people of Boston, 
in town meeting assembled " upon pub- 
li(]ue notice," generall.v agreed that " our 
brother Philemon Purmont shall be en- 
treated to become schoolmaster for the 
teai-hing' and nourteuring of children 
among' us." On the occasion of the two 
hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the 
founding of the school, April 23, 1885. 
the Eev. Phillips Brooks, one of its many 
distinguished graduates, delivered the 
oration. Eeferring to the resolution of 
the town meeting he said: "How simple 
that short record is, and how unconscious 
that short view is of the future which is 
wrapped up in it ! By it the first educa- 
tional institution, which was to have con- 
tinuous existence in America, and in it 
the public system of the land, came into 
being." As we have alreadv endeavored 
to show, it seems clear that on the mere 
(luestion of priority, Boston must yield 
precedence to New Amsterdam ; but the 
little honor that young colony may lose 
by taking second rather than first place 
in the matter of time of foundation is 
more than offset by the zeal and intelli- 
gence that vi'as everywhere manifested in 
the furtherance of the noble work so early 
begun, and in the determination that every 
child should have the opportunity, and be 
required, to secure at least a i-udimentary 
education. Charlcstown followed the 
example of Boston, and opened its first 
public school in 1636; Salem and Ipswich 
in 1637; Cambridge in 1642; and Eoxbury 
in 1645 ; while the Plymouth Colony, more 
tardy in its recognition of educational 
needs, did not come into line until about 
1650. These schoels were not, in the 
modern sense, " free schools." That term, 
in colonial days, signified an institution 
whieh was not restricted to any class of 
students, but it looked forward to an idti- 



EDUCATIO^' IX COLONIES AXD STATES. 



697 



mate endowment. For the support of the 
Boston School the town set apart the rent 
of Deer Island, and of some of the other 
islands in the harbor. All the prominent 
citizens made contributions in its behalf; 
and those who sent children to it, and 
were able to pay for their instruction, 
were called upon to do so. Indian chil- 
dren alone were to be " taught gratis." In 
1642 the General Court enjoined that the 
selectmen of every town should " have a 
vigilant eye on their brethren and neigh- 
bors, to see that none of them shall suffer 
so much barbarism in any of their families 
as not to endeavor to teach, by themselves 
or others, their children and apprentices 
so much learning as may enable them 
perfectly to read the English tongue, and 
(obtain) a knowledge of the capital laws; 
upon penalty of twenty shillings for each 
neglect therein." And " if, after admo- 
nition, parents were still neglectful of 
their duty in these particulars," children 
might be taken from their parents and 
bound to such masters as the selectmen 
might deem fit, to supply the place of the 
" unnatural parent." But it is to the 
gi-eat law of 10-17 that we must look for 
the birth of the Massachusetts (and that 
means of the New England) school 
system, which has justly been called " the 
great charter of free education in the 
Commonwealth." " It being one chief pro- 
ject," the law reads, " of that old deluder, 
Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of 
the Scriptures, as in former times keep- 
ing them in an unknown tongue, so in 
these later times by persuading from 
the use of tongues, so that at last the 
true sense and meaning of the original 
might be clouded and corrupted with 
false glosses of deceivers; and to the 
end that learning may not he buried 
in the graves of our forefathers, in church 
and commonwealth, the Lord assisting our 
endeavors: It is therefore ordered by 
this court and authority thereof that every 
township within this jurisdiction, after 
the Lord hath increased them to the num- 
ber of fifty householders, shall then forth- 
with appoint one within their town to 
teach all such children as shall resort to 



him, to write and read; whose wages shall 
be laaid, either by the parents or masters 
of such children, or by the inhabitants in 
general, by way of supply, as the major 
liart of those who order the prudentials 
of the town shall appoint ; provided that 
those who send their children be not op- 
pressed by paying much more than they 
can have them taught for in the adjoin- 
ing towns. And it is further ordered that 
where any town shall increase to the num- 
ber of one hundred families, or house- 
holders, they shall set up a grammar 
school, the master thereof being alile to 
instruct youths so far as they may be 
fitted for the University ; and if any town 
neglect the performance hereof above one 
year, then every town shall pay five 
pounds per annum to the next such school, 
till they shall perform this order." This 
law was mandatory and aimed at universal 
education. The schools were not to be 
established for any class, rich or ijoor; for 
the children of ministers or magistrates; 
but were to be the common nurseries of 
instruction where every child should be 
taught the rudiments of a general educa- 
tion; while in the " Grammar Schools," 
for which this law made such notable pro- 
vision, one sees the forerunners of those 
preparatory schools which later became so 
prominent a factor in the New England 
educational system, some of which have 
achieved a renown second only to that of 
the great universities themselves. Similar 
laws were early enacted in the neighbor- 
ing colonies, the Connecticut law of 1650 
covering the same points, and using al- 
most the same phraseology as the Massa- 
chusetts Statute, — the provisions for the 
establishment of secondary, or preparatory 
schools, being identical. As Maine was 
not set off from Massachusetts until 1820, 
and New Hampshire was subject to the 
same laws until 1693, any movements in 
those localities toward the establishment 
of schools during the seventeenth century 
followed the lines marked out by the Gen- 
eral Court of Massachusetts. The size of 
the colony of Ehode Island, which num- 
bered only ten thousand souls, and those 
widely scattered, in 1700, gave little en- 



G9S 



JFROM COLONY TO WOliLD POWER. 



eiiuragenieut for tlie establishment of a 
sfhool system, though there were schools 
at Providence and Newport before the 
close of the century. Under such auspices 
as these were set in motion the forces 
v.liioh were later to give to New England 
the distinction, which it has so well earned 
and so richly merited, of being the highest 
exponent of an enlightened educational 
and intellectual advancement, whose in- 
fluence is felt to-day to the remotest 
bounds of our great country. None of 
the other colonics succeeded in actually 
establishing schools until the early part 
of the eighteenth century, though there 
were some sporadic attempts. 

As has been said, none of these schools 
were strictly public schools in the sense in 
which the term is used to-day. In prac- 
tically all cases a certain amount was paid 
for the tuition of each child by its parents, 
only the very poor and Indians ever re- 
ceiving gratuitcus instruction. Nor was 
the kind and amount of instruction given 
such as to mark the common school sys- 
tem with distinction. It was of the most 
elementary character, usually limited to 
reading, writing, and the simplest calcu- 
lation. As Prof. Boone has said, in his 
'' History of Education in the United 
States," " Its contents can be best shown, 
perhaps, by enumerating the schoolbooks 
used. Prior to 1065 Richard Mather's 
Catechism was, aside from the Bible, al- 
most the only one known. Then and later 
the New Testament was in common use, 
and the Psalter, containing: 1 — the 
Psalms; 2 — Proverbs; 3 — the Sermon on 
the Mount; and 4 — The Nicene Creed. 
The " Horn book " was very early em- 
ployed in this country, as in England. 
The historical " New England Primer " 
was not introduced until near the close 
of the seventeenth century, then taking 
the place of the Catechism. These books 
determined the organization of the school 
as follows : 

1 — Psalter class-beginners. 
2 — Testament class. 
3— Bible class." 

It shoidd be remembered also that even 



these meagre educational advantages 
existed for boys alone, the girls having no 
share in the school privileges. It is true 
that the jjeople of Dorchester, Mass., in 
1689, when ordering the establislimeut of 
a school " left to the discretion of the 
elders and the seven men for the time be- 
ing whether maydes sltall he taugJit with 
the hoys or not;" but there is no record 
that any action favorable to the 
" maydes " was ever taken. The prevail- 
ing sentiment of the period was expressed 
in the order which gave birth to the 
famous Hopkins School in New Haven, 
Ct., in 1684, which ruled that "all girls 
be excluded as improper and inconsistent 
with such a grammar school as ye law en- 
Joins and as is the designe of this settle- 
ment." Nor was there any general change 
in this sentiment manifested until after 
the Revolutionary War, when it ap- 
parently began to dawn upon the male 
intelligence that a little more considera- 
tion for the mental culture of women 
might not result in disaster to either the 
civil or religious institutions of the 
Commonwealth. Between 1780 and 1800 
many town records show that in the 
future it was the purjjose of the people to 
allow the girls some share in the school 
privileges which had heretofore been the 
sole prerogative of the boys. Thus, the 
town of Gloucester, Mass., in 1790, re- 
solved " that the master be directed to be- 
gin his school from the first day of April 
to the last day of September at eight 
o'clock in the morning and close at six 
o'clock in the afternoon, or any eight 
hours in the twenty-four as shall be 
thought the most convenient ; and that 
two hours, or a proportionable part of that 
time, be devoted to the instruction of 
females^ — as they arc a tender and inter- 
esting hranch of the community, hut have 
heen much neglected in the puhtic scliools 
of this tou'n." As Grammar Schools be- 
came more common during the seven- 
teenth and eighteenth centuries there were 
occasional but rare instances in which 
girls w-ere admitted to their privileges, 
though a distinguished educational au- 
thority who studied the records of about 



EDUCATION IX COLONIES AND STATES. 



699 



two liunJred New England towns found 
less than a dozen such cases during 
the seventeenth century. The "Dame 
Schools " were, however, open to the girls 
as well as boys; and any intellectual aspi- 
rations that the " tender and interesting- 
branch of the community " may have had 
must perforce have found their realiza- 
tion in the puerile instruction offered in 
those educational nurseries. These so- 
called schools were conducted by women, 
usually in some room of their houses, and 
were most primitive affairs. As one has 
said, " There were no desks, maps, black- 
boards, nor any other equipment for school 
teaching', save a teacher, who, in many 
cases, knew little beyond the letters she 
was teaching, and, perhaps, a single copy 
of the horn book." The Dame School was 
usually a purely private venture ; but as 
its usefulness was often manifest it came 
to be occasionally supported in part by the 
town, as is illustrated by the records of 
Springfield, Mass., which show that in 
1682 " the selectmen agreed with Goodwife 
llirick to encourage her in the good work 
of training up of children, and teaching 
children to read, and that she should 
have three pence a week for every child 
that she takes to perform this good work 
for." 

The only text-book known to the youth 
of the seventeenth and most of the eigh- 
teenth centuries, except to those who were 
preparing for the University, was the 
Bible. Both in Old England and the New 
it was the Puritan's library of religion, 
philosophy, poetry, proverbial wisdom, 
and physical science; and apart from the 
ancient classics, with which only a limited 
number could become familiar, there were 
practically no other works. Remember- 
ing these facts, it is not surprising that 
the whole range of knowledge taught in 
the Elementary and Grammar Schools, 
apart from the College preparatory, down 
to the Revolution was embraced under the 
three heads of reading, writing, and re- 
ligion. Even mathematics is rarel.v re- 
ferred to until after 17.50, the first record 
which points to its simplest forms being 
a Pennsylvania contract of 1683 with a 



teacher which provided that the children 
under his charge should " learn to read, 
write and cast accounts." And though 
sijelling was probably taught to a limited 
extent in connection with reading, it re- 
ceived no separate mention as a branch of 
study until toward the close of the eigh- 
teenth century. Of course during the 
early colonial days the same teacher 
taught all grades of pupils, from those 
just learning the alphabet to those pur- 
suing the most advanced studies provideil 
for. The schoolhouse was usually small, 
and rough, and made of logs; and all the 
children assembled in one room. As 
Watertown was one of the larger of the 
early settlements adjacent to Boston, its 
schoolhouse would probably be quite up to 
the average of those in rural communities, 
if not among the best; and the town record 
shows that in 1640 " John Sherman was 
appointed to i^rocure the schoolhouse 
built; and to have it built 22 foot long, 
and 14 foot wide and 9 foot between 
joints." 

Theoretically, and well-nigh in reality, 
the all-engrossing subject of thought and 
conversation among the early Puritans 
was Religion, and its text-book, the Bible. 
While its primal truths could be taught 
in the home and the school, there was ever 
before the eyes of the elders the necessity 
of preparing young men for the ministry, 
who in due course should be able to open 
up the " hidden mysteries of the Word " 
to parents and teachers. In England, 
Emmanuel College of Cambridge became 
the Protestant Theological Seminary, and 
nearly all the early New England minis- 
ters, and some of the civil leaders, were 
graduates of that College. In 1638 there 
were in the four or five settlements of Mas- 
sachusetts and Connecticut more than 
forty graduates of Cambridge, and several 
Oxonians; and it has been roughly esti- 
mated that one of every two hundred and 
fifty of the inhabitants had received a 
college education, — a proportion three or 
four times larger than that of the present 
day. So numerous and influential were 
the Cambridge graduates that Cotton 
Mather wrote: "If New England hath 



rou 



FROM COLO^'Y TO WORLD POWER. 



been in some respects Immanuers land, 
it is well; but this I am sure of, Immanuel 
College contributed more than a little to 
make it so." Naturally to such men it 
was a matter of supreme concern that 
" the lisi-ht of learning should not go out, 



a school or college, whereof two hundred 
pounds shall be paid the next year, and 
two hundred pounds when the work is 
tinished; and the next Court to appoint 
when and what buildings." In harmony 
with this action, the next General Court 








;^S>-~'^ 








EMMANCEL COLLEGE. 



nor the study of God's word perish ; " and 
they very early turned their thoughts 
toward the establishment of a college for 
the higher education of their youth, 
" dreading to leave an illiterate ministry 
to the churches, when our i^resent mini- 
>tcrs shall lie in dust." The General 
Court of Massachusetts which sat in 103(5 
was a small but notable body of repre- 
sentative citizens, presided over by one 
of the most remarkable men of the 
century. Sir Harry Vane, later a leader 
in the whole long contest between Charles 
I. and Parliament, the intimate friend of 
^rilton, who possessed, as so conservative 
a writer as Sir James Mackintosh de- 
clared, " one of the most profound minds 
that ever existed, — not inferior, perhaps, 
to Bacon." On the records of the As- 
scmlily for the eighth day of September, 
IG.^O, this entry appears: "The Court 
;!gree to give four hundred pounds toward 



appointed twelve of the most notable men 
of the colony, including John Winthrop, 
Shepard, Cotton, Stoughton, and Dudley, 
" to take order for a college at Xew- 
towne; " and a short time after the ap- 
pointment of this commission, the Court 
changed the name of ISTewtowne to Cam- 
bridge, " a grateful tribute," as one has 
said, " to the trans-Atlantic literary 
parent of many of the first immigrants, 
and indication of the high standing to 
which they intended the institution they 
were establishing should aspire." But the 
money voted by the General Court was not 
forthcoming, and it is uncertain whether 
it was ever paid in; and down to 1G3S 
nothing tangible had been done towards 
establishing the college, though popular 
interest in the undertaking had been 
stimulated and was thoroughly aroused. 
It is doubtful, however, whether definite 
action would have been taken at that 



EDUCATION IX COLONIES AXD STATES. 



701 



time had not the death of Rev. John. 
Ilai-vai-d occurred in 1638, who be- 
qurathed to the proposed institution one- 
half of his fortune, about eigiit hundred 
pounds (equivalent to the purchasing 
power of seven or eight thousand pounds 
of our money), and all his library, which 
wa.s probably by far the largest in the 
Colony, and the best suited for college 
uses. 

It is a most singular fact that a young 
man of good social and financial condi- 
tion and of the highest moral and mental 
character, could spend ten or twelve years 
at one of England's foremost colleges; 
come to the New England Colony and 
commence his work as a preacher; and at 
his death leave what was for that time a 
royal gift to establish an institution of 
learning destined to stand at the head of 
all the educational institutions of the 
Xew World, — and yet for nearly two 
hundred and fifty years after his death 
not the slightest detail should be known 
of his ancestry or his family connections, 
nor of his own life, even to the intelli- 
gent and investigating minds of the 
scholars who owed their early knowledge 
and their inspiration for higher and con- 
tinuous study to the institution which the 
beneficence of this stranger had estab- 
lished. Yet such was the state of knowl- 
edge regarding John Hai'vard, the earliest 
and in many respects the noblest of the 
many founders of educational institutions 
in the country, that so late as 1886 James 
Russell Lowell speaks of him " as scarce 
more than a name ; " and nearly as recent 
a writer, paraphrasing the peculiar pas- 
sage in Hebrews, said : " John Harvard 
seems to be the ' Melchizedec ' of the first 
age of the Colony of Massachusetts. He 
is known to us only as a ' priest of the 
Most High God ' and as one who ' gave 
gifts.' So far as any certified facts con- 
cerning his lineage or circumstances have 
been presented to us, he is without father, 
without mother, without descent, having 
neither beginning of days, nor a known 
resting place for his mortal dust." Even 
so far back as 1842 James Savage, the 
most distinguished authority on the gen- 



ealogies of the earlj- settlers in irassachu- 
setts, offered a reward of five hundred dol- 
lars for five lines of information about 
John Harvard, in any capacity, public or 
private ; but no one ever claimed the re- 
ward. And in the preface to his interest- 
ing volume, " John Harvard and His 
Times," bearing the date of 1907, Mr. H. 
C. Shelley says : " This is a pioneer effort 
to reveal the character of John Harvard. 
It may seem incredible, yet it is never- 
theless strictly true, that the ijresent vol- 
ume is the first to be written on the young 
minister whose generosity had such an im- 
portant influence on the beginnings of ed- 
ucation in America." The key that un- 
locked the mystery surrounding the life 
of this interesting man was the establish- 
ment, beyond question, of the fact that in 
documents and parish records of those 
days the name " which we know certainly 
to be intended for Harvard " is variously 
spelt as " Harwood," " Hervy," " Hawar," 
" Ha ward," " Herward," " Harvye," "Har- 
vey," etc. ; and the discovery in the records 
of St. Saviour's Church, in Southwark 
Borough, London, of the entry of the mar- 
riage of Robert Harvey, and later entries 
regarding the birth of his children, etc. 
From this single starting point a remark- 
ably consistent and veiy interesting life 
story has been evolved. Robert Harvey, 
the father of John, settled in Southwark 
in 1597, and commenced life as a butcher. 
He was evidently successful in his busi- 
ness and accumulated quite a consider- 
able property in a few years. Southwark's 
High Street was the main thoroughfare 
from the end of London bridge, the only 
bridge across the Thames at that time, to 
the south and west of England. For quite 
a distance from the river High Street was 
lined with some of the most famous of 
London's old historic Inns, including the 
noted " Tabard Inn " immortalized by 
Chaucer. These " Inns " were celebrated 
for the feasts, and the quality and abund- 
ance of the fare furnished, and naturally 
made the butcher's trade a lucrative one. 
Here, too, Shakespeare spent much of his 
life as actor and playwright, the records 



702 



FKOJVI COLONY TO WOliLD POWER. 



showing that he was connected with the 
St. Saviour parish, of whose church Kob- 
ert Harvey early became a vestryman. As 
Southwark was not then thickly settled it 
would seem certain that he and the great 
playwright must have been well ac- 
quainted; and it is believed that after the 
death of his first wife, it was Shakespeare 
who took Harvey to Stratford-upon- 
Avon, and introduced him into the Rogers 
family, then one of the most i^rominent 
families in that town of two thousand 
population. The Rogers house, from 
which Robert Harvey took away his sec- 
ond wife, Katherine Rogers, was the most 
pretentious one in the jilaee, as it is to- 
day, being now known a^s the " Harvard " 
house. The marriage took place in 1605, 
and the following year the first child, Rob- 
ert, was born, followed fifteen months 
later, November 29, 1607, by the birth of 
a second son, John Harvard. The family 
life of the Harvards seems to have been a 
peaceful and harmonious one, the family 
in 1625 including besides the father and 




JOHN' HARVARD MONUMENT. 

mother, a child by the first wife, and five 
children as the result of the second mar- 
riage. In 1603 London had been visited 
by the plague which for many years was 
the scourge of Europe. One of its victims 
was the wife of Robert Harvey. In 1625 



tliere was a second visitation, and within 
five weeks Rotert Harvey and four of his 
six children had succumbed to its ravages, 
leaving only the widow and two sons, 
John and Thomas. Before John had 
graduated from Cambridge in 1635, his 
mother had become a widow for the third 
time, the generous fortune left her by her 
first husband being materially increased 
by the estates of his two successors. In 
1627 John entered Emmanuel College, 
Cambridge, where he remained until 1635. 
Nothing is known of his character as a 
student, nor of his relations with the 
family during these years. Leaving Cam- 
bridge, he returned to Southwark, with 
the happy anticipation, we may presume, 
of a visit with his mother and brother, 
only to find that his mother had passed 
away shortly before he reached home. It 
is evident from the tenor of her will that 
John was her favorite son, though she 
divided her estate between them without 
manifesting partiality. There are evi- 
dences that John spent the next year in 
general study, giving a great deal of time 
to the collection of the books which he 
wished to take with him to New England, 
which was no easy task in those days, 
as all booksellers were under a careful 
espionage by Archbishop Laud's minions, 
and a constant watch was maintained for 
books savoring of heresy against the 
Church of England, or of criticism of the 
Divine Right of Kings. In the spring of 
1036 he married Ann Sadler, the sister of 
an Emmanuel College friend; and a year 
later they set out for the New World. 
The first reference to him in the annals 
of New England is the statement that in 
1037, he was " admitted as townsman of 
Charlestown." He was apparently early 
installed as pastor of the first church 
there; but, though he sui-vived the first 
winter, the approach of the second found 
him in a bad physical condition ; and, con- 
sumption developing, he passed away in 
the autumn of 1638. That he was buried 
in Charlestown is considered well estab- 
lished; but ju.st where, is unknown. For 
nearly two hundred years no action was 
taken to perpetuate his memory, the Col- 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



703 



lege which he founded being his only 
monument. But in 1828 Edward Everett 
started a movement among the alumni in 
Boston, to erect a memorial of him in 
the old burying ground in Charlestown. 
A plain granite shaft was chosen as the 
form the memorial should take; and at 
its dedication Everett delivered one of his 
most scholarly addresses, eloquently em- 
jihasizing the influence which the act of 
the unknown minister in founding the 
College had exerted over all the subse- 
quent generations. It was not pretended 
that the site of the monument marked the 
exact place of Harvard's burial; and it is 
as true to-day as it was in 1886, when Dr. 
Oliver Wendell Holmes said in his poem 
read at the two hundred and fiftieth cele- 
bration of the founding of the University, 
that 

" In vain the delving antiquary tries. 
To find the tomb where generous Harvard 
lies." 

Many loving memorials of Harvard 
have been erected during the last quarter 
of a century. In 1884, on the occasion of 
the tri-centennary celebration of the estab- 
blishment of Emmanuel College, a beauti- 
ful memorial window was placed in the 
renovated chapel of that institution by 
Harvard Alumni, Professor Charles Eliot 
Norton and Ambassador James Russell 
Lowell representing the younger Cam- 
bridge and making appropriate addresses. 
The same year a fine statue of " John Har,- 
vard, Founder," was erected on the Delta 
of the LTniversity grounds. In 1904 a 
brass memorial tablet was placed in Em- 
manuel College by the University alumni, 
and in 1905 our Ambassador to Great 
Britain, one of Llarvard's most distin- 
guished sons, Joseph H. Choate, presented 
to St. Saviour's Church, Southwark, a 
rarely beautiful stained glass window. 
" Around John Harvard in New Eng- 
land," says his biographer, " as he lay on 
his death bed, were many ministers whose 
names, he must have thought, were des- 
tined to achieve a far greater and more 
enduring fame than his own, little dream- 
ing that such of them as would be remem- 



bered would owe their renown to some 
casual mention of his own name. In that 
other England, too, he knew he had left 
men, students at Emmanuel with himself, 
whose names were to be carved deeply in 
the history of his native land ; who, in 




FIRST HARVARD COLLEGE. 

the Senate, at the Court, and in the 
Church, would infallibly rise to high 
places and be accounted leaders in the na- 
tion's life. Yet, while even the greatest of 
these are known to few save the diligent 
student of history, while their court- 
honors have turned to dust and their 
achievements are lost in oblivion, the dy- 
ing inspiration of John Harvard has given 
him an immortality which gathers 
brighter radiance with every passing gen- 
eration." 

That the people of Boston made imme- 
diate use of Harvard's generous bequest 
is evident. Among the records of the Gen- 
eral Court, for 1639, under date of March 
13th, occurs the following entry: "It is 
ordered that the college agreed upon form- 
erly to be built at Cambridge shall be 
called Harvard College." The first super- 
intendent of the infant institution was 
Nathaniel Eaton, a man of marked in- 
efficiency, who was constantly in trouble, 
and finally in 1640, was fined and dis- 
missed from the service for unmercifully 
flogging an usher. He was succeeded the 
same year by Henry Dimster, who had 
just arrived in the colony, on whom the 
title of pj-esident was first bestowed. He 
held the office for fourteen years, and by 
untiring energy succeeded in giving some 
stability to the foundation, and permanent 



7UJ: 



PKOM COLOXY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



direction to the activities of the college. 
The first class, consisting of nine men, 
^v;^s graduated in 1G-I:2, each receiving the 
bachelor's degree. The oldest extant doc- 
ument relating to Harvard is a pamphlet 
bearing the title, " New England's Eirst 
Fruits in respect to the Progress of Learn- 
ing in the College at Cambridge, in Mas- 
sachusetts Bay," etc., written in the form 
of a letter dated at Boston, September 26, 
1042, which was published in London in 
lG4o. In it the writer or writers describe 
the existing condition of the institution, 
the requisites for admission and for the 
taking of degrees, and give a detailed ac- 
count of all the exercises of the first Com- 
mencement Day. " The edifice is very 
faire and comely within and without," the 
letter says, " having in it a spacious hall 
(where they daily meet at Commons, Lec- 
tures, Exercises) ; and a large library with 
some books to it, the gifts of diverse of 
our friends, their chambers and studies 
also fitted for and possessed by the stud- 
ents, and all other rooms of ofiice neces- 
sary and convenient, with all needful of- 
fices thereto belonging, and by the side 
of the Colledge a faire Grammar Schooll 
f(ir the training up of young scholars and 
fitting of them for Academicall learning, 
that still as they are judged ripe, they 
may be received into the Colledge of this 
srhoolc." The writer further chronicles 
" Master Dunster's " success in governing 
and teaching the young men, he having 
" so trained up his Pupills in the tongues 
and arts, and so seasoned them with the 
principles of Divinity and Christianity 
that we have to our great comfort (and 
in truth) beyond our hopes, beheld their 
progresse in Learning and Godliness also; 
insomuch that we are confident if these 
early blossomes may be cherished and 
warmed with the influence of the friends 
of learning and lovers of this pious worke 
they will, by the help of God, come to 
happy maturity in a short time." The 
requisites for admission to the college, and 
for the granting of Degrees, are each de- 
scribed, respectively, as follows: 

" When any Schollar is able to under- 
stand Tiilly, or such like classical Latine 



author extempore, and make and speake 
true Latine in Verse and Prose, suo ut 
aiunt Marte; And decline ijerfectly the 
Paradigms of Noinies and Verhes in the 
Greek tongue; let him then and not be- 
fore be capable of admission into the Col- 
ledge." 

" Every Schollar that on proofe is found 
able to read the Originalls of the Old and 
Neiv Testament into the Latine tongue, 
and to resolve them Logically; withal be- 
ing of godly life and conversation; And 
at any publick act hath the approbation 
of the Overseers and Master of the Col- 
ledge, is fit to be dignified with his first 
Degree." 

"Evei'y Schollar that giveth up in writ- 
ing a System or Synopsis, or summe of 
Logiek, Naturall and Morall Phylosophy, 
Arithmetick, Geometry, and Astronomy; 
and is ready to defend his Tlieses or posi- 
tions; withal skilled in the Originalls as 
above said; and of godly life and conver- 
sation; and so approved by the Overseers 
and Master of the Colledge, at any pub- 
lique Act, is fit to be dignified with his 
2d Degree." 

All through the seventeenth century 
the history of the College was one of con- 
tinuous struggle for financial support, the 
outlook at times being most disheartening. 
During this entire period the president 
constituted the entire faculty, no tutor 
having been appointed until 1G99, and no 
professorship established until 1721; and 
though this condition made it imperative 
that the presidents should be men of great 
learning, as well as possessed of executive 
ability, as they in fact were, yet the salary 
never exceeded two hundred pounds, and 
frequently only reached one hundred and 
fifty. The total grants made to the Col- 
lege by the colony during the first century 
of its existence amounted to only about 
eight thousand dollars ; and at the close 
of that century (1736) the total annual 
income from all sources was only seven 
hundred and fifty pounds. During the ad- 
ministration of President Leverett (1707- 
24) improvements in the curriculum were 
initiated which, as they gradually lieeamc 
effective, materially changed the efiiciency 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



705 



and character of the colleg-e course. Down 
to the early part of the eighteenth century 
the only languag-e the students were al- 
lowed to use while on the College prem- 
ises, for any i^urpose of communication 
with the officials or with each other, was 
Latin. With the accession of President 
Leverett this custom was abolished, and 
English assumed its rightful position. 
Virgil and Cicero entire were made a part 
of the course, while Chaldee and Syriac 
were dropped. By the time of the Eevo- 
lution the instruction had been organized 



which time its advance along all lines has 
been steady and vigorous. About six 
thousand students are now annually en- 
rolled, who may elect their studies from 
the five hundred or more courses that are 
offered leading to the bachelor's degree, 
while the teaching force numbers about 
live hundred and fifty. The libraiT has 
grown from the two or three shelves of 
books presented to the prospective college 
by John Harvard until it now ranks the 
third in the country with over eight hun- 
dred thousand volumes. LTufortunatcly 




HARVARD COLLEGE CAMPUS, 1870. 



into a system in four groups: 1. Latin; 
2. Greek; 3. Logic and Metaphysic; 4. 
Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, — 
each group being put in the exclusive 
charge of one man. During the year 1775 
the library and classes were removed to 
Concord, and the College halls were given 
to the use of the Continental Army, the 
president's house having been occupied for 
a time by General Washington. The era 
of the rapid development of the college 
may be said to have begun with President 
Kirkland's administration, in 1810, since 



l)ut one volume of John Ilaiwanl's library 
is in existence, a largo folio entitled the 
" Christian Warfare." This book hap- 
pened to be in the hands of a borrower on 
the night of January, 1764, when Ilarvard 
Hall was completely destroyed by fire, 
and in it were burned all the other vol- 
umes that belonged to the founder. Until 
1S(J5 the College was nominally under 
state control; but since that date the gov- 
ernment has rested upon the shoulders of 
the President and Fellows, under the gen- 
eral supervision of the Board of Over- 



roG 



FKO:\I COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



sccrs. " The gTowth of Harvard Univer- 
sity under the administration of President 
Eliot,'' saj-s Professor Dexter in his most 
admirable History of Education in the 




CHARLES W. ELIOT. 

United States, " has been rapid and 
healthy ; and it must probably be placed 
at the head of the higher institutions of 
learning in our country, not only in point 
of age but of general influence." 

During the autumn of 190S it became 
known that President Eliot, who had so 
nobly maintained the ho:;orable position 
of the University and had been so active 
in its advancement, had tendered his 
resignation to the governing- board, to take 
effect upon the completion of his fortieth 
year of continuous and active service in 
the Spring of 1009. So closely had he 
been identified with the marvelous growth 
of the institution during the last third of 
a century, and so prominent a factor had 
he been in all its distinguished achieve- 
ments, that the announcement of his 
resignation was received by the Alumni 



with the sincerest regret, not a few feel- 
ing that it would be next to impossible 
to find a successor who might acceptably 
take up his work. Early in 1909, how- 
ever, the University authorities announced 
that Professor Abbott Lawrence Lowell 
had been selected as President Eliot's suc- 
cessor, a choice that has given great sat- 
isfaction to the Alumni and promises a 
maintenance of the high standard and 
ideals for the University which it was 
ever President Eliot's ambition to estab- 
lish. Professor Lowell comes of the best 
of New England stock, his ancestors on 
his father's side having for several gen- 
erations been prominent in social, judicial, 
and business life; while on his mother's 
side he is a grandson of Abbott Lawrence 
who was in his day one of the most prom- 
inent and highly esteemed merchants of 
Boston, after whom the city of Lawrence 
was named, as the city of Lowell was 
named after one of his paternal ancestors. 
Professor Lowell was born in 1856 and 
graduated from Harvard College in 1877, 
and Law School in 1880. For several 
years he was actively engaged in the prac- 
tice of law, also serving as a trustee of 
the Institute of Technology, and as sole 
trustee of the Lowell Institute, founded 
by his great-uncle, which is described in 
the chapter on "Princely Gifts" in this 
volume. Professor Lowell has long been 
a student of European Continental poli- 
tics, visiting Europe .several times to 
prasecute such studies, and has given to 
the world the benefit of his labors in the 
form of several books on Government in 
Europe, which are of such a high standard 
that his work has been classed by critics 
with that of Bryce on the " American 
Connnonwealth." In 1897 he was ap- 
pointed a lecturer at the University on 
Government in Europe, and in 1899 be- 
came Professor of the Science of Govern- 
ment. 

We have gone more fully into the early 
history of Harvard not only because it is 
the oldest and is now the most honored of 
our Colleges, and because of the interest 
that attaches to the personality of its 
young and heretofore unknown founder; 



EDUCATIOxV IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



707 



but also because that early history was that 
of all the other of our noted educational 
institutions founded previous to the mid- 
dle of the nineteenth century. With 
hardly an exception they were established 
by men of positive and aggressive re- 
ligious principles and policies, with the 
prime object of training young men for 
the ministry, so that the churches should 
not lack learned and cultured teachers and 
leaders. For all alike the early years were 
years of financial distress and dishearten- 
ing struggle, prosperity and material suc- 
cess having come only during the life of 
the last two or three generations. The 
same general forms of government char- 
acterized them all, and the advantages, so 
far as the range of studies was concerned, 
ofl:'ered by all were very similar. The in- 
stitutions founded during the last fifty 
years have differed materially from the 
older ones, and from each other, in many 
ways which will be noted later on. 

It is, of course, well known that action 
was taken by the home government look- 
ing toward the establishment of a Univer- 
sity in Virginia fully twelve or fifteen 
years before the Puritans landed in Bos- 
ton harbor. In 1616 the King (James I.) 
ordered the bishops of London to collect 
money for a college to be founded in Vir- 
ginia, with the result that before 1620 
about fifteen hundred pounds had been 
raised. In 161S instructions sent to Gov- 
ernor Yardley ordained " that a con- 
venient place be chosen and set out for 
the planting of a University at the said 
Henrico in time to come, and that in the 
meantime preparation be made for the 
building of the said College for the chil- 
dren of the infidels according to such in- 
struction as we shall deliver. And we will 
ordain that ten thousand acres partly of 
the lands they impaled and partly of the 
land within the territory of said Henrico, 
be allotted and set out for the endowing 
of the said university and college with 
convenient provisions." This grant seems 
to have been duly made, and included one 
thousand acres for an Indian college; the 
remainder to be the foundation for a sem- 
inary of learning for the English. What- 



ever hopes may have been raised among 
the colonists by these measures, however, 
were unfortunately frustrated by the In- 
dian uprising aiid massacre in 1622, when 
more than two hundred and fifty of the 
settlers were killed, and the villages and 
plantations utterly destroyed. This nat- 
urally postponed any consideration of the 
question of education, though the pro- 
posed University was not lost sight of, 
and it was ordered that " all the moneys 
collected be deposited until the planta- 
tion be so settled as there may be use of 
a school there." 

The difference between the conditions 
of the settlement of New England and of 
Virginia had, naturally, a great influence 
in directing the respective school systems. 
In the northern colonies, as we have seen, 
active, bustling villages and towns sprang 
up during the seventeenth century all over 
Eastern Massachusetts and Southern Con- 




ABBOTT LAWRENCE LOWELL. 

necticut. But in Virginia the county, 
and not the town, was the civil unit; and 
the settlers who stamped their character- 
istics of social and civil life on the state 



ro8 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



■were the Cavalier families, who left Eng- 
land after the execution of Charles I., and 
settled in Virginia. They were generally 
men of well-established and well-con- 
nected families, who took up large tracts 
in the new country, establishing the great 
plantations. Under such conditions any- 
thing- like an elementary, common-school 
system such as gained an early foothold 
in >^ew England was out of the question. 
Thei'e were a few so-called " free " Acad- 
emies established on private foundations. 
Of such schools Eiske discovered five, the 
Symnis School, founded in 1636 ; Cap- 
tain ^Morris's in Hj.jo ; Richard Russell's 
in 1667; and the Eaton school about 1(!.j9. 
In speaking of the growth of Harvard 
College we referred to a little pamphlet 
published in London in 1643, entitled 
"New England's First Fruits." In 1649 
a similar pamphlet regarding Virginia 
was also published in London ; and in 
speaking of the many advantages which 
the new country offered to settlers the un- 
known writer says: "I must not forget 
to tell j'ou we have a free school, with two 
hundred acres of land, a fine house upon 
it, forty milch kine, and other accommo- 
dations; the benefactor deserves perpetual 
memory; his name, Mr. Benj: Symms, 
worthy to be chronicled : other petty 
schools also we have." In 1671 the Lords 
Commissioners of education, inquiring of 
Sir William Berkeley, the governor, as to 
what provisions had been made in the 
colony for public instruction, received the 
following tart reply : " The same course 
that is taken in England, out of towns; 
every man according to his ability in- 
structing his children. But I thank God, 
thero. are no free schools nor printing, 
and I hope we shall not have them these 
hundred years ; for learning has brought 
disobedience and heresy and sects into the 
world, and printing has divulged them and 
libels against the best government. God 
keep us from both." Of the wealthier 
planter-colonists some sent their sons to 
English schools and universities, while 
others lird tutors and governesses sent out 
from England to care for their children ; 
and in still other cases the clergymen of 



the parish also conducted a private school. 
As is well known the Poor Debtor laws of 
England imtil well into the nineteenth 
century were relics of the most vicious 
barbarism ; and frequently poor scholars 
were imprisoned for nominal offenses. 
These, with other convicts, were more or 
less regularly shipped to the colonies ; and 
in 1678 the Rev. Jonathan Boucher, rector 
at Annapolis, Md., declared " that two- 
thirds of the schoolmasters of Maryland 
were convicts, working out a term of 
penal servitude ; and," he continues, " not 
a ship arrives with either redemptioners 
or convicts, in which schoolmasters are 
not re<jula,rly advertised for sale, as 
weavers, tailors, or other trade; with little 
difference that I can hear of except per- 
haps that the former do not usually fetch 
so good a price as the latter." 

In 1725 the representative of the society 
for the Propagation of the Gospel located 
in Delaware, in a report on the state of 
education in his district, said : " There arc 
some private schools within my respected 
district which are very often put into the 
hands of those who are brought into the 
country and sold as servants. Sonvj 
schoolmasters are hired by the year by a 
knot of families who, in their turn, enter- 
tain him monthly, and the poor man lives 
in their homes like one that begged an 
ahns, more than like a person in credit 
and authority. When a ship arrives in 
the river it is a common expression with 
those who stand in need of an instructor 
for their children, ' let us go and buy a 
schoolmaster.' The truth is the office and 
character of such a person is generally 
very mean and contemptible here, and it 
cannot be otherwise till the public take 
the education of cliildren into their 
mature consideration." While there is not 
much evidence that the proud Virginia 
Cavaliers were in the habit of getting 
tutors for their families in this way, yet 
it is hardly probable that the practice 
should have obtained so commonly in the 
adjacent colonies of ilarylnnd and Dela- 
ware, and not have found some supporters 
in Virginia. In fact John Fiske (Old 
Virginia and her Neighbors) says: 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



roij 



" Sometimes the schoolmaster or private 
tutor was an indented white servant who 
had come out as a redemjitioner, or even 
as a convict." It would naturally be idle 
to expect or look for any development of 
elementary education in localities where 
teaching was held in such low esteem, 
even had the country been more com- 
pactly settled, so as to admit of the es- 
tablishment of schools. "As a matter of 
fact," says Professor Boone (Education 
in the United States), "however, there 
was no school system in any colony south 
of Connecticut before the Revolution, and 
no enterprise of the kind to speak of be- 
fore the nineteenth century. As else- 
where, there were isolated and transient 
schools througliout the provinces, which 
had a commendable influence in forming 
public sentiment. In both Virginia and 
South Carolina, however, the sons of those 
who could afford it were sent abroad to 
be educated or put under tutors at home; 
and parents assisted by settled clergymen, 
and an occasional transient teacher, fur- 
nished all the elementary instruction of 
the period." 

It is doubtless true that the lack of 
elementary public schools and the en- 
forced exjienso of maintaining them led 
the Virginians to centre their regard and 
enthusiasm more effectually upon their 
famous college. At no time, since the mas- 
sacre of 1622 had suspended the college 
movement, had the plan been lost sight 
of; and toward the close of the seven- 
teenth century the colony was fortunate 
in having among its churchmen a scholar 
of distinction, as well as a man of great 
energy and business sagacity, in the per- 
son of James Blair. He was for many 
years before coming to Virginia a minis- 
ter of note in the established church of 
England, and numbered among his close 
friends and supporters no less distin- 
guished officials than Tillotson, Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury, and Stillingfleet, 
the learned Bishop of "Worcester. In 1668 
Blair took up the project of establishing 
the college with energy, first collecting 
twenty-five hundred pounds from the 
wealthy planters toward its foundation, 



and then going to England where he en- 
listed the cordial support of the church, 
and raised additional funds. With great 
confidence and zeal he made his appeal 
directly to William and Mary for the 
charter and royal suiii)ort, witli marked 
success. The Treasury Commissioner, 
however. Sir Edward Seymour, treated 




JAMES BLAIR. 

him with scant courtesy, declaring that 
the nation had far greater need of it-; 
money to prosecute the war against Louis 
XIV. than to establish colleges in the 
colonies. " But," said Blair, " you must 
not forget that the people of Virginia 
have souls to save, as well as those of 
England." " Souls ! " shouted Seymour, 
" damn your souls ! Make tobacco ! " But 
notwithstanding this official rebuff, Blair 
returned to Virginia with his charter and 
about two thousand pounds additional to 
establish the college. The charter stated 
the object of the institution to be " that 
the church of Virginia may be furnished 
with a seminary of ministers of the Gos- 
pel, and that the youth may be properly 
educated in good manners, and that the 
Christian faith may be propagated among 
the western Indians to the glory of Al- 
mighty God; to make, found, and estab- 
lish a certain plan of universal study or 



no 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEK. 



perpetual college of divinity, philosophy, 
languages, and other good arts and 
sciences." Financially, none of the load- 
ing institutions of the country founded 
prior to the niueteentli century was 
launched under such happy auspices. In 
addition to twenty thousand acres of the 
best land in the colony, it was to receive 
a tax of a penny a pound on all tobacco 
exported from Virginia and Maryland, as 
well as the fees of the Surveyor-General's 
office. The College was opened in 1693 
on the " Middle Plantation," between the 
James and York rivers, with James Blair 
as its first president, — a position he held 
with success and honor for fifty years. 
Shortly after the establishment of the col- 
lege, Governor Nicholson decided to re- 
move the capital from Jamestown, a ma- 
larial and unhealthful place, to the higher 
ground and more salubrious climate of 
the " Middle Plantation," which was done 
in 1699, the new town being named Wil- 
liamsburg and having now the double 
honor of being the capital city and the 
seat of the college. The first commence- 
ment exercises were held in ITOO; and it 
was regarded as one of the most important 
occasions in the early histoi-y of the 
colony. " Not only were Virginians and 
Indians present on that gala day," says an 
old chronicler, " but so groat was the fame 
of it that people came in sloops from 
Maryland and Pennsylvania, and even 
from New York." Unlike Harvard, Yale, 
and other northern institutions, the full 
treasury of William and Mary enabled it 
to have a faculty from the stfirt. it con- 
sisting of the President, a grammar mas- 
tor, writing master, and an usher until 
1712, when a professor of mathematics 
was added; and in 1729 the number of 
professors was six. Though established on 
a royal foundation, and directly controlled 
in its government by the Church of Eng- 
land, William and Mary soon became one 
of the most prolific nurseries of liberty 
and independence in the colonies. 

The life of the students seems to have 
been a free one, and when the legislature 
was in session Williamsburg was the scene 
of many distinguished assemblies, and of 



a more formal order of social life than 
could be seen elsewhere in the counti-y. 
That the students were not devoted too ex- 
clusively to study is evident from one of 
the decrees of the faculty which ordered 
" yt no scholar belonging to any school in 
college, of w' age, rani?, or quality soever, 
do keep any race horse at y* college, in 
y^' town, or anywhere iu the neighborliood, 
— y' they be not in any way concerned in 
making races, or in backing, or abetting, 
tliose made by others; and y' all race 
horses kept in y*" neighborhood of y® col- 
lege and belonging to any of y'' scholars, 
be immediately despatched and sent oif, 
and never again brought back, and all of 
this under Pain of y'' severest animail- 
version and punishment." Other similar 
orders forbade " cock-fighting, betting, the 
playing of billiards, and the bringing of 
cards or dice into the college." 

The influence of William and Mary in 
the South, down to the time of the Revo- 
lution, was marked and most salutary. On 
the roll of its alumni will be found the 
name of nearly every man from Virginia 
prominent in the political events tliat led 
up to the break with the mother country; 
and the college has the further distinct 
honor of having been the birthplace in 
1776 of the first Greek Letter Fraternity 
— Phi Beta Kappa — to whose membership 
only men (and since 1S75 women) of the 
highest scholastic attainments are ad- 
mitted. John Fiske has so concisely and 
sympathetically summarized some of the 
distinctive characteristics and glories of 
William and Mary that we cannot do bet- 
ter than quote his words : " The College 
founded by James Blair was a most val- 
uable centre for culture for Virginia, and 
has been remarkable in many ways. It 
was the first college in America to intro- 
duce teaching by lectures, and the elective 
system of study ; it was the first to unite 
a group of faculties into a iniiversity: it 
was the second in the English world to 
have a chair of Municipal Law, George 
Wythe coming to such a profossorship a 
few years after Sir William Blackstone; 
it was the first in America to establish a 
chair of History and Political Science; 



EDUCATIOiSr IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



711 



and it was one of the first to pursue a 
thoroughly secular and unsectarian policy. 
Though until lately its number of students 
at any one time had never reached one 
hundred and fifty, it has given to our 
country fifteen senators and seventy rep- 
resentatives in Congress; seventeen gov- 
ernors of states and thirty-seven judges; 
three Presidents of the United States, — 
Jefferson, Monroe, and Tyler; and the 
great chief justice Marshalh It was a 
noble work for America that was done 
by the Scotch parson James Blair." 

It is estimated that at the beginning of 
the eighteenth century there were less 
than one hundred thousand people in New 
England, of which number Massachusetts 
could claim about sixty thousand and 
Connecticut about fifteen thousand. 
Under such conditions there hardly 
seemed to be a dejnand for a second col- 
lege in New England. But the incon- 
venience and expense of the journey from 
Connecticut to Boston, coupled with tlie 
desire of the ministers of that colony to 
have a college of their own, led in 1698 to 
a plan for a college to be founded and 
directed by a general Synod of the 
churches, which should be called the 
Church School. In 1699 ten of the prin- 
cipal clergymen of the colony were agreed 
upon to be " Trustees to found, erect, and 
govern a college." The next year, 1700, a 
meeting of these trustees was held, and 
each one brought an armfid of books 
which he laid upon the table, repeating 
the formula, " I give these books for the 
founding of a college in this colony." 
These volumes and the acts of the 
Trustees at this meeting constitute the 
beginning of Yale College. The follow- 
ing year a charter was obtained, and Rev. 
Abraham Pierson, a graduate of Harvard 
of the class of 1668, was chosen the first 
Rector. The School (it was not called a 
College until some years later) was opened 
in March, 1701, Jacob Hemingway being 
the first and only student. For the first 
sixteen years of its existence the School 
had no home, one class being located in 
one town, another, in another. " Tale 
College was founded," says President 



Hadley, " after a fashion at the beginning 
of the last (eighteenth) century, along 
the north shore of Long Island Sound. 
For many years it was difficult to say what 
it was and where it belonged." When, 
however, in 1716 it was determined the 
School must have a home somewhere a 
bitter fight broke out between Hartford, 
New Haven, and Saybrook for the honor 
of being the seat of the colony's first insti- 
tution of learning. The General Assem- 
bly, however, the next year decided the 
(luestion in favor of New Haven. Toward 
the end of the previous century deter- 
mined but unsuccessful attempts had been 
made to establish religious tests at Har- 
vard; and as a result of their failure in 
this effort some of the leading divines 
both of Massachusetts and Connecticut 




ELIHU YALE. 



became critical of conditions at the Cam- 
bridge College, and espoused the cause of 
the new Connecticut school. Prominent 
among these malcontents were the two 
Mathers, in Boston; and it has been sup- 
posed that a letter of Cotton blather first 
called the attention of Elihu Yale to the 
struggling New Haven School. Yale, 



ri2 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



whose father came out to the Connecticut 
Colony in 1C38, was born at or near Bos- 
ton, in 1649. In 1052 the family returned 
to England, where Elihu was educated. In 
1678 he joined the East India Company, 
making a large fortune while in the East, 
and being the Govcrnnr of Madras from 
16S7 to 1692. Between 1714-1721 he gave 




TIMOTHY DWIGHT. 

about eight hundred pounds to the new 
School, as well as many books. This gave 
the infant school a start and made its 
foundation more secure. But its growth 
was slow, and like all its sister institu- 
tions, it was always in need of funds. In 
1745 a new charter was granted, and the 
name was formally changed to " Yale Col- 
lege in New Haven." During the Rev- 
olutionaiy war the College was again 
broken vtp, some of the students going to 
Wetherstield, others to Glastonbury; and 
" the president visited the diiferent classes 
as often as he could with convenience." 
But with the inauguration of Timothy 
Dwight as president, in 1795. Yale began 
a new era of prosperity. At that tjjne the 
whole number of students was less than 
one hundred; and the faculty consisted of 
the president, one professor, and three 



tutors. Dwight was particularly success- 
ful in strengthening the faculty, securing 
witbin a short time men like Benjamin 
Silliman, Jeremiah Day. and James Ken- 
nedy, each of whom gave more than fifty 
years of his life to the college. In 1846 
regular graduate courses of instruction 
were established, the first degree being 
conferred in 1852. The Sheffield Scientific 
School was founded in 1847, and in 1886 
the name was changed to Yale University. 
The growth of the institution has been 
steady, though lately it has not been so 
marked as that of Columbia and Harvard. 
Tliere is now a regular average attendance 
of about three thousand three hundred 
students. — with a corps of about four hun- 
dred instructors. The library contains 
close to 375,000 volumes. 

One of the most unique of the higher 
institutions of learning was the " Log Col- 
lege " of William Tennent, famous in it- 
self and for its own work, but also as the 
forerunner of Princeton College. Ten- 
nent was an Irishman, a graduate of Ed- 
inburgh University in 1695, who came to 
America in 1716, and in 1727 was pastor 
of a Presbyterian church at the " Eorks 
of the Neshaminy," in Pennsylvania. lie 
was a strong preacher, of great piety, and 
of broad learning and culture, and a 
teacher inspired with a love for his work 
among young men. Realizing the dire 
need of some school for higher learning, 
even for his own sons, he built a log 
house about twenty feet square, which, 
with Tennent himself, constituted the en- 
tire plant, teaching force, etc., of the Col- 
lege during the twenty years of its exist- 
ence. Whiteficld visited the school while 
on his tour through the United States, and 
in his journal said of it : " It is a log 
house about twenty feet long, and near 
as broad; and to me it resembled the 
school of the Hebrew prophets. From 
this despised place seven or eight minis- 
ters of Jesus have lately been sent forth, 
more are almost ready to be sent, and a 
foundation is now being laid for the in- 
struction of many others." Wlien. in 
1742, Tennent withdrew from active labor 
at the age of seventy, the school ceased to 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



"13 



exist, but it had awakened in the Pres- 
byterian denomination the purpose to es- 
tablish a college for educating their young 
men for the ministry, so that it should 
not be necessary to send to the old coun- 
try for their preachers. The result of 
Tennent's work, and of the interest it 
aroused, was the foundation of Princeton 
College, whose charter was secured in 
1748. Like Yale, it had at first no home, 
the earliest work being done at Elizabeth- 
town. Of the first trustees six were grad- 
uates of Yale, three of Harvard, and three 
nf Tennent's Log College. The require- 
ments for admission, as well as the 
courses of study adopted, were practically 
the same as those of Harvard and Yale. 
When in 1751 it was determined to build 
a permanent home for the young college, 
a lively contest ensued among the New 
Jersey towns for the honor of having the 
institution located within their limits. 
New Brunswick seemed about to be 



the one about which centre the richest 
sentiments of devotion of all Princeton 
graduates. The building was finished in 
1757 and was then considered the finest 
edifice of any character in the colonies, 
and is to-day one of the most venerable 
and imposing of all college buildings. It 
was first occupied in 175G, when there were 
seventy students; and at the commence- 
ment of that j'car, twenty-two were grad- 
uated. It was the following year that the 
noted scholar and theologian. .lonathan 
Edwards, was chosen president, but his 
career was cut short by death only two 
months after his installation. In 1768 
John Witherspoon, destined to become 
one of the great leaders in the national 
struggle for independence, accepted the 
call to the presidency, though he had de- 
clined it two years before. On his moth- 
er's side Witherspoon was descended from 
John Knox, and was graduated from the 
University of Edinburgh in 1742. He 




y \i i: rni,i.i:i;i:, INHO. 



selected when the people of Princeton 
bestirred themselves, and outbade their 
rivals, so securing the coveted prize in 
1752. Two years later work was begun 
upon Nassau hall, which is still the build- 
ing of greatest interest to all alumni, and 



>vas recognized in Scotland as one of thc^ 
most learned and eloquent expounders of 
Calvinistic doctrines, and was honored by 
all the colleges of that faith in Great 
Britain. He brought to the infant college 
at Princeton a gift of the greatest value 



714 



FROM COLONY TO WOliLD POWEK. 



at tliat time in the shaije of a library of 
about six hundred volumes. Upon arriv- 
ing' in this country he at once identified 
himself ardently with the advocates of lib- 
erty and separation, and by his writings 
and addresses was a powerful influence in 
bringing the Scotch and Scotch-Irish ele- 
ments of the people into line as supporters 
of the cause of the people. He was a 
signer of the Declaration of Independ- 




JAMES MCCOSH. 

ence, and served twice in the Continental 
Congress, — a man of the most pronounced 
patriotism as well as of religious earnest- 
ness. During his administration of the 
affairs of the College a great advance was 
made in the introduction of the latest 
educational methods and improvements 
in the system of teaching. He introduced 
the lecture system, himself giving courses 
on rhetoric, moral philosophy, history, and 
theology. It was during his administra- 
tion that Princeton was, for so long a 
time, the very centre of the contending 
forces of the Revolutionary War. Speak- 
ing of the college at this time, and of its 
one building, Professor Sloane has said: 
" When first completed Nassau Hall was 



visited by travelers as the largest build- 
ing then in the colonies. Within the walls 
of this now venerable and stately pile 
were quartered the troops of contending 
British and Americans in the Revolution- 
ary War. The Continental Congress 
used it for their sittings v.dien driven from 
Philadelphia, and adjourned in 1783 to 
attend the college commencement in a 
body. Its walls still bear the imprints of 
cannon balls used in the battle of Prince- 
ton, and on them hangs a portrait of 
Washington painted by Peale. It was 
paid for by the money given as a personal 
gift by the former for the use of the build- 
ing by his troops, and fills a frame which 
once contained an effigy of George II. 
Nine signers of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence frequented its halls, and its win- 
dows blazed with light in a grand illumi- 
nation when the news of the signing 
reached the town. Aaron Burr studied in 
its class-room; and his body was borne 
from its walls to a neighboring church 
yard." Of course, the college suffered 
greatly in every way during the Revolu- 
tionary War, — its library was scattered, 
its apparatus destroyed, and its routine 
worlv sadly demoralized. After the war 
the State of New Jersey voted six hun- 
dred pounds a year for three years to aid 
the College in rejilacing its lost or de- 
stroyed property. When peace again set- 
tled upon the land the college had a rapid 
growth; and at the opening of the nine- 
teenth century had about two hundred 
students, with a graduating class of fifty- 
four. Princeton has always been one of 
the most conservative of the older colleges, 
and for the last sixty years its growth has 
been steady and its standards high. Dr. 
MeCosh, who became its president in 1SG8, 
holding the office for twenty years, was 
one of the most influential and command- 
ing figures in the educational world dur- 
ing that period, — ^his administration and 
influence greatly advancing the reputation 
of the institution, and inspiring all its 
departments with new life and energy. 
Dr. McCosh was succeeded as president by 
the Rev. F. L. Patton, who resigned in 
1002 and was immediately succeeded by 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



ri5 



the historian aud distinguished student 
of Political Science, Woodrow Wilson, — a 
succession that demonstrated to the public 
that Princeton was disposed to keep pace 
with its sister institutions in their recog- 
nition of the fact that new forces were at 
work in, and would characterize, the twen- 
tieth century, and that all colleges and 
universities that would share in these ad- 
vanced movements must throw off the 
shackles of sectarian conservatism which 
had heretofore too frequently dominated 
their courses. Princeton has no profes- 
sional schools. The Theological Seminary 
is a closely affiliated institution, but a 
separate corporation. The average enroll- 
ment of students is now about sixteen hun- 
dred, and the teaching force numbers 
about one hundred and sixty. The digni- 
fied retirement of ex-President Grover 
Cleveland to Princeton, where, though 
not directly connected with the college, 
he was an occasional lecturer on po- 
litical history and civic questions, as well 
as one of the most highly esteemed and 
lionored friends of both officers and stu- 
dents, added not a little distinction to the 
later history of the College and the town. 
Few of the early documents bearing on 
the rise and advancement of learning, and 
of academic institutions, in the colonies 
were more interesting in their character, 
or have been more fruitful of permanent 
and notable results, than two announce- 
ments that appeared in the issue of the 
New York Mercury for May 31. 1754. 
One of these stated that a "public Lot- 
tery " would be held " as a further pro- 
vision toward founding a college for the 
advancement of learning within the col- 
ony, to consist of five thousand tickets at 
thirty shillings each, eight hundred and 
thirty-two of which are to be fortunate." 
The other announcement took the form of 
a long and detailed advertisement, setting 
forth the character, purpose, course of in- 
struction, etc., of the " intended Seminary 
or college of New York," over the signa- 
ture of Samuel Johnson, who further ad- 
vises the public that " The trustees have 
thought fit to appoint me to take charge 
of it." The lengthy statement which fol- 



lowed, addressed " To such parents as now 
have (or expect to have) children prepared 
to be educated in the College of New 
York," announced that it " was proposed 
to begin tuition upon the first day of July 
next, at the vestry room in the new school- 
house adjoining to Trinity Church in 
New York, which the gentlemen of the 
vestry are so good as to favor them with 
the use of in the interim till a convenient 
Place may be built." After a lengthy 
statement as to the standard of education 
and character to be striven for, the adver- 
tisement declares that " the Chief Thing 
that is aimed at in this College is to teach 




Photo. Cupi/i-iuhti'd by J. E. Furdj/, Boston. 
WOODROW WILSON. 

and engage the children to know God in 
Jesus Christ, and to love and serve Him 
in all Sobriety, Godliness, and Richness 
of Life, with a jierfect Heart and a wil- 
ling mind; and to train them up in all 
Virtuous Habits, and all such useful 
Knowledge as may render them creditable 
to their Families, and Friends, ornaments 
to their Coimtry, and useful to the Pub- 
lic Weal in their generation. ... To 



716 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD PO\YEK. 



wliicli good purposes it is earnestly de- 
sired that Parents, Guardians, and Mas- 
ters would train them up from their cra- 
dles, under strict government, and in all 
Seriousness, Virtue, and Industry. And 
above all. that in order hereunto, they be 
very careful themselves to set them good 








ii 



FIXST KIN(; s CO:_Ll-r,K. 

examples of true Piety and Virtue in 
their own conduct." " Vth and lastly," 
the advertisement continues, " a serious, 
virtuous, and industrious course of Life 
being first provided for it is further the 
Design of this College to instruct and 
perfect the Youth in the learned lan- 
guages, and in the Arts of Reasoning ex- 
actly, of writing correctly, and speaking 
eloquently, and in the Arts of Numbering 
and Measuring, of Surveying- and Navi- 
gation, of Geography and History, of 
Husbandry, Commerce, and Government; 
and in the knowledge of all nature in the 
Heavens above us and in the Air, Water, 
and Earth around us, and the various 
kinds of Meteors, Stones, Mines, ajid Min- 
erals, Plants, and Animals, and of every- 
thing- useful for the comfort, the conven- 
ience, and elegance of Life in the chief 
Manufactures, finally to lead them from 
the Study of Nature to the Knowledge of 
Themselves, and of the God of Nature, 
and their Duty to Him, themselves, and 
one another. And everj'thing that can 
contribute to their true Happiness, both 
here and hereafter. This much, Gentle- 
men, it is thought proper to advertise you 
of, concerning the Nature and Design of 
this College." Below Mr. Johnson's sig- 
nature ;•< the following, " N. B. The 



charge of Tuition is established by the 
Trustees to be only Twenty-five shillings 
for each quarter." 

Later in the same year (1754) a charter 
incorporating- " the governors of the col- 
lege of the Province of New York in the 
city of New York, in America," was 
granted by George II., and the actual work 
nf instruction was begun. Shortly after, 
a building thirty feet wide by one hun- 
<lred and eighty feet long was erected on 
land in the " skirts of the city," being on 
the lots now bounded by Church, Barclay, 
and Murray streets. This building was 
the college home for more than one hun- 
dred years. For the first year of the col- 
lege's existence President Johnson was 
the sole member of the faculty; but with 
the incoming of the second class his son 
was appointed a tutor. In 17.58 the first 
commencement was held, eight men re- 
ceiving their bachelor's degrees; and in 
1767 the Medical Department was estab- 
lished. During the Revolutionary War 
the work of the college was virtually sus- 
pended, the college building was con- 
verted into a hospital, and the apparatus 
and books were stored. After the evacu- 
ation of New York by the British troops, 
however, the State Legislature passed " an 
act for granting certain privileges to the 
college, hitherto known as King's Col- 
lege, for altering the name and charter 
thereof, and erecting a University within 
the State;" and in 1787 the new charter, 
similar to the old one, was granted and 
the name changed from King's to Colum- 
bia College. One of the most important 
of the early acts of the Trustees was the 
establishment in 1798 of the Professorship 
of Law, with the Hon. James Kent as its 
first incumbent; and it was as the head 
of this department that he prepared and 
delivered to the students of Columbia the 
remarkable course of lectures which con- 
stitute his learned " Commentaries on 
American Law," — conferring upon Ameri- 
can students not only of Law, but also 
of Political and allied Sciences, the same 
great boon that Sir William Blackstone 
had given to the English people forty 
years before in his " Commentaries on the 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



717 



Laws of England." The Medical School, 
established in 17(i7, was made independ- 
ent of the college in 1814, as the College 
of Physicians and Surgeons, but was re- 
annexed to Columbia in 1860, and fully 
reincorporated as the Department of 
Medicine in 1891. In 1864 the School of 
Mines was established; and it is not too 
much to say that down to about the last 
decade of the nineteenth centurj' the col- 
lege proper was little more than a New 
Tork city institution; while its three 
great schools of Medicine, Law, and Mines 
attracted students from all parts of the 
countiy who far outnumbered the students 
attendant upon the usual college courses. 
By 1857 the college had entirely out- 
grown its old buildings and site, and a 
move was then made, again to the " skirts 
of the city " at the corner of Madison 
avenue and Forty-ninth street, where it 
remained until, about forty jears later, 
another move was made to the present 
superb site on Morningside Heights, — 
commanding the finest and most enchant- 
ing views of the Hudson valley and Long 
Island Sound, — and the erection of new 
and thoroughly modern buildings, equip- 
ped with every facility for the conduct of 
the best collegiate work, was begun. One 
of the most conspicuous of these, the Li- 
brary building, costing one million dol- 
lars, was the personal gift of President 
Seth Low to his Alma Mater, as a memo- 
rial of his father, one of New York's most 
distinguished merchants. In 1901 Mr. 
Low resigned the presidency to engage in 
the mayoralty contest, in a determined 
effort to redeem the city from the clutches 
of Tammany ; and Nicholas Mun-ay But- 
ler was elected his successor, assuming 
the duties of the office, January 1, 1902. 
Mr. Butler, who was forty years of age 
when made president, had probably had a 
larger experience in pedagogical work, 
and had studied its philosophy and en- 
gaged more extensively in its practical 
development, than any other living edu- 
cator in the United States except that 
Nestor of teachers, and wisest and most 
venerated of college presidents, — to whom 
instructors and scholars alike gladly yield 



supreme honors, Charles W. Eliot, of 
Harvard. Under the liberal policies that 
now obtain at Columbia, the wide outlook 
and the keen scent for new avenues of 
educational, political, and civio influence, 
the institution is forging ahead and as- 
suming a masterful position at an un- 
precedented rate, and with a most bril- 
liant prospect for material growth, and 
a more pronounced influence in all things 
that make for higher culture and for 
righteousness. At the beginning of 1908 
its roll of instructors numbered more 
than si.x hundred, while about fifty-two 
hundred students were sharing in the ad- 
vantages offered by the university, not the 
least of which is the library with upwards 
of 450,000 volumes. 

Of course our space will not admit of 




Photo. Copyrighted by J. E. Pin-fiy, Boston. 
NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER. 

any detailed account of the early history 
of the many colleges and universities, too 
many of them only so-called " Universi- 
ties," which are now scattered over the 
entire counti-y, most of them blessings to 
the communities in which they have been 
established, and rich in uplifting influ- 



718 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



o:ices. In addition to the five oldest and 
most representative institutions already 
described nineteen others were established 
before the opening of the nineteenth cen- 
tury. In connection with the early his- 
toiy of two of these interesting questions 
arose. When in 1793 a charter was sought 
for Williams College, in Massachusetts, a 
vigorous and formal remonstrance was 
filed by Harvard, which urged that it 
" was properly a college of the whole gov- 
ernment ; and that the Commonwealth 
would do its people an injury by taking 
the support from one old and established 
institution, and encouraging a new and 
feeble school." And though the protest 
failed, the question was raised which is 
still an open and much-discussed one, as to 
the advisability of creating so many new 
schools. When one considers that there 
are now, for example, in Massachusetts 
thirteen; in New York, twenty-sis; in 
Pennsylvania, thirty-three; in Virginia, 




JOILN .MARSHALL. 

fourteen ; in Tennessee, twenty ; in Ohio, 
thirty-four; in Illinois, thirty-one; in 
Kansas, twenty; in Washington (State) 
six; in Oregon, eight; and in California, 



twelve colleges whose charters empower 
them to bestow the academic degrees, a 
large proportion of them maintaining a 
most precarious existence simply to con- 
serve sectarian prejudices, one may well 
question whether money, energy, and 
talents are not frittered away in seemingly 
futile efforts to bolster np weak and 
struggling institutions, which would be 
much more effectually used, and would 
realize for the people of the states con- 
cerned far greater benefits, under a wise 
concentration of endowment and endeavor. 
Dartmouth College, growing out of the 
efforts of the Rev. Eleazer Wheelock to 
Christianize the Indians (beg-un in 175-t) 
iiad for many years a checkered and 
troublous existence. In 1769 a royal 
charter was secured for the school with 
the title of Dartmouth College, in honor 
of Lord Dartmouth. Early in the nine- 
teenth century internal troubles developed, 
and in 1815 the State Legislature ousted 
the trustees of the old institution, incor- 
porating a new College, with a new Board 
of Trustees. To determine the legality of 
this act the old Board brought suit in the 
State Courts with the result that the 
course of the Legislature was sustained as 
valid. An appeal was then made to the 
Supreme Court of the United States, 
which was heard in March, 1818, Daniel 
Webster, who liad graduated from Dart- 
mouth in 1801, appearing for the appel- 
lants. The gist of Mr. Webster's argu- 
ment was " that the charter of Dartmouth 
College created a private corjioration for 
administering a charity; that in the ad- 
ministration of such uses the trustees 
have a recognized right of property; that 
the grant of such a charter is a contract 
between the sovereign power and the 
.grantees and descends to their successors; 
and that, therefore, the Act of the New 
Hampshire Legislature in taking away the 
government from one board of trustees 
and conferring it upon another was a vio- 
lation of contract," and so repugnant to 
that clause of the Constitution of the 
United States which refused to any state 
the power to pass a " law impairing the 
obligation of contracts." In this conten- 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



'19 



tioH every position taken by Mr. Webster 
was fu'iiy sustained, the distinguished 
chief justice, John Marshall, delivering 
the opinion of the Court. And the prose- 
cution of this, the famous " Dartmouth 
College Case," not only at once placed 
Webster in the • front rank of constitu- 
tional lawyers, but the decision of the 
learned court, as voiced by Marshall, has 
always been considered the most far-reach- 
ing, in all its effects, for weal or for woe, 
of all the judgments that Court has 
rendered during its entire history. 

Although, as we have said, it is im- 
possible to give here any detailed account 
of the great number of Colleges and Ilni- 
• versities that are now established in this 
country, yet, as the totals probably so far 
exceed any conceptions of those not 
familiar with the facts, before leaving the 
subject of colleges vre shall give the latest 
available statistics as presented by the 
Bureau of Education, and W'hich may be 
relied upon as practically correct for the 
present time. There are in the United 
States 493 " Universities, Colleges, and 
Technical Schools," which employ 18,520 
male and 2,571 female instructors, and 
have an enrollment of 177,560 male and 
51,792 female students. The total income 
of these institutions (1905-6) was $40,- 
705,120; their libraries contained 11,310,- 
509 bound volumes; their scientific ap- 
paratus was valued at $25,626,268; and 
their grounds and buildings at $236,- 
253,175; while the total of their produc- 
tive funds was placed at $236,613,929. 
Whatever other suggestions these un- 
paralleled summaries may convey, they 
proclaim more emphatically than any 
words could do that it is no less the pur- 
pose of the sons of the twentieth century, 
than it was of the Pilgrim Fathers of the 
^eventeenth, to make sure that the " light 
of learning may not die out, nor the study 
of God's word perish." 

That a more or less well-defined system 
of Collegiate education should have been 
early worked out in the colonies is not 
surprising, as a very large number of the 
settlers from the date of the first arrivals 
were graduates of English or Continental 



Universities. They brought with them 
clearly defined ideas of what the higher 
institutions of learning should be. But of 
primary or secondary systems of schools 
there were no examples existing in Eng- 
land, and none on the Continent that seem 
to have so impressed themselves upon the 
colonists as to endure the process of 
transplanting. Their first essays in the 
direction of the nurture of education 
looked uniformly toward the establish- 
ment of colleges, with but little practical 
thought as to the sources from which the 
College must derive its student support. 
Consequently for two hundred years after 
the foundation of the Virginia, Massa- 
chusetts Bay, and Connecticut settlements 
the Colonists were experimenting as to 
elementary and secondary education with 
very dubious results. So obstinate seemed 
the conditions to be overcome, and so un- 
successful their early ventures, that for 
the first half century preceding the Revo- 
lutionary War there was a general decline 
along these lines throughout the colonies. 
This was attributed in part, perhaps, to 
the unsettled social and political condi- 
tions that prevailed as a result of the 
many Indian wars, and to the growing 
troubles with the mother country; but it 
was more especially due to the lack of a 
lively appreciation of the need of such 
schools, and of the vital relation they bore 
to the colleges they had labored so enthu- 
siastically and devotedly to establish, and 
of which they were so justly proud. Even 
so early as 1701 the Massachusetts Gen- 
eral Court complained that the funda- 
mental law of 1647, which required every 
town of fifty families to open an ele- 
mentary school, and every town of one 
hundred families, a grammar school was 
" shamefully neglected by diverse towns 
and the penalty thereof not required." 
As the penalty for non-compliance with 
the statute was fixed at the low sum of 
five pounds, many localities found it 
much cheaper and far less troublesome 
to pay the fine than to maintain the 
school. After the war an effort was made 
in Massachusetts to remedy the evils that 
had crept in and to meet new conditions 



720 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLU POWEK. 



by the passage of the school law of 17S0. 
By that act, among other things, the Dis- 
trict Scliool System was established to 
meet the needs of rural populations too 
far removed from tlie town to enjoy the 
benefits of its sehool. Towns of fifty 
families were to support an English 
school at least six months during the 
year, at which reading-, writing, the Eng- 
lish language, arithmetic, orthography, 
and decent behavior were to be taught, 
which was a marked enlargement of the 
curriculum of the existing schools. The 
terms of schools in towns of one hun- 
dred, one hundred and fifty, and two hun- 
dred families were fixed so that sessions 
should be more continuous; while the 
penalties for failure to comply with the 
provisions were raised to ten poinids in 
the case of elementary, and thirty pounds 
in the case of grammar schools. The 
law required that all teachers should be 
college graduates, and should "produce 
satisf actoiy evidence thereof ; " and fur- 
ther made citizens of the United States 
alone eligible as teachers, a reflection of 
the animosities resulting from the war. 
This law continued in force until 182C. 
when the system of control of school 
affairs in each locality was placed in the 
liands of School Committees of not less 
than five persons, who were to be elected 
at the annual Xovm meetings. In 18.37. 
however, the greatest step in advance was 
made by the creation of the State Board 
of Education, of which the distinguished 
Horace !Mann was made the first Secre- 
tary. Then followed the development of 
the general system of primary and 
secondary education which has made of 
the schools of the state models that 
nearly every other state in the Union has 
copied. 

The decline in the efficiency of the 
grammar schools in the latter part of the 
eighteenth centui-y, however, gave rise to 
another class of institutions which has 
exerted a far-reaching influence. These 
were the Academies, which were the di- 
rect successors of the grammar schools, 
and the forerunners of the present day 
High Schools. Many of these Academies 



were local affairs, and so not possessed of 
great i^ermanency or influence; others 
were institutions of broad scope and well 
founded, which drew students from all 
parts of the country. The first of these 
institutions to become well established 
and to take out a charter was the Ger- 
mantown Academy, near Philadelphia, in 
175.3. The first to incorporate in Massa- 
chusetts was the Phillips Academy at 
Andover, Mass., in 17S0; and at about the 
same time the Phillips Academy at Exe- 
ter, ]Sr. H., was also chartered. The third 
to be established in New England was the 
Dummer Academy, which was chartered 
in 1782, though it had been in successful 
existence since 17G1, and was the pioneer 
Academy of Xew England. In the latter 
.year Lt. Gov. Dummer bequeathed his 
mansion and three hundred and twenty 
acres of land for the establishment and 
support of the school which was opened in 
Byfield, Mass. It achieved marked suc- 
cess from the start, which was largely due 
to the personal influence of its principal. 
Samuel Moody, who was one of the most 
noted educators of his century. Under 
his wise and intelligent supervision the 
Dummer Academy early became, accord- 
ing to a historian of these institutions, 
" the best type of an English grammar 
school that had existed on American soil.'' 
Mr. Mood.v was a graduate of Harvard, 
and his appointment as principal of the 
Academy was for life, and he could only 
be removed in case the Overseers of 
Harvard College adjudged him " inuuoral 
and incompetent." These academies mul- 
tiplied rapidly all over the country, and 
before 1820 there was hardly one of the 
older states where they were not to be 
found, doing the best educational work 
that had been done; and many of them 
with established reputations that reached 
far beyond the confines of their own 
states. Some of these, in addition to 
those already named, were the Leicester, 
Mass., Academy (1784); the Newark. 
N. J. ; the Wilmington. N. C. ; the Warren. 
R. I.; the Philadelphia, and thy renowned 
Moravian Academies at Bethlehem and 
Nazareth, in Pennsylvania. At first th? 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



schools were chiefly open to boys alone, 
public opinion not yet having advanced 
to the more enlightened plane which 
would admit of the highest school advan- 
tages common to both sexes. But the 
rapidly growing popularity of these 
Academies began early to excite among 
the girls a desire for school advantages 
which rapidly developed into a demand, 
so that during the latter part of the 
eighteenth and earlj' part of the nine- 
teenth centuries many of these institu- 
tions became coeducational, while others 
were chartered for the exclusive use of 
women. In 1784 Leicester Academy threw 
its doors open to both sexes, with equal 
advantages for all. The Penn Charter 
School of Philadelphia had been coeduca- 
tional from its foundation. The Dwight 
School for Girls at Greenfield, Ct., was 
opened in 1785. In 1803 the celebrated 
Academy at Bradford, Mass., was founded 
for both sexes; but after a few years the 
boys were forced out, and it has since 
been, and is now, one of the best and most 
distinguished of the higher schools for 
women alone. Between 1820 and 1870 the 
Academies and Seminaries devoted exclu- 
sively to women multiplied on every hand. 
In 1821 Emma Willard founded her re- 
nowned Female Seminary at Troy. N. Y., 
which was chartered in 1837: in 1822 
Catherine Beecher opened her girls' school 
at Hartford, Ct.; in 1823 the Adams 
Academy at Derry, N. II., was estab- 
lished, — the first school in New England 
to be chartered for the exclusive benefit 
of girls. Mary Lyon, who later founded 
that most beneficent institution, Mt. Hol- 
yoke Seminary, was a teacher at the 
Adams Academy. In fact so rapid was 
the spread throughout the country of 
these Seminaries and Academies devoted 
exclusively to the higher education of 
girls that in 1875 they numbered more 
than three hundred. This number has 
since that date gradually declined be- 
cause of the greater privileges accorded 
girls in the development of the High 
School system. These Academies, as a 
class, were generally styled " Free 
Academies," although in practically all 
46 



cases fees were required for attendance, 
and they rarely received any state or 
municipal aid. The earliest founded 
institutions of the class, which gave to 
the later ones their general character and 
direction, had for their prototypes the 
great so-called public schools of England, 
such as Eton and Rugby. These English 
schools are richly endowed, the salary of 
the head-master of Eton being twenty-five 
thousand dollars a year; and admission to 
them has generally been dependent upon 
connection with some particular church, 
high social position, or some other form of 
caste or class distinction. And it is only 
in the sense that the American Academies 
were open to " all sorts and conditions " 
of youth that they have been " free," in 
contrast with the exclusiveness of the 
English Schools. Prof. Dexter has pre- 
pared a tabulated statement of the 
Academies in active operation in all the 
states in 1850. New York heads the list 
with 887, having 49,328 pupils; Pennsyl- 
vania follows with 524, and 23,751 schol- 
ars; and in all the states there were 6,085 
such Academies, having a teaching force 
that numbered 12,260, and an enrollment 
of 263,096 pupils. 

Though an account of the development 
of the High Schools would seem naturally 
to follow a consideration of the Academies 
which the former so largely superseded, 
yet no intelligent idea of the rise of the 
High School system, nor of the latter day 
common-school system, can be obtained 
unless one is somewhat familiar with the 
revolution in educational theories and 
methods which began in the third and 
fourth decades of the nineteenth century. 
This was in harmony with the general 
awakening along all intellectual lines 
that characterized that period. Its influ- 
ence was dominant in Science, Literature, 
the Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce. 
As we have endeavored to show, for the 
fifty years previous, Colleges and Acade- 
mies had multiplied rapidly, and had been 
steadily though slowly raising their 
standards of scholarship; but these were 
the schools for the few, all of them de- 
manding fees for tuition and subjecting 



122 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



the scholar to other expenses, which only 
a limited number of the people were able 
to meet. And all the time the facilities 
afforded the many, the schools for the 
people, had been deteriorating in char- 
acter and had become almost entirely 
neglected, in many places. Prof. Dexter, 




HORACE MANN 

in his " History of Education in the 
United States," has so well summarized 
these conditions, that we quote his words: 
" In 1837 the State of Massachusetts was 
paying but $2.73 per pupil for the educa- 
tion of its children, a sum only about 
one-tenth that of the present cost, and 
less than even the poorest communities of 
the South are now devoting to it. There 
was absolutely no such thing known as the 
jjcdagogical supervision of the schools, 
and not a public institution for the train- 
ing of teachers in the country. Such were 
the educational conditions in the East, 
when, in 1S37, Massachusetts first organ- 
ized its State Board of Education. The 
far-reaching influence of this move was 
due to two things: first, the fact that 
general conditions were ripe for a period 
of educational jirogress; and, second, that 



the right man was at hand to become its 
leader. Neither one could have accom- 
plished much without the other, but the 
combination was a most happy one. To 
it we may ascribe the tremendous growth 
in common-school education which the 
country has since seen." What Luther 
was to the religious reformation ; what 
Cromwell was to the political revolution 
in England, Horace Mann has been to 
the public common-school system which 
now pervades every part of our country, 
and of which all the American people are 
justly so proud. He was born in Frank- 
lin, Mass., in 1796, and, left a fatherless 
lad at the age of thirteen, his boyhood 
days were days of hardship and continued 
struggle. As he was not able to attend 
school more than a few weeks in a year, 
the meagre advantages open to youth 
situated as he was impressed themselves 
upon his mind. Speaking of his instruct- 
ors later in life he said, " they were 
very good people, but very poor teachers." 
Mann was an insatiate reader and had 
such reverence for books that, as he once 
said, " I would as soon stick a pin into 
ray own flesh as into the pages of a book." 
At the age of nineteen he came in con- 
tact with his " first real teacher " and 
fitted for college in six months, entering 
Brown University, from which he gradu- 
ated in the class of 1819. After gradua- 
tion he taught Latin and Greek for two 
years at Brown, then took up the study 
of law, and was admitted to the bar in 
1823, opening an office in Dedham, Mass. 
In 1827 he was sent to the Legislature and 
represented Dedham in that body until 
1833, when he removed to Boston, and was 
the same year elected to the State Senate. 
From his first entry into political life he 
took a lively interest in every measure of 
reform. It was through his personal 
exertions that the State Lunatic Asylum 
was established at Worcester, and he was 
the first chairman of its board of trustees. 
He was president of the State Senate 
when the State Board of Education was 
established ; and, though higher official po- 
sitions were certainly within his grasp, 
he resigned his offices and gave up a 



educatioin IX colo:nies axd states. 



lucrative law practice, to become the first 
Secretary of tlie Board in order that 
through the opening thus afforded him he 
might work out an entire change in the 
whole system, or lack of system, in pub- 
lic education. 

As has been said, " During twelve years 
of his secretaryship Mr. Mann's accom- 
plishments were little short of stujx^ndous. 
Rarely have great abilities, unselfish de- 
votion, and brilliant success, been so 
united in the course of a single life." 
And in a " Supplementary Report " made 
after his election to Congress in the 
Spring of 18-18, Mr. Mann said : " From 
the time I accepted the Secretaryship in 
June, 1837, until May 1, 1848, when I 
tendered my resignation of it, I labored 
in this cause an average of not less than 
fifteen hours a day. From the beginning 
to the end of this period I never took a 
single day for relaxation, and months and 
months together passed without my with- 
drawing a single evening to call upon a 
friend." In Congress Mr. Mann was, 
from the first, a fearless and pronounced 
champion of anti-slavery principles, and 
early saw the true trend of the conflict ; 
for in his first speech he said : " I think 
the country is to experience serious 
times. Interference with slavery will 
excite civil commotion in the South. But 
it is hest to interfere. Now is the time to 
see whether the Union is a rope of sand or 
a hand of steel." Nominated for gov- 
ernor by the Free Soil party in 1852, he 
was the same day elected president of the 
new Antioch College, at Yellow Springs, 
Ohio ; and failing of election as governor, 
he accepted the presidency of the college, 
devoting the remainder of his life to the 
further expansion of his educational 
ideals, and espousing especially the prin- 
ciple of coeducation, which Antioch had 
adopted, being a close second to Oberlin 
College, which first opened its doors freely 
to both sexes. Mr. Mann was also most 
happy and fortmiate in his married life, 
his wife, Mary Tyler Peabody, and her 
sister, Elizabeth Preston Peabody, both 
being leaders in all movements looking to 
the betterment of social and educational 



conditions, both skillful and interesting 
writers and sjieakers, and pioneers in the 
Kindergarten work in this country. We 
believe it is not too much to say that no 
other great cause has ever been more dis- 
tinctly marked by the impress of the 
thought and activities of one man, than 
has the cause of elementary and second- 
ary education, in fact of education in gen- 
eral during the past forty years, received 
its impulse and taken its direction from 
the life-work of Horace Mann; and not 
the least evidence of this, nor the least 
of the tributes to his memory, is the fact 
that even now not a year passes without 
his name being given to some new elegant 
school building in the grow-ing cities of 
the middle and far West, — the affectionate 
and reverent homage of thoughtful and 
intelligent men and women to a wise, 
earnest, and unselfish public benefactor. 

The chief principles for which Mann 
contended when he took up his work as 
Secretary of the Massachusetts State 
Board of Education and for which he 
labored throughout his term, may be 
roughly summarized as follows : 

1 — The abolition of the District School 
System as established by the Act of 1789, 
which he characterized as " the most un- 
fortunate law on the subject of Common 
Schools ever enacted in the State." He 
advocated the town as the unit of admin- 
istration, and intelligent supervision. 

2 — The apportionment by the State of 
adequate public school funds. 

3 — The extension of the school year. 
In 1837 one-third of the children within 
the state were without any school advan- 
tages whatever, and a large proportion of 
the remainder attended school only two or 
three months in winter, or a few weeks 
in summer. In 1839 the minimum school 
year for all districts was fixed at six 
months, a term which has been steadily 
lengthened until now every child in the 
state must take at least seven full years, 
of forty weeks each, in school. 

4 — The establishment of Normal 
Schools for the training of teachers. 

5 — The building of good, clean, sani- 



7:i4 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



tary schoolhousos, — " fit temples of 
science." 

C — The uniformity of text-books. When 
Mr. Mann began his labors lie found over 
three hundred different sets in use in the 
state. 

7 — The establishment of public libraries 
as the adjuncts of the school system. 

What Mann achieved along these lines 
during his eleven years of service can 
hardly be hinted at here. But there was 
hardly a point which he aimed at that was 
not approximately reached during that 
period, or such permanemt direction given 
to educational thought and administra- 
tive forces that tlie results were secured 
later on. In 1839 two Normal Schools 
were established, for the education of 
teachers. In 184C Special Agents of the 
Board of Education were appointed, add- 
ing greatly to its efficiency. In 1854 city 
and town superintendents were author- 
ized. In 18G9 to'svns were empowered to 
expend public funds for the conveyance 
of children to schools, in an effort to 
settle the question of the consolidation of 
rural schools. In 1882, after fifty years 
of controversy, the District School Sys- 
tem was finally abolished. In 1883, even- 
ing schools were authorized, and in 1884 
absolute uniformity of text-books was 
secured by enactment of the free text- 
book law. In 1891 a law was passed re- 
quiring of evei-y town free High School 
instruction and the school year was ex- 
tended to eight months ; and in 1902 a law 
became operative which required every 
town and city to employ a superintend- 
ent of schools, either singly or in com- 
bination with other towns. This brief 
though imperfect summary of school leg- 
islation will serve to show ho\\ clearly the 
development of the educational system of 
the state down into the present century 
has been along the lines laid down by 
Horace Mann nearly seventy years ago. 

It is an interesting coincidence that in 
1837 Connecticut, and in 1843 Rhode Is- 
land, established Boards of Education 
similar to that of Massachusetts, of each 
of which, in turn, Henry Barnard became 
Secretary, — a man whose place in the ed- 



ucational history of the country, both in 
the aim and sincerity of his work and in 
the light of results achieved, is second 
only to that of his great contemporary 
and fellow-worker, Horace Mann. And we 
have considered so fully the development 
of the common-school system of these 
New England States simply because it 
marks witli considerable exactness the 
trend of development in all the Eastern 
States as well as in the newer states of 
the West, — subject, of course, to varia- 
tions made necessary by individual local 
conditions. 

One of the earliest results of the new 
spirit that was pervading educational 
movements was the establishment of Nor- 
mal Schools. The need of these schools 
as nurseries for teachers had been recog- 
nized for years, but no direct legislation 
had been taken in any state looking 
toward their establishment. The father 
of the movement was Mr. James F. Car- 
ter, who, in 11^20, published an essay treat- 
ing of an " Institution for the Training 
of Teachers," and endeavored to test his 
principles by the founding of a private 
school at Lancaster, Massachusetts. Tliis 
was not a success, but Mr. Carter's enthu- 
siasm was not checked; and when in 1853 
he was elected to the Legislature he at 
once began a campaign in the interests of 
a public seliool for the same purpose. As 
he was the author of the bill creating 
the State Board of Education, he had 
abundant opportunity to press his measure 
in debate, with the result that, in 1839, 
the State opened two public normal 
schools, one located at Lexington for 
women and the other at Barre for both 
sexes. 

In nearly all cases the Normal Schools 
are open to both sexes, though women 
largely predominate. A distinctive feature 
of all these schools is the Practice 
School, in which the prospective teachers 
constituting the student body are given 
an opportunity to observe the work of 
expert teachers, and also to give instruc- 
tion themselves. In many of the larger 
cities the municipal governments have es- 
tablished training schools for teachers and 



EDUCATION IX COLONIES AND STATES. 



725 



are in this way able to supply their own 
needs. The earliest of these schools was 
the Girls' Normal, of Philadelphia. The 
Boston Normal was established in 1852, 
and the Chicago Normal under the 
direction of Colonel Francis Parker 
achieved an enviable reputation. In addi- 
tion to these classes of Normal Schools 
many of the leading- colleges have estab- 
lished complete pedagogical departments, 
with elaborate equipment; and later still 
has come the distinctive Teachers' Col- 
lege, of which the most highly developed 
examples are the New York State Normal 
College, at Albany, N. Y.; the Teachers' 
College connected with the Columbia 
University, conducting the Horace Mann 
School; and the School of Education of 
the University of Chicago. The sys- 
tematic study of methods and interchange 
of thought is maintained among teachers 
by a variety of Institutes, State Educa- 
tional Associations, with stated annual 
meetings usually lasting through a week; 
and, over all, so to speak, the National 
Educational Association, — " The N. E. 
A.." — whose annual meetings, usually of 
a week to ten days in July, are events of 
national importance. 

One of the mooted questions in the 
whole history of educational growth has 
been what amount of education, or opjaor- 
tunities for procuring' an education, a 
city or state is bound to provide for its 
children. It has been generally con- 
ceded that every town or city should make 
it possible for every child to get the rudi- 
ments of an education; but beyond this 
many taxpayers have been indisposed to 
go. But a vast growth of liberal senti- 
ment has been manifest during the last 
forty years, with the result that every 
self-respecting community now demands 
that the state shall provide a sound edu- 
cation for all its children. Hence we have 
in every city and town the High Schools, 
cflfering the best advantages whether one 
wishes to fit for college, or to make the 
High School course round out one's 
student life. As has been said before, 
the place of the Academies which, a half 
century ago, were the only finishing and 



college preparatory schools, has now been 
taken by the High Schools, though many 
of the older and more historic Acad- 
emies still survive, and are doing noble 
work. But the tendency has been to go 
even farther, and have the state furnish 
all its children who will avail themselves 
of it, the highest University education. 
This purpose has been accelerated, too, 
by the fact that so many of the so-called 
private colleges were the schools of a sect, 
or some particular faction or party. Con- 
sequently the State Universities are non- 
sectarian and non-partisan, and some of 
them have taken foremost positions as 
educational institutions. One of the most 
active spirits in this movement was 
Thomas Jefferson, who was the direct 
cause of the founding of the Virginia 
State University at Charlottesville, which 
became the model on which many others 
were constructed. These Universities 
have been mostly confined to the Western 
States, — the State in being carved out of 
the public domain receiving allotted lands 
for educational purposes. The movement 
was greatly strengthened by the passage 
in 1862 of the Morrill Act, which pro- 
vided a grant of thirty thousand acres for 
each senator and representative in Con- 
gress. The amount realized from the 
sale of these lands, varying from $50,000 
to $750,000, was to be devoted to the sup- 
port in each state of a higher institution 
of learning, at which technical and agri- 
cultural branches should be taught. 
Many states have made their Agricul- 
tural College a department, in reality, of 
their State University; others have estab- 
lished an entirely separate and distinct 
institution, usually in a different part of 
the state. Prominent among these state 
universities are those of Michigan, Wis- 
consin, Minnesota, Illinois, and Cali- 
fornia, which take high rank among the 
foremost Universities in the land in every 
respect. 

As a typical representative of these in- 
stitutions a brief sketch of the history of 
the University of Michigan, located at 
Ann Arbor, will in a general way tell the 
story of all. In 1826 the United States 



26 



PKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



Congress set apart two entire townships 
in the then Territory of Michigan for the 
foundation of a future college. This was 
established by the first legislature of the 
new state in 1S37, though not oi^ened to 
receive students until 1841. The Univer- 
sity is practically entirely supported by 
the state, and is open to all youth of the 
commonwealth, of both sexes, upon the 
payment of a matriculation fee of five 
dollars, though an annual charge of from 
twenty to thirty-five dollars is made for 
incidental expenses. In 18.50 a Medical 
School was added; and in 1859 the Law 
School was opened, which has developed 
into one of the most thorough and re- 
nowned law schools of the West. The 
grounds surrounding the buildings em- 
brace about fifty-five acres. A fund es- 
tablished by the sale of lands yields ap- 
proximately forty thousand dollars a year, 
which is supplemented by a state tax of 
one-sixth of a mill ; while the legislature 




JAMES B. ANGELL. 

has ever been generous in its appropria- 
tions to meet the further needs of the in- 
stitution. The faculty now numbers 
about three hundred and sixty, and close 
to five thousand students were in attend- 
ance during 1908. The government of 
the institution is vested in eight regents 



elected by the people. The high standing 
and scholarly reputation of this LTniver- 
sity are in a marked way a monument to 
the intelligent and untiring devotion of 
its President, James B. Angell, who has 
been its directing spirit since 1871; while 
he, in turn, by his notable services to the 
whole country in various official positions, 
and his vigorous support of all movements 
making for good citizenship, has con- 
ferred no less distinguished honor upon 
the L'niversity. Dr. Angell celebrated 
his eightieth birthday January 7, 1909, at 
about the same time resigning his office. 
This resignation the governing- Board de- 
clined to accept, except in form, creating 
a new office of Chancellor of the Univer- 
sity especially in honor of the retiring 
president, so that he should be relieved of 
the active duties and cares of the presi- 
dency while at the same time his wise 
supervision and invaluable exijerience 
should be retained in the service of the 
institution. His successor as president 
has not yet been named. The most prom- 
inent possible candidate talked of is 
United States Senator Beveridge, though 
it is not known to the public whether he 
would accept the honor. 

Another development along- the line of 
advanced education has been the gradual 
establishment of schools for post-graduate 
work. In most cases provisions have been 
made by way of extending academic work 
for such advanced study; while in the 
ease of the younger of the Universities, — ■ 
as Johns Hopkins, Cornell, Chicago, the 
graduate departments have received the 
most careful attention and consideration 
from the beginning. During the first half 
of the nineteenth century it was consid- 
ered necessary to go to the European L^ni- 
versities if one wanted to take a higher 
than the bachelor's degree. Edward 
Everett is said to have been the first to 
take such a foreign degree, he having re- 
ceived his Ph. D. degree from Gottingen, 
in 1819. Later the custom became some- 
what common, and so our own Universi- 
ties were led to provide opportunities for 
advanced study with a view to securing 
the higher degrees. Yale seems to have 



EDUCATION IX COLONIES AND STATES. 



727 



led off in this work and conferred the 
Ph.D. degree on three men in 1S61, though 
no distinct graduate school was organized 
until 1872. The Harvard Catalogue of 
18G0 was the first to announce any definite 
plans for graduate instruction there, 
though the M. A. degree was the only one 
conferred until 1872, when the Doctor's 
degree hegan to be regularly conferred 
on students who had pursued definite pre- 
scribed courses of study for three years 
after graduation, and had presented a 
satisfactory thesis. Down to about this 
time it had been the custom to give the 
M. A. degree to all applicants two or three 
years after graduation, who had read any 
general course, and were willing to pay the 
fees for the same. But with the increas- 
ing appreciation of gxaduate work came 
the determination to make its titles more 
valuable, so that it became universal to 
require specified advanced study with an 
examination before the M. A. degree 
could be conferred, the same as in the 
case of the Doctor's degree, — the deter- 
mined effort of all institutions, as well as 
of all graduates, being to make these two 
degrees represent actual work done, and 
to take from them every element of merely 
honorary distinction. A report made by 
the Federation of Graduate Clubs showed 
that out of 3,204 graduate students in 
twenty-four leading universities, 35.4 per 
cent were taking literature and language 
studies; 20.6 per cent historical; 14.2 per 
cent natural science; IS per cent phil- 
osophical studies; 11.1 per cent mathe- 
matics. 

The most important advance of all, 
however, of the last century has been in 
the provision of advantages for the educa- 
tion of women, either in co-educational 
institutions, or in Women's Colleges. The 
first steps in co-education were taken in 
the early days when girls were gradually 
given some of the advantages boys alone 
had previously enjoyed. Then the neces- 
sities of the occasion forced towns to ed- 
ucate the boys and girls together. Later, 
school buildings were erected with a 
strong partition wall extending the entire 
length and one was the " girls' side," and 



the other, the " boys' side." Developing 
a little further, finding that no serious 
results followed this closeness of contact, 
the walls were gradually knocked out of 
the old buildings, and omitted in the 
new ones; and the boys and girls in com- 
mon shared equal privileges. As the 




.MARV LYON. 

many prejudices, physically and morally 
founded, against the higher education of 
women began to disappear under the in- 
fluence of an enlightened public opinion, 
many of the old Academies added some- 
what to their courses, and so became 
" Seminaries," or even " Colleges." This 
was especially true in the Southern 
States, where twenty such Colleges were 
founded before 1850, while there were 
only two in the Northern States, Mt. 
Holyoke Seminary, at South Hadley, 
Mass., and Eockford College, at Eockford, 
111. Mt. Holyoke was opened as a Sem- 
inary in 1837, and 1893 took on a full 
college organization. Its founder, Mary 
Lyon, was one of the most distinguished 
teachers, as well as noblest women of her 
generation. With its beautiful and health- 
ful location, its fine new buildings and 
equipment, Mt. Holyoke is now doing 
superb work of the highest character. Of 
the later institutions for the higher educa- 



728 



FKOM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



tion of women two classes exist — one, like 
the State Universities, offering the women 
exactly the same advantages and facilities 
that the men have; and the other, the 
Women's Colleges, established upon dis- 
tinct and separate foundations. The 
oldest of these, undoubtedly, is Elmira 
College, of Elmira, N. Y.. which was 
founded in 1855, and gave from the start 



has never been large compared with that 
of its sister institutions. Th? year 1875 
was a red-letter one in the matter of 
women's education, for then both Smith 
and Wellesley Colleges opened their doors, 
and both have since taken and main- 
tained the foremost rank among similar 
institutions, and have also become the 
most popular as demonstrated by their 



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HgUM 


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IQ 



VASSAR 

a course of instruction as extensive and 
thorough as that given by the men's col- 
leges of the period. The first of the high 
grade, distinctly women's colleges, how- 
ever, was Vassar, which was founded in 
1865 by Matthew Vassar, a wealthy brewer 
of Poughkeepsie, New York. It was his 
intent that this institution should be for 
women what Harvard and Yale were for 
men ; and from the start the requisites 
for admission, as well as the curriculum, 
have been maintained at a high standard. 
About the same time Wells College, at 
Aurora, New York, was established, start- 
ing as Wells Seminary in 1808, but taking 
a charter in 1870, since which time it has 
maintained a high standard. For many 
jears the number of students was limited 
to seventy-five, though this ninnber has 
been exceeded latterly ; but its attendance 



COLLEGE. 

constantly growing classes. Wellesley 
was founded at Wellesley, M;issachusetts, 
by Heni-y F. Durant, who had been one 
of Boston's most noted lawyers, the part- 
ner of Gen. B. F. Butler, but who was so 
affected by the death of an only son that 
lie gave up his practice, and devoted the 
remainder of his life, and his wealth, to 
religious causes, — among which he classed 
the College he founded, — a " College for 
the glory of God by the education and 
culture of women," as he expressed it. 
Early in its career Wellesley was most 
fortunate in securing the services of 
Alice Freeman as president, whose devo- 
tion to all measures looking toward the 
uplifting of her sex, in every walk of life, 
gave her a unique and most honorable 
position among the many noble American 
women. The college rapidly assumed a 
high standard of excellence under her wise 



EDUCATION IN COLONIES AND STATES. 



729 



administration, and its rei^utation as an 
educational institution of the noblest 
ideals and achievements was firmly es- 
tablished. In 1S87 she resigned the pres- 
idency to become the wife of Harvard's 
distinguished professor of moral phil- 
osophy, George II. Palmer. Though with- 
drawn from official positions, she main- 
tained her active interest in the cause of 
education, and in the intellectual and 
social advancement of women, until her 
seemingly untimely death, in the midst 
of her many activities, in 1901, at the age 
of forty-six. During the early years of 
that institution she served as Dean of the 
Women's department in the new Univer- 
sity of Chicago, giving it the benefit of 
her wide experience and rich culture in 
the establishment of its system of coedu- 
cation. TVellesley has a beautiful campus 
of over four hundred acres, and a fine 
lake for boating. Smith College, sit- 
uated at Northampton, Massachusetts, in 
the beautiful Connecticut ■( alley, was 
founded by Sophia Smith, who gave four 
hundred thousand dollars for that pur- 
pose. Smith, unfortunately, has a small 
campus, which is already comparatively 
crowded with buildings, — a feature in 
which it compares very unfavorably with 
Vassar, lit. Holyoke, and Wellesley, all 
of which have ample and beautiful 
grounds. The success of Smith has, how- 
ever, been marked from its first year, and 
its classes now number from three hun- 
dred to four hundred each year. Though 
now thirty-four years old it has had but 
one president, L. Clark Seelye, formerly 
professor of English Literature at Am- 
herst College. A later and most promis- 
ing aspirant for honors among Women's 
Colleges, is Bryn Mawr, founded at the 
town of the same name a few miles from 
Philadelphia, in 1885, by Joseph W. Tay- 
lor. By many educators Bryn llawr is 
given first rank among the women's col- 
leges. Its productive funds are larger 
than those of any other of this class of in- 
stitutions, and its equipment, especially 
along scientific lines, is unsurpassed; and 
it is said to have a larger number of 



women taking advanced worit than any 
other of the exclusively women's colleges. 




ALICE FREEiMAN PALMER. 

In addition to these independent insti- 
tutions there is a class of Women's Col- 
leges of a very high order, affiliated with 
universities for men. The best known of 
these are Eadelitfe College, affiliated 
with Harvard; Barnard College, affiliated 
with Columbia; the H. Sophie Newcomb 
Memorial College, holding a similar re- 
lation to Tulane University in New Or- 
leans; also the College for Women at 
Western Eeserve University, Cleveland, 
Ohio ; and the Women's College of Browm 
University, at Providence, R. I. Cer- 
tainly a most remarkable growth is here 
recorded as well as a most remarkable 
change in public sentiment. That " ten- 
der and interesting branch of the com- 
munity," which the good people of 
Gloucester in 1790 thought had been 
much neglected in their schools, has come 
into a rich heritage. 

The many and varied educational ideas 
that have been adopted within the last 
third of a century are nearly bewildering. 



■30 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLU POWER. 



There is hardly a good beacli anyT\'liere 
on the Atlantic or Pacific coast that does 
not know the Summer School. Many of 
these have unquestionably been estab- 




Fhot'2. Copyrighted by J. E. Pttrdy^ Boston. 
WILLIAM R. HARPER. 

lished for commercial purposes only, and 
liave been financial schemes. But the 
majority have been honestly conducted 



study centres, where the summer vacation 
has been used to the gi-eatest advantage 
and benefit. The pioneer in this move- 
ment and the most conspicuous example 
of its beneficences has been, of course, 
The Chautauqua. The outgrowth of a re- 
ligious camp meeting at Lake Chautau- 
qua, near Jamestown, N. T., in 1874, the 
development into a summer school was 
gradual but most comprehensive in its re- 
sults. For more than a quarter of a cen- 
tury thousands have attended its meetings 
and followed its courses of study, which 
have been most wisely directed by Bishop 
J. H. Vincent and the late President W. 
1\. Harper, of the University of Chicago, 
(leneral culture has been the end aimed 
iit rather than special instruction or train- 
ing. Oratory, music, art have been the 
drawing attractions, — all of the highest 
character, and so productive of the hap- 
piest results both from the educational 
standpoint, and from that of recreation. 
We have endeavored to give a general 
review of the lines along which Education 
has been developed in this country; and 
the study is a most interesting one. So 
long as the spirit and enthusiasm which 
are so characteristic of the common 
thought of the people of our country shall 
continue, we can certainly look for the 
permanency of those political institutions 
which demand a higher average of educa- 
tion than can be found elsewhere. 



LVI. 
AN ERA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



Contrast Between Early Gifts and Those of To-day. — Different Sources of Wealth. — Total of 
Gifts Above .$5,00U for 1003-1907 Inclusive Upward of .$1,100,000,000. — Animating Impulse 
in Such Gifts. — "There is Something Pathetic About a Great Gift."— Stephen Girard and 
His Benefactions. — His Estate Valued at $9,000,000. — Girard College and Its Peculiar 
Restriction as to Ministerial Visitors. — Notable Gift of John Lowell. — The Lowell Institute 
and Its Work.— The Lyceum Lectures in Xevv England. — Estimate of Value of Lowell's 
Beneficence by Hon. Edward Everett. — George Peabody and His Royal Liberality. — Letter 
of Thanks from Queen Victoria. — The J. F. Slater and Daniel C. Hand Bequests for the 
Freedmen. — Beneficent Action of Miss Anna T. Jeanes. — Tlie Enoch Pratt Library. — Johns 
Hopkins; His University and Hospital. — Influence of Deatli of Son on Leland Stanford and 
Wife.— "The Children of California Shall Be Our Children."— The Leland Stanford Junior 
University. — " The Lolita Armour Institute of Bloodless Surgery." — ■ The Newberry and 
Crerar Libraries in Chicago. — Peter Cooper and Cooper Union. — John Jacob Astor's 
Gift to City. — James Lenox and His Library. — " The Finest Collection of Books and Art in 
New World." — J. Pierpont Morgan's Many Liberal Benefactions. — Samuel J. Tilden's 
Notable Gift to New York. — The Tilden Library Foundation. — Joseph Pulitzer Gives 
$2,000,000 to Establish His School of Journalism.— Peculiar Gift of Mrs. Russell Sage.— 
The True Measure of the Value of Gifts. — Carnegie and His Many Notable Gifts. — 
Rockefeller's Beneficence; The University of Cliicago, and General Education Board. — 
Influence of Robert G. Winthrop on Direction of George Peabody's Great Benefactions. — 
Indirectly, also, of Those That Have Followed. — Opinions of President Daniel Coit Gilman. 



" Gi'nerosity once aroused cannot remain inactive; for it is a quality wliose beauties are enlianced by 
exercise." — Plinx. 



NE of the earliest settlers in Boston, writing to friends in 
old England, in 1643, said: "After we had bnilded our 
houses, provided necessaries for our liveliliood, reared con- 
venient places for worship, and settled the civill govern- 
ment, one of the next things wee longed for and looked 
after was to advance learning and to perijetuate it to pos- 
terity; dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the 
Churches, when our present ministers shall lie in dust. 
And as wee were thinking and consulting how to effect 
this great work it pleased God to stir up the heart of one 
Mr. Harvard (a godly gentleman and lover of learning, 
then living among us) to give the one-half of his estate (it being in all about £1700) 
toward the erecting of a college, and all his library. After him another gave £300 ; 
others after them cast in more, and the publique hand of the State added tlie rest." 
In the year 1907, Mr. Eockefeller added by one act thirty-two million dollars to the 
eleven million he had already given to establish the " General Board of Education of 
the United States." These gifts of John Harvard and of Mr. Eockefeller illustrate 
well the extremes of a generous system of beneficence that has characterized the 




FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



American jicople. In the earliest days 
nearly all the gifts were for educational 
purposes, " that the light of learning 
might not go out, nor the study of God's 
word perish; " as hospitals, homes for the 
destitute and afflicted, and similar institu- 
tions which have latterly been so liberally 
endowed, wore comparatively unknown 
until the last century. During the period 
covered by this volume hardly a decade 
has passed without some princely gift for 
the public good, while during the last two 
decades the prodigality of a few men has 
been simply bewildering. This era of lib- 
eral benefactions divides itself naturally 
into two periods, the dividing line chron- 
ologically being about the year 1890. Pre- 
vious to that date the men who opened 
their purses and their hearts bestowed 
upon worthy causes the accumulated sav- 
ings of earnest and wise endeavor in the 
business or the professional world, the re- 
sults of their own untiring industry, sup- 
plemented by careful economy, and un- 
ostentatious living. Since then, by the 
peculiar change in business methods and 
conditions, a few men have amassed 
enonnous wealth under systems of monop- 
oly and special in'ivilege, so that even the 
income from their investments and busi- 
ness holdings has become a burden, and 
many have apparently felt forced to give 
in order to quiet the stirrings of con- 
science, or to temper the severity of a hos- 
tile public criticism. So vast has the 
volume of these great donations become 
that a careful statistician has placed the 
total of known gifts in amounts exceeding 
five thousand dollars during the years 
1903 to 1907, inclusive, at upwards of 
eleven hundred million dollars; and this 
is exclusive of all private charities, of 
sums given by churches and societies for 
missionary or other causes, and of all spe- 
cial contributions like those for the relief 
of the sufferers by the destruction of San 
Francisco and similar calamities. During 
1907 the known gifts of three persons, Mr. 
Eockcfeller, Mr. Carnegie, and ilrs. Sage, 
reached the enormous sum of $156,- 
459,928. 

It would be a most interesting study 



could we trace to its source in the mind 
and heart of the giver the occasion of each 
of these noble benefactions. In many 
cases it has imdoubtedly been the desire 
to make an ostentatious display of great 
wealth, which shall achieve for its pos- 
sessor a world-wide notoriety; in others, a 
religious purpose to wisely use the talents 
that have been entrusted to the holder by 
the Creator; in others vanity, and an am- 
bition to perpetuate one's name; while 
in others, a larger number we are prone 
to believe, a heart touched by sorrow has 
been the impelling force to benevolent 
action. Dickens wrote : " There is noth- 
ing innocent or good that dies and is for- 
gotten. All infant, a prattling child 
dying in the cradle, will live again in the 
better thoughts of those who loved it, and 
play its part through them in the redeem- 
ing actions of the world. Oh! if the deeds 
of human creatures could be traced to 
their source, how beautiful would even 
death appear; for how much charity, 
mercy, and purified affection would be 
seen to have their source in dusty graves." 
In her book entitled " Famous Gifts and 
Tlieir Givers," Mrs. Bolton has said: 
" There is often something pathetic about 
a great gift. The only son of Leland 
Stanford dies, and the millions which he 
would have inherited are used to found a 
noble institution on the Pacific Coast. 
The only sou of Henry F. Durant dies, 
and the soiTowing father and mother use 
tlieir fortune to build Wellesley College. 
The only son of Amasa Stone is drowned 
while at Tale College, and his father 
builds Adelbert College of Western Re- 
serve University, to honor his boy and 
bless his city and state." And we know 
tbat one of Mr. Rockefeller's noblest gifts 
of millions to establish an institution to 
further medical research was the impulse 
of a heart burdened with grief over the 
death of a favorite grandson from 
diphtheria. 

In 17.")0, near Bordeaux, France, a son 
Stephen was born to Pierre Girard and 
his wife Anne Marie. The family was pos- 
sessed of considerable wealth, and Louis 
XV. had knighted Pierre for bravery on 



AN ERA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



733 



board the squadron at Brest during- the 
war between France and England. When 
Stephen was eight years of age his right 
eye was destroyed by an accident; and as 
his playmates ridiculed his appearance he 
became morose and ill-natured. The 
death of his mother, too, during his early 
youth further affected his disposition, so 
that he became subject to fits of extreme 
ill temper. His step-mother having chil- 
dren of her own had little love to bestow 
upon the unfortunate lad, and she be- 
came very impatient with Stephen's re- 
bellious disposition. After a stormy scene 
iu the home when the boy was about four- 
teen, he was ordered by his father to sub- 
mit or leave his home, to which the 
motherless boy replied, " Give me a ven- 
ture on any ship that sails from Bor- 
deaux and I will go at once where you 
shall never see me again." The matter was 
soon arranged and Stephen started out 
in life as cabin boy. From that time until 
he was twenty-three he sailed from Bor- 
deaux and was then given command of a 
vessel. His father had given him about 
three thousand dollars, and with this he 
had traded judiciously, considerably in- 
creasing the amount. In 1774 he sailed 
away from his native city never to return. 
Reaching New York he traded from there 
with the West Indies until 1776 when, on 
a return trip, he ran into Delaware Bay 
in a fog only to learn that a British fleet 
was lying outside. Getting into Philadel- 
phia he opened a store in Water street, 
and disposed of the cargo he had brought 
in to good advantage. During that win- 
ter he fell in love with and married the 
beautiful young daughter of a ship- 
builder with whom Girard was planning 
for new vessels to continue his trade after 
the war should be over. His married life 
seems to have been a happy one, though 
the wife was eleven years younger than 
he, and hardly more than a child. In 
1785, when Girard was thirty-five, came 
the great sorrow of his life; for then a 
melancholy settled upon his young wife 
which resulted in hopeless insanity. His 
grief was aggravated, too, by the birth of 
a daughter shortly after his wife's afilic- 



tion, — named for her mother, llary 
Girard, — who lived only a few months. 
Girard then became a recluse, working 
day and night to kill his grief. He was 
uniformly successful in his ventures, and 
made money rapidly for those times; but 
he allowed himself no rest nor any 
pleasures. In 1793 Philadelphia was vis- 




STEPHEN GIRAKD. 

itcd with a scourge of yellow fever, and 
the situation became deplorable in the ex- 
treme. All who could get away from the 
city fled to other places, and great num- 
bers of those who remained sickened and 
died without care. Then the cold and 
unapproachable Girard came forward and 
volunteered his services; and for two 
months he spent from six to eight hours 
evei-y day in the hospitals and the rest of 
the time, frequently all through the night, 
he helped to remove the dead from the 
houses, and eared for the sick. To a 
friend he wrote : " The deplorable condi- 
tions to which fright and sickness have 
reduced the inhabitants of this city de- 
mand succor from those who do not fear 
death, or who at least do not see any risk 
in the epidemic which now prevails here. 



(34 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



This will occupy me for some time; and 
if I liave the misfortune to succumb, I 
will have at least the satisfaction to have 
performed a duty which we all owe to each 
other." Busy as he was as merchant and 
visitor of tlie sick, for he rendered similar 
services throujjli two subsequent seourg'es 
of the fever, Mr. Girard found time to do 
his duty as a citizen, serving several 
times in the City Council and for twenty- 
two years as W^arden of the Port. When 
the charter of the Bank of the LTnited 
States expired in 1811, Girard had about 
a million dollars on deposit with Baring- 
Bros., in London, and innnediatcly used 
the whole of it to buy stock of the bank. 
He then opened in Philadelphia the Bank 
of Stej^hen Girard, with a capital of $1,- 
200,000. On two occasions he made im- 
portant loans to the governnient when in 
financial distress^ and his money and 
credit were ever at the service of the 
Treasury Department. During the war 
with Great Britain he was really the 
mainstay of the government, continually 
making large advances down to the estab- 
lishment of the second United States 
Bank, of which he became a director, and 
whose policy he largely influenced. In 
1814, when the government could obtain 
only twenty thousand of five million dol- 
lars that were needed he promptly fur- 
nished the entire amount ; and when later 
the interest on the public debt could not 
be paid, he wrote the Secretary of the 
Treasuiy that he would' wait for his 
money or take it in treasury notes. In 
1815 his wife passed away, and his heart 
was again sorely bruised. " I shall never 
forget the last and closing scene," wrote 
a friend, "when Mr. Girard, filled with 
emotion, stepped forward, kissed his wife's 
cheek, and his tears moistened his face." 
Work, work was the only panacea for 
his grief. " I do not value fortune," he 
wrote to a friend. " The love of labor 
is my highest ambition. I observe with 
pleasure that you have a numerous 
family; that you are happy in the posses- 
sion of an honest fortune. This is all 
that a wise man has to wish for. As for 
myself, I live like a galley-slave. When 



I rise in the morning my only efi'ort is to 
labor so hard that when night comes I 
may be enabled to sleep soimdly." 

After a long and active career, gen- 
erally regarded as a recluse and con- 
sidered miserly, though his quiet benefac- 
tions were numerous and liberal, Girard 
was attacked by an influenza which de- 
veloped into pneumonia, and he quietly 
passed awa.y on the 26th of December, 
1831, just a short time before his eighty- 
second birthday. Having been born a 
Catholic he remained within that com- 
munion until his death, believing it was 
" better for a man to die in the faith in 
which he had been bom." He often ex- 
pressed his admiration for the Friends, 
however, and acknowledged that he strove 
to model Iiis life after their virtues. The 
city accorded him a public funeral, and 
the press of the day declared that so great 
a concourse of people had never before 
been seen on any similar occasion in the 
city. When his will was opened it was 
learned that the memory of his sufferings 
as a motherless and homeless boy had re- 
mained by him and that his quietly borne 
griefs had directed the course of his 
benevolence. His estate was valued at 
$9,0()0,000. In his will he said : " I have 
been for a long time impressed with the 
importance of educating the poor, and 
placing them, by the early cultivation of 
their minds and the development of their 
moral principles, above the temptations 
to which, through poverty and ignorance, 
they are exposed; and I am particularly 
desirous to provide for such a number of 
poor male white orphan children as can be 
trained in an institution a better educa- 
tion, as well as more comfortable mainte- 
nance, than they usually receive from the 
application of public funds." Accordingly 
after making a long list of bequests to the 
City of Philadelphia, and the City of New 
Orleans: to numerous hospitals, notably 
the one that carefully protected and 
cared for his lamented wife for so many 
years; to numerous relatives, captains of 
vessels, and employees, he left two million 
dollars and the residue of his estate to 
trustees to erect and maintain " a college 



AN EEA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



735 



for poor white male orphans." He en- 
tered into the most minute details as to 
its buildings, directing that they should 
be " constructed of the most durable ma- 
terials and in the most permanent man- 
ner, avoiding needless ornament." The 
material to be used was marble or granite, 
and he even specified the size of the 
stones that should be placed in certain 
parts of the structures. The trustees, it 
is feared, hardly followed out the spirit of 
the donor's instructions, as they proceeded 
to erect one of the most beautiful and 
ornamental buildings, of Greek architec- 
ture, in the country. The main building 
is surrounded by a colonnade formed by 
thirty-four Corinthian columns, each of 
which is said to have cost thirteen thou- 
sand dollars. Four other buildings of 
white marble were erected for dormi- 
tories, recitation rooms, etc., the whole 
being completed in 1847, at a total cost 



which is a large source of revenue for the 
institution. The college was opened Jan- 
uary 1, 18-18, when one hundred orphans 
were admitted to its privileges. In the 
fall one hundred more were admitted, and 
the following April a third hundred. By 
his will Mr. Girard had directed that the 
college should be open to all fatherless 
white boys, but preference should be given 
to those born in Philadelphia; then to 
those born in the State of Pennsylvania ; 
next, to those born in New York, where 
the founder first landed in the United 
States ; and lastly to the fatherless boys of 
New Orleans, with which city Girard had 
carried on a lucrative business. He di- 
rected that the boys must enter between 
the ages of six and ten years and must re- 
main until they were from fourteen to 
eighteen, when they were to be bound out 
by the mayor until they were twenty-one 
to learn some useful trade, or to become 




GHiAHD COLLEGE. 



of close to two million dollars. Happily 
the residue of the estate, invested chiefly 
in Philadelphia real estate, has increased 
rapidly in value, and is now estimated at 
from eighteen to twenty millions, so that 
the college is richly endowed. Mr. Girard 
also owned valuable coal lands outside the 
city which are said now to produce an- 
nually about two million tons of coal. 



trained in Agricvdture, — the tastes of the 
boys to be consulted in this regard. Each 
boj' has three suits of clothes while in the 
institution, and on leaving is given a 
ti-unk containing clothing and books to 
the value of from seventy-five to one hun- 
dred dollars. 

In accordance with the instruction of 
the testator the entire grounds, originally 



736 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



embracing forty-five acres, -n-ere to be sur- 
rounded by a brick wall " ten feet big-h 
and sixteen inches thick, coTered with a 
heavy marble capping." The seclusion 
thus enforced, coujiled with one clause of 
the will, has given many an erroneous 
idea of Girard's religious attitude. " I 
enjoin and require." reads the will, "that 
no ecclesiastic, missionary, or minister of 
any sect whatsoever shall ever hold or ex- 
ercise any station or duty whatsoever in 
said college, nor shall any such person 
ever be admitted for any purpose, or as a 
visitor, within the premises appropriated 
to the purposes of said college." For this 
requirement, the donor has been assailed 
and vilified by clergymen and church 
members all over the land until it became 
true that the average person who knew 
of tlie college regarded it as little better 
than a pagan or heathen institution, from 
which God and all religious influences 
were barred, simply because luinisters 
were excluded. This restriction is, of 
course, peculiar and unnecessarily rigid. 
But Mr. Girard had had peculiar expe- 
riences and was, by common consent, a 
very peculiar man as well as eccentric, 
and possessed of very positive convictions. 
There are, nevertheless, jarobably few col- 
leges or schools in the country where, in 
accordance with tlie founder's will, more 
careful attention is paid to the religious 
and moral teaching of the students. Re- 
ferring to this clause in his will, Mr. 
Girard said: "In making this restric- 
tion I do not mean to cast any reflection 
upon any sect or person whatsoever; but 
as there is such a multitude of sects, and 
such a diversity of opinion amongst them, 
I desire to keep the tender minds of the 
orphans who are to derive advantage from 
this bequest free from the excitement 
which clashing doctrines and sectarian 
controversy are so apt to produce. My 
desire is that all the instructors and 
teachers in the college shall take pains to 
instill into the minds of the scholars the 
purest principles of morality so that on 
their entrance into active life they may, 
from inclination and habit, evince benev- 
olence toward their fellow creatures, and a 



love of truth, sobriety, and industry, 
adopting at the same time such religious 
tenets as the matured reason may enable 
them to jjrefer." There is on the grounds 
a handsome gothic chapel where the 
students gather for worship morning and 
evening, the exercises being non-sec- 
tarian in character, and consisting of a 
hymn, reading from the Bible, and prayer. 
On Sundays the boys assemble in their 
class-rooms at nine in the morning and 
two in the afternoon for religious reading 
and instruction; and at 10:30 A. M. and 
3 P. iL they meet in the chapel for wor- 
ship, addresses being made by the presi- 
dent, or some invited layman. 

Many thousands of fatherless boys have 
shared the blessings of Mr. Girard's 
beneficence, and have been prepared for 
a more intelligent appreciation of their 
privileges and duties as citizens of this 
great Republic. We have dwelt at greater 
length upon the character of the founder 
and of the institution he founded because 
of the peculiarity of both, and because it 
was the first great gift for public uses by 
a citizen of the United States. And 
there is certainly much of interest in the 
fact that a practically orphaned French 
boy, a lonely wanderer during his youth 
in many lands, whose every association 
and surrounding were such as to lead him 
from the paths of virtue and hig'h pur- 
pose, should preserve noble ideals and 
purity of life, and become one of the most 
useful citizens of a great and renowned 
city of our country, as well as one of the 
staunehest supporters of our national gov- 
ernment in its hours of sorest financial 
need. Xo man born on the soil and 
nourished in all the noblest sentiments of 
patriotism ever showed more devotion to 
his native land than did this exile from 
his homeland manifest for his adopted 
country. Just west of the main college 
building is a monument erected to the 
memory of graduates from Girard college 
who gave their lives for their country dur- 
ing the Civil War. On one side are the 
names of those whom the college de- 
lighted to honor; on the other are en- 
graved these words from Mr. Girard's 



AK EKA OF PRINCELY GIETS. 



will : " And especially do I desire that by 
every proper means a jjure attachment to 
our Republican institutions and to the 
sacred rights of conscience, as guaranteed 
by our happy constitutions, shall be 
formed and fostered in the minds of the 
scholars." 

The first of the many noble benefac- 
tions that have made the United States 
the most disting'uished nation, and the 
last century the most notable period in 
the intellectual and social history of the 
world, to become available for instruction 
as well as the entertainment of the peo- 
ple, was the unique betjuest of John 
Lowell, Jr., of Boston, of two hundred and 
fifty thousand dollars to establish what 
has since been known as the Lowell In- 
stitute. During the second quarter of the 
last century Boston and New England 
were pre-eminently the centres of culture 
and intelligence in this country, whose in- 
fluence was radiated throughout the land, 
so that down to the present day it is mani- 
fest even in the lately settled portions of 
the far West. One of the most popular 
and common methods of gratifying the 
thirst of the people for a more intimate 
knowledge of the Creator and His created 
universe was by lectures which were de- 
livered weekly or oftener in every town of 
any size throughout the eastern states, 
which had for their purpose not entertain- 
ment merely but the imparting of useful 
and stimulating information to all who 
came within the range of their influence. 
During the winter of 1837-8, twenty-six 
distinct courses of lectures were delivered 
in Boston alone, and that count does not 
include courses of less than eight lectures; 
and it was estimated that upwards of 
thirteen thousand people attended the full 
number of lectures in the several courses. 
While the greater part of these entertain- 
ments were designed for popular instruc- 
tion, the live questions of thfe day were 
also frequently discussed, so that their in- 
fluence in the realms of politics, religion, 
and sociology was far reaching. As a dis- 
tinguished Unitarian minister who had 
large experience in the formation and 
management of these courses has said: 
47 



" The Lyceum rose to a great power and 
fell away and practically died within a 
quarter of a century. But it killed 
slavery; it broke the power of superstition 
in theology; it made women free; it 
created a universal demand for higher 
culture." 

No one so intimately and intelligently 
acquainted with the trend of the thought 
and aspirations of the times as was ilr. 
Lowell could fail to see that here was a 
field which afforded opportunities for the 
accomplishment of vast good by any per- 
son or persons who should occupy it and 
work along well-considered and carefully 
prepared lines, with abundant financial re- 
sources at their command. Few men better 
understood all the elements that combined 
to make up the distinctive life of the New 
England of his time, than did the gener- 
ous founder of this Institute; and few 
families had more actively contributed to 
its material, intellectual, and moral well- 
being than had his. His grandfather. 
Judge Lowell, was one of the staunehest 
patriots, even in Boston, during the Revo- 
lutionary War, was a member all through 
those trying years of the General Court, 
and in 1779 was chosen a member of the 
Convention for framing the constitution 
for the State; and, with James Bowdoin 
and John Adams from the Boston dele- 
gation, was placed upon the committee of 
twenty-four who were chosen to report on 
a Declaration of Rights, and the form of 
a constitution. In 1781 he was chosen a 
member of the Continental Congress, and 
on the adoption of the Constitution he 
was appointed by President Washington 
to the bench of the District Court of 
Massachusetts. In 1801 he was further 
honored by an appointment as Chief Jus- 
tice of the Circuit Court for the First 
Circuit, under the new organization of 
the judiciary which then was made. He 
was for eighteen years a member of the 
Coi-poration of Harvard College, to whose 
interests he was ever warmly devoted. 
Judge Lowell was not more distinguished 
for his legal and Judicial ability than for 
his fine literary taste, his active benevo- 
lence, and brilliant and charming social 



(38 



FROM COLO^"Y TO WORLD POWER. 



qualities. The maternal grandfather of 
the founder, Jonathan Jackson, was 
hardly less eminent than Judge Lowell, 
and was one of the most successful and 
influential of the class familiarly known 
as " Old Boston Merchants." But his ac- 
tivities were not confined to commercial 
affairs. He was a member of Congress, 
and having inherited a large property for 
those days, he contributed liberally to 
sustain the credit of the Commonwealth 
during the dark days of the Revolution, 
and at its close was a large creditor of the 
State. During the latter part of his life 
Mr. Jackson was Treasurer of the State, 
as well as of the University at Cambridge, 
— holding the latter office until the time 
of his death in 1810. Judge Lowell had 
three sons: John, who, after graduating 
from Harvard College and law school, de- 
voted most of his time to literature, both 
as student and writer; Charles, after 
graduating at Cambridge, first studied 
law and then theology, and was for more 
than fifty years pastor of the famous AVest 
Unitarian Church of Boston, and was the 
father of one of the most noted of all 
America's writers and statesmen, James 
Russell Lowell ; and Francis Cabot, the 
father of the subject of this sketch, who 
distinguished himself, in association with 
his brother-in-law Patrick Jackson, by 
early introducing cotton manufacture into 
the LTnited States, and who was the 
founder of the City of Lowell, which was 
named in his honor. John Lowell, Jr., 
therefore, entered life surrounded by every 
blessing and influence which generations 
of the highest culture, integrity, and 
wealth could furnish. Nor was he un- 
worthy of the noble traditions he in- 
herited. Born in 1799, even as a boy he 
was thoughtful and studious, and at the 
age of eleven accompanied his father to 
England and Scotland, where the latter 
wished to study the process of cotton 
manufacture. Upon his return to the 
United States in 1813, young Lowell 
entered Harvard, but his health did not 
permit of his completing his college 
course. Three years later he made two 
voyages to India, the first to Batavia, re- 



turning by way of Holland and England, 
and the second to Calcutta. His favorite 
reading during his early life was accounts 
of voyages and travels, and his knowledge 
of the geography of the world is said to 
have surpassed that of men of finislied 
education. He had a passion for travel 
and in early life made plans to explore 
Africa and the far East. After return- 
ing from India he engaged in commercial 
pursuits; but as all his ventures were in 
Indian trade, and at that time all connec- 
tion with those distant ports was by sail- 
ing vessels only, he found abundant time 
to follow up his favorite lines of read- 
ing and study. " He spared no time," 
says his biograi)her, " for the frivolous 
pleasures of youth, less perhaps, than his 
health required for its relaxations and for 
exercise. Few subjects in science or litera- 
ture escaped his attention ; and an un- 
commonly retentive memory rendered 
available for future use all the knowledge 
which he was so diligent in acquiring. 
He rapidly formed one of the best selected 
and most expensive private libraries in 
the city, and acquired a familiarity with 
its contents not alwa.ys jxissessed by the 
owner of many books." But he also 
believed that he owed a duty to his city 
and Commonwealth and served several 
terms in the Common Council, and the 
State legislature, where " he was distin- 
guished for his assiduous attention to his 
duties, and for the practical and business- 
like view he took of every subject under 
discussion. Indeed, it was his character- 
istic to do thoroughly whatever he under- 
took." In the years 1830 and 1831, within 
a few months, his whole life was changed 
by the sad loss of his wife and two 
daughters, his only children. As soon as 
he had recovered somewhat from the 
shock his thoughts turned to travel, and 
in the fall of 1832 he started on a long 
journey, which proved to be his last. He 
seems to have had a foreboding that his 
life would not be a long one ; and so, with 
no one now dependent upon him, before 
leaving his native land, he set aside by 
will a large portion of his estate to estab- 
lish the Lowell Institute. The object of 



AN ERA OF PEINCELY GIFTS. 



739 



Iiis bequest, as set forth in the original 
will, " is the maintenance and support of 
public lectures to be delivered in Boston 
upon philosophy, natural history, the arts 
and sciences, or any of them, as tlie trus- 
tee shall from time to time deem ex- 
pedient, for the promotion of the moral 
and intellectual and physical instruction 
or education of the citizens of Boston." 
He had, apparently, no definite plans for 
his tour when he first started out, his 
chief aim being to secure diversion from 
his overwhelming grief. But as he pro- 
ceeded his plan took more definite form, 
and in an early letter he mentioned his 
purpose, if jaossible, to enter the Chinese 
Empire by way of the Indian frontier; 
and alluding to the distant prospect of 
his return home, he said " I must first sec 
the circle of the earth." Leisurely he 
traveled across Europe, visiting unusual 
places and scenes, and eventually arrived 
in Egypt, where he proceeded to study all 
the conditions of the country, and inves- 
tigate its ruined cities and temples. Here 
he was attacked by an intermittent fever 
which was long continued and sapped his 
vitality. But regaining his health in a 
measure he pressed on toward India. 
"While crossing the Eed Sea his little 
vessel was wrecked on an island, and he 
nearly lost his life, while the hardships 
and exposure to which he was subjected 
caused a recurrence of his fever. He and 
his little company were rescued after a 
few days, and reached iloeha, January 1, 
1836 ; and it was from there, on the 17th, 
that his last letters were written. Leaving 
ilocha Januai-y 23d he reached Bombay 
February 10th, where, after an illness of 
three weeks, he passed away, March 4, 
1836, being a little less than thirty-seven 
years of age. 

While in Egypt, after a partial recovery 
from his illness, Mr. Lowell, amid the 
ruins of Thebes, wrote a codicil to his 
will, giving more explicit directions to 
his Trustee as to the administration of 
his trust, of which the following are the 
most important and interesting: "As the 
most certain and most important part of 
true philosophy seems to me to be that 



which shows the connexion between God's 
revelations and the knowledge of good and 
evil implanted by Him in our nature, I 
wish a course of lectures to be given on 
natural religion, showing its conformity 
to that of our Saviour. For the more per- 
fect demonstration of the truth of those 
moral and religious precepts, by which 




JOHN LOWELL, JR. 

Copy of only portrait extant. Painted in Egypt 
at the time of the execution of will endowing I.owell 
Institute. 

alone, as I believe, men can secure happi- 
ness in this world and that to come, I 
wish a course of lectures to be delivered 
on the historical and internal evidences in 
favor of Christianity. 

"As the prosperity of my native land, 
New England, which is sterile and unpro- 
ductive, must depend hereafter, as it has 
heretofore depended, first, on the moral 
qualities, and secondly, on the intelli- 
gence and information of its inhabitants, 
I am desirous of trying to contribute to 
this second object also; and I wisli 
courses of lectures to be established on 



74U 



FROM COLON r TO WOKLD POWEK. 



pliysics and chemistry, with their applica- 
tion to the arts; also on botany, zoolosy. 
geology, anj mineralogy, connected with 
their particular "utility to man. 

" After the establishment of these 
courses of lectures, shonlil disposable 
funds remain, or, in process of time be 
accumulated, the trustee may appoint 




LOUIS AGASSIZ. 

courses of lectures to be delivered on 
the literature and eloquence of our lan- 
guage, and even on those of foreign na- 
tions, if he sees fit. He may also, from 
time to time, establish lectures upon any 
subject that, in his opinion, the wants 
and taste of the age may demand." 

Upon this foun<lation the first lecture 
was delivered December 31, 1839, by the 
Hon. Edward Everett, one of the most 
distinguished orators and statesmen of 
Massachusetts. His address was chiefly 
a memorial of the founder, though the 
general jiurposes of the trust were out- 
lined. This lecture was immediately fol- 
lowed by a course on the " Evidences of 
Christianity," by the Eev. J. G. Palfrey; 
and from that day to this most valuable 
courses have been given by the most dis- 
tinguished scholars and leaders of thought 
of this country and Europe. Mr. Lowell's 
ample provision for the expense of this 



work admits of the payment of such 
amounts for the lectiu'es as shall attract 
the most notable men from any part of 
the world, and amply repay them for all 
expenses of travel, as well as for the prep- 
aration of the best work they can pro- 
duce. To name the men who have occu- 
pied the platform on this foundation is 
to call the roll of all the men distinguished 
in science, literature, philosophy, theol- 
ogy, and art of the whole English speak- 
ing world during- the last seventy years. 
Xot only have the lectures themselves 
served to advance the cause of learning, 
but vmexpected and indirect benefits have 
resulted. At the suggestion of Sir 
Charles Lycll, the eminent geologist, who 
had just completed a course of lectures 
on Science, the trustee was led to invite 
Louis Agassiz to come to this country, 
and lecture upon Comparative Embryol- 
ogy. This course was so well received, 
and the lecturer so highly appreciated, 
that he was induced to deliver another 
course on the subject of " Glaciers," 
which was the first series of illustrated 
scientific lectures ever given here, — Pro- 
fessor Cooke of Harvard having assisted 
Professor Agassiz by the use of a lantern 
which he had invented to illustrate his 
own lectures on Chemistry before the In- 
stitute. Agassiz -was so much pleased 
with his reception and the lively interest 
manifested by the people in scientific sub- 
jects that he became desirous of remain- 
ing permanently in the country; and to 
make such a course possible, Mr. Abbott 
Lawrence founded the Lawrence Scien- 
tific School in connection with Harvard 
College, guaranteeing Professor Agassiz's 
salary as professor of Zoology and Ge- 
ology. In 1872 Professor John Tyndall 
delivered a course of lectures before the 
Institute on " Light and Heat," for which 
he was paid ten thousand dollars; but 
so delighted was he with the character o£ 
his audiences and with the interest in 
scientific studies he found prevailing here, 
that he gave the entire amount he had 
been paid for his services to establish 
scholarships at Harvard, Columbia, and 
the University of Pennsylvania, with the 



AN ERA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



rii 



result that each of these institutions has 
since had men studying abroad, as the 
outcome of Professor Tyndall's interest in 
higher education here. In all, more than 
six thousand lectures have now been de- 
livered since the beginning of the Insti- 
tute's work in 1839. Moreover, as the 
reputation of the Institute is now as great 
in Euroiie as in America, and it is recog- 
nized as a distinguished honor to be in- 
vited to address its audiences, the lectur- 
ers make elaborate and careful prepara- 
tions; and many of the best published 
books on all subjects of knowledge are 
lectures which the writers had prepared 
at the invitation of the trustee. By the 
terms of Mr. Lowell's will ten iser cent of 
each year's income is added to the princi- 
pal which, with judicious investments, 
has more than doubled the original gift. 
As a result it has been possible to make 
many other provisions to extend the in- 
fluences of the Institute. By arrange- 
ment with the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology any persons, male or female, 
may attend, without expense to them- 
selves, the same courses of lectures that 
are given to the students of that college, 
thus securing for outsiders the same privi- 
leges, in effect, which it accords to its own 
students. These courses are generally 
given in the evening so that men and 
women employed during the day may at- 
tend. For many years, too, instruction in 
science has been given to the teachers of 
the city, both by lessons and lectures, 
under the supervision of the Boston 
Society of Natural History. In 1872 the 
Lowell School of Practical Design was 
established for the purpose of promoting 
Industrial Art in the United States, which 
has proved a most beneficent development 
of Mr. Lowell's comprehensive scheme. 
This school has a drawing room and a 
weaving room. The course of study 
covers three years, and students are taught 
the art of designing ana making patterns 
from prints, ginghams, silks, laces, car- 
pets, oilcloths, etc. In the weaving room 
are chain looms for dress-goods, woolens, 
cassimeres, ginghams, and; one Jacquard 
loom. This branch of the work has fitted 



hundreds of students to fill most profitable 
positions as designers. 

The management of the entire Lowell 
fund, with the power to select lecturers, 
was left by the founder to one trustee, who 
should choose his successor; and he di- 
rected that such trustee should be " in 
preference to all others some male de- 
scendant of my grandfather, John Lowell, 
provided there be one who is competent 
to hold the office of trustee, and of the 
name of Lowell." For several years Pro-, 
fessor Abbott Lawrence Lowell has seiwed 
with marked ability as such trustee. He 
has also for many years been an efficient 
trustee of the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology, and in June of tlie current 
year (1909), upon the retirement of 
President Eliot, he will become President 
of Harvard University. 

In his address referred to above the 
Hon. Edward Everett said of Mr. Lowell's 
bequest : " The sum generously set apart 
by him for this purpose is, with the ex- 
ception of the bequest of the late Mr. 
Girard of Philadelphia, the largest, if I 
mistake not, which has ever been appro- 
priated in this country by a private in- 
dividual for the endowment of a literary 
institution. The idea of a foundation of 
this kind, in which, unconnected with any 
place of education, provision is made, in 
the midst of a large commercial popula- 
tion, for annual courses of instruction by 
public lectures, to be delivered gratui- 
tously to all who choose to attend them 
is, I believe, original with Mr. Lowell. I am 
not aware that among all the munificent 
establishments of Europe there is any- 
thing of this description upon a large 
scale." And estimating the beneficent in- 
fluences that would radiate from Mr. 
Lowell's gift, and mindful of the eager 
desire of the lonely, ill, and bereaved 
traveler that his bequest should have the 
most far-reaching influence for good, as 
manifested by the codicil to his will writ- 
ten among the ruins of Thebes, the dis- 
tinguished orator said : " The few sen- 
tences penned, with a tired hand, by our 
fellow citizen, on the top of a palace of 
the Pharaohs, will do more for human 



r4- 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



imijrovement than, for aught that ap- 
pears, was done by all that giooruy dynasty 
that ever reigned. I scruple not to atiirm 
that, in the directions given by him for 
a course of jxipular instruction, illustra- 
tive of the great truths of natural reli- 
gion and the evidences of Christianity, 
and unfolding the stores of natural science 
and useful knowledge, to be dispensed 
without restriction to an entire commu- 
nity, there is a better hope that mental 
activity will be profitably kindled, thought 
put in salutary motion, the connection of 
truth with the uses of life traced out, and 
the condition of man benefited, than in 
all the councils, rescripts, exijloits, and 
institutions of Sesostris and his line. Let 
the foundation of Mr, Lowell stand on the 
principles prescribed by him and no lan- 
guage is emphatic enough to do full jus- 
tice to its importance. These are bless- 
ings which cannot die. They will abide 
when the sands of the desert shall have 
covered what they have hitherto spared 
of the Egyptian temples, and they will 
render the name of Lowell, in all wise and 
moral estimation, more truly illustrious 
than that of any Pharaoh engraved on 
their walls. These belong to the empire 
of mind, which alone of human things, 
is innnortal : and they will remain as a 
memorial of his Christian liberality, 
when all that is material shall have van- 
ished as a scroll." 

Of late years much attention has been 
given to free education in the South and 
many notable gifts have been made to 
further the good cause. The pioneer, how- 
ever, in this movement was a distin- 
guished son of Massachusetts, George 
Peabody. Born at Danvers in 179.5, after 
receiving only a common school educa- 
tion, he became a clerk in a store at 
the age of fourteen. Five years later he 
removed to Georgetown, D. C, to take 
charge of a store belonging to his uncle, 
John Peabody. Shortly after, he became 
a partner of Elisha Riggs in the dry- 
goods business, the headquarters of the 
firm being removed to Baltimore the next 
year, and in 1822 branches were estab- 
lisl-ed in Philadelphia and New York. 



By the retirement of Mr. Eiggs in 1829, 
Mr. Peabody became the head of the 
house. Having accumulated great wealth 
for that time, he transferred his interests 
to London, England, in 1837, establishing 
the banking house of George Peabody ifc 
Co. He had previously formed important 
financial connections there, and in 1835 
had successfully negotiated the sale of 
eight million dollars' worth of the bonds 
of the State of Maryland, thus sustaining 
the credit of the Commonwealth, His 
commission of two hundred thousand 
dollars he returned to the State, for which 
a vote of thanks was extended to him by 
the legislature. This was his first large 
gift. He materially served his native 
land by furnishing the funds required to 
arrange and display the exhibits from the 
United States at the great London exhibi- 
tion of 1851 ; and the same year he estab- 
lished his custom of giving Fourth-of- 
July dinners, the first of which was at- 
tended by the Duke of Wellington and 
many other distinguished persons, while 
the Quc^n sent portraits of herself and 
Prince Albert to adorn the halL Mr. Pea- 
bcHly always derived great satisfaction 
from these annual banquets, convinced 
that they contributed materially to a bet- 
ter understanding between the people of 
his native and adopted country. In 1852 
he gave $30,000 to establish the Peabody 
Listitute and Library at South Dan- 
vers, subsequently adding $170,000 to this 
amount, and giving $50,000 for a similar 
institution in Danvers; and in recogni- 
tion of his munificence the people of 
South Danvers in 1868 changed the name 
of their town to Peabody. In 1857 Mr. 
Peabody revisited the United States, and 
while here gave $300,000 to found the 
Peabody Institute of Baltimore, an amount 
which he later raised to $1,000,000. He 
also made various gifts to educational 
institutions at that time. In 1S62 he 
prepared plans for lodging houses which 
he proposed to erect for the poor of Lon- 
don, donating for that purpose $2,500,000 
in all. In 1866 he again visited the 
ITnited States, and his departure from 
England called forth the following inter- 



AN EEA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



743 



esting letter in recognition of his ser- 
vices to liis adopted country : 

" The Queen hears that Mr. Peahody 
intends shortly to return to America, and 
slie would be sorry that he should leave 
England without being assured by herself 
how deeply she appreciated the noble act, 
of more than princely munificence, by 
which he has sought to relieve the wants 
of the poorer subjects residing in London. 
It is an act, the Queen believes, wholly 
without parallel; and which will carry its 
best reward in the consciousness of hav- 
ing contributed so largely to the assist- 
ance of those who can so little help them- 
selves. The Queen, however, would not 
have been satisfied without giving Mr. 
Peabody some public mark of her sense 
of his munificence; and she would gladly 
have conferred upon him a baronetcy or 
the Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, 
but that she understands Mr. Peabody to 
feel himself debarred from accepting such 
distinctions. It only remains, therefore, 
for the Queen to give Mr. Peabody this 
assurance of her personal feelings; which 
she would further wish to mark by asking 
him to accept a miniature portrait of her- 
self which she will desire painted for him, 
and which when finished can either be 
sent to him in America, or given to him 
on the return which she rejoices to hear 
he meditates to the country that owes him 
so much." 

To this letter Mr. Peabody replied: 

"Madam: — I feel sensibly my inability 
to express in adequate terms the gratifica- 
tion with which I have read the letter 
which your Majesty has done me the high 
honor of transmitting by the hands of 
Lord Russell. On the occasion which has 
attracted your Majesty's attention of set- 
ting apart a portion of my property to 
ameliorate the condition and augment 
the comforts of the poor of London, I 
have been actuated by a deep sense of 
gratitude to God who has blessed me with 
prosperity, and of attachment to this 
great country, where, under your Maj- 
esty's benig^i rule, I have received so 
much kindness, and enjoyed so many 



years of happiness. Next to the ap- 
proval of my own conscience, I shall al- 
ways prize the assurance which your Maj- 
esty's letter conveys to me of the appro- 
bation of the Queen of England, whose 
whole life has attested that her exalted 
station has in no degree diminished her 
sympathy with the humblest of her sub- 
jects. The portrait which your Majesty 
is pleased to bestow on me, I shall value 
as the most gracious heirloom that I can 
leave in the land of my birth, where, to- 
gether with the letter which your Majesty 
has addressed to me, it will be regarded 
as an evidence of the kindly feeling of 
the Queen of the United Kingdom toward 
a citizen of the United States. I have 
the honor to be 

Your Majesty's most obedient servant, 
George Peabody." 




GEORGE PEABODY. 

Shortly after arriving in the United 
States on this occasion Mr. Peabody pre- 
sented $150,000 to Harvard University to 
establish an Institute of Archseology, and 
a like amount for the department of 
physical science at Yale University; and 
he laid the foundation for the endowment 
most closely associated with his name, 
The Peabody Education Fund, by a gift 
to trustees of $2,100,000, which in 18G9 



744 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLJJ POWER. 



was increased to .$3,500,000. He also gave 
upward of $200,000 to various charities 
while on his visit. The letter of Mr. Pea- 
body aunouncing the creation of the Ed- 
ucation Fund exijlains the objects he had 
in view. After referring to the educa- 
tional needs of " those portions of our 
beloved and common country which have 
suffered from the destructive ravages, and 
the not less disastrous consequences, of 
civil war," he said: "With my advancing 
years, my attachment to my native land 
has but become more devoted. My hope 
and faith in its successful and glorious 
future have grown brighter and stronger; 
and now, looking forward beyond my stay 
on earth, as may be iiermitted to one who 
has ijassed the limit of threescore and ten 
years, I see our country, iniited and pros- 
perous, emerging from the clouds which 
still surround her, taking- a higher rank 
among the nations, and becoming richer 
and more powerful than ever before. But 
to make her prosperity more than super- 
ficial, lier moral and intellectual devel- 
opment should keep pace with her ma- 
terial growth ; and in those portions of 
our nation to which I have referred, the 
urgent and pressing physical needs of an 
almost impoverished people must for some 
years preclude them from making, by un- 
aided effort, such advances in education, 
and such progress in the diffusion of 
knowledge among all classes, as every 
lover of his country must earnestly de- 
sire. I feel most deeply, therefore, that 
it is the duty and privilege of the more 
favored and wealthy portions of our 
Jiation to assist those who are less for- 
tunate; and, with the wish to discharge, 
so far as I am able, my responsibility in 
this matter, as well as to gratify my de- 
sire to aid those to whom I am bound 
by so many ties of attachment and regard, 
I give to you, gentlemen, most of whom 
have been my personal and especial 
friends, the sum of one million dollars to 
be by you and your successors held in 
trust, and the income thereof used and 
applied in your discretion for the promo- 
tion and encouragement of intellectual, 
moral, or industrial education among the 



young of the more destitute portions of 
the southern and southwestern states of 
our Union; my purpose heing that the 
benefits intended shall he distributed 
among the entire population, without 
other distinction than, their needs and the 
opportunities of usefulness to them." 

In 1869 Mr. Peabody made his last 
visit to the United States, at that time 
giving $150,000 to found the Peabody 
Museum at Salem, Mass., and $165,000 
to other institutions and to charities. 
Shortly after returning to London he was 
taken suddenly ill, and passed away on 
the 4th of Xovember of that year. By 
command of the Queen the remains were 
laid in Westminster Abbey, where funeral 
services were held on the 12th of Xovem- 
ber, it being the first time in history that 
the gates of that venerable and historic 
edifice had been opened for the obsequies 
of a private citizen of another country; 
and it was there that it was the wish of 
the Queen as well as of the English peo- 
ple tJiat his remains should find their final 
resting place, surrounded by those of the 
noblest and most distinguished of Eng- 
land's dead. But his oft-expressed wish 
to lie beside his mother in his native land, 
and his cry of "Danvers! Danvers! don't 
forget," which were almost the last words 
he said, were respected and his body was 
conveyed to American shores on the new- 
est and finest frigate of the British Navy 
— the " Monarch," from which it was re- 
ceived by an American squadron under 
the command of Mr. Peabody's long-time 
friend, Admiral Farragut, the interment 
being made at South Danvers, now Pea- 
bodj'. Mr. Peabody had never married, 
and notwithstanding his vast liberality 
left an estate valued at upward of $5,000,- 
000, which was bequeathed to relatives 
and friends. 

When it is considered that Mr. Pea- 
body was also a most liberal and generous 
giver in a private way; and when one 
further considers the vastly changed con- 
ditions under which the great fortunes of 
the last twenty years have been accu- 
mulated, it may certainly be questioned 
whether this distinguished citizen and 



AN EEA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



745 



benefactor of two countries should not, 
even now, be placed at the head of the list 
of America's princely givers. In his 
eulogy of Mr. Peabody on the occasion of 
the funeral services at Danvers, the Hon. 
Robert C. Winthrop said : " It would af- 
ford a most inadequate measure of his 
munificence were I to sum up the dollars 
and pounds he has distributed. Tried 
even by this narrow test his beneficence 
has neither precedent nor parallel. But 
it is, as having attracted and compelled 
the attention of mankind to the beauty, 
the nobleness, the true glorj' of living and 
doing for others; it is, as having raised 
the standard of munificence to a degree 
which has made it a new thing in the 
world ; it is, as having exhibited a wisdom 
and a discrimination in selecting the ob- 
jects, and in arranging the machinery, of 
his bounty; it is, as having discarded all 
considerations of caste, creed, nationality, 
in his world-wide philanthropy, regard- 
ing nothing human as alien to him; it is, 
as delighting as much in devising modes 
of bestowing his wealth, as he had ever 
done in contriving plans for its increase 
and accumulation, — literally throwing out 
his bags like some adventurous aeronaut, 
who would mount higher and higher to 
the skies, and really exulting as he cal- 
culated, from time to time, how little of 
all his laborious earnings he had at last 
left for himself; it is, as having fur- 
nished this new and living and magnetic 
example, which can never be lost to his- 
tory, never be lost to the interests of 
humanity, never fail to attract, inspire, 
and stimulate the lovers of their fellow- 
men as long as human wants and human 
wealth shall coexist upon the earth, — it 
is in this way that our lamented friend 
has attained a pre-eminence among the 
benefactors of his age and race like that 
of Washington among the patriots, or that 
of Shakespeare or Milton among poets." 
One of the earliest of the Scientific in- 
stitutions of the United States was the 
" Smithsonian Institution " at Washing- 
ton. James Smithson, the founder, the 
natural son of Sir Hugh Smithson, later 
the Duke of Northumberland, and Mrs. 



Macie, a niece of the Duke of Somerset, 
was born in 1754. He graduated from 
Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1786, with 
the reputation of excelling all others in 
his knowledge of Chemistry, and in 1787, 
as " a gentleman well versed in various 
branches of natural philosophy and par- 
ticularly in chemistry and mineralogy " 
he was recommended for election to the 
Royal Society, later serving as its vice- 
president. He spent most of his life in 
travel and on the Continent, everywhere 
making minute observations of the 
climate, physical conditions, and geologi- 
cal structure of the locality visited, as 
well as the character of its minerals, and 
the methods employed in mining and 
smelting ores. He was a frequent con- 
tributor of important papers to the trans- 
actions of the Royal Society and of the 
French Institute, of which he was also an 
active member for many years. It is said 
to have been his purpose to leave his en- 
tire fortune to the Royal Society; but as 
a result of some misunderstanding he 
changed his plan and shortly before his 
death in 1829 made a brief will giving 
the income of his entire estate to his 
nephew during his life, and the estate it- 
self to his children should he marry. In 
case he should not marry, the entire prop- 
erty was bequeathed " to the United 
States for the purpose of founding an 
institution at Washington for the in- 
crease and diffusion of knowledge among 
men." The nephew dying unmarried about 
five years later, the property fell to the 
United States, and in 1838 there were 
paid into the National treasury $508,- 
318.45. "Mr. Smithson," says Professor 
Simon Newcomb, " is not known to have 
had the personal acquaintance of an 
American, and his tastes were supposed 
to have been aristocratic rather than dem- 
ocratic. We have thus the curious spec- 
tacle of a retired English gentleman be- 
queathing the whole of his large fortune 
to our government to found an establish- 
ment which was described in fen words, 
without a memorandum of any kind by 
which his intentions could be divined, or 
the recipient of the gift guided in apply- 



74G 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEII. 



ing it." Smithson's illegitimate birth 
aroused in him a strong desire for post- 
humous fame; and he wrote at one time, 
" The best blood of England flows in my 
veins ; on my father's side I am a North- 
umberland ; on my mother's I am related 
to kings ; but it avails me not. My name 
shall live in the memory of man when 
the titles of the Northumberlands and the 
Percys are extinct and forgotten." And 
it is surmised that it was in some degree 
to realize that ambition that he made the 
peculiar disposition of his fortune. What 
form or scope the " institution for the 
increase of science among men " should 
take was the subject of long and serious 
deliberation by the national Congress, but 
in lS-i6 an act was passed establishing 
the " Smithsonian Institution," and Re- 
gents were appointed. It was directed 
that the institution should have a library, 
a museum, and a gallery of art, while the 
regents were empowered to take such 
other steps as slmuld tend to promote the 
objects of the beiiuest. By gradual de- 
velopment along comprehensive and 
broadening lines the benefits radiating 
from Smithson's bequest have become of 
inestimable value, and supplement almost 
every phase of educational activity 
throughout the country. Some years ago 
the library became a part of the Congres- 
sional library while the art museum be- 
came an adjunct of the Corcoran gallery; 
Init in 189(5 it was withdrawn from that 
gallery and re-established in more suit- 
able quarters in the Institute buildings. 
It was then judicially declared to be the 
National Art Gallery, and has since re- 
ceived gifts of several notable collections 
containing, particularly, specimens of the 
best work of the most distinguished Amer- 
ican artists. The work of the Institute 
has been chiefly directed toward the mak- 
ing and encouragement of original re- 
search along all lines of Natural Science 
in the broader sense of the term. It has 
become a sort of educational clearing 
house; and the humblest citizen of this, 
or any other country, may freely apply to 
it for information upon practically any 
subject of knowledge, — except, perhaps, 



the languages, literature, and history, — 
with the assurance that his communica- 
tion will be received and given careful 
consideration, and that the desired infor- 
mation will be forthcoming if available. 
It is, in fact, hardly too much to say 
that on Smithson's generous foundation 
has been built up the most useful, all 
things considered, single educational 
foundation in the United States. And it 
is a most gratifying consideration that our 
government is intelligently and wisely ex- 
ecuting the trust imposed upon it by this 
generous foreigner and stranger " to 
create an institution for the increase and 
diifusion of knowledge among men." 

In his eulogy on George Peabody, the 
Hon. Robert C. Winthrop estimated that 
not the least of the beneficent results of 
Mr. Peabody's munificence would be that 
it would attract and compel " the atten- 
tion of mankind to the beauty, the noble- 
ness, the true glory of living and doing 
for othere ;" and there are at least five of 
the later " princely givers " whose bene- 
factions can be traced with considerable 
directness to Mr. Peabody's inspiring ex- 
ample. The conditions of the people of 
the South at the close of the civil war 
excited feelings of the warmest sympathy 
in the hearts of their brethren at the 
North; and Mr. Peabody's principal gift, 
as has been said, was the foundation of 
the " Educational Fund " whose benefits 
were to accrue " to I he entire population 
(of the South) witlwut other distinction 
tlian tlieir needs and the opportunities 
of usefulness to them." To many, how- 
ever, the intellectual and moral condition 
of the freednian particularly appealed, 
and two notable gifts soon followed Mr. 
Peabody's for the uplifting of the colored 
race. John F. Slater, born at Slaterville, 
R. I., in 1815, was the son of Samuel 
Slater, who was the pioneer in the es- 
tablishment of cotton mills in this 
country, having started his first mill 
in December, 1790. John entered the mills 
at an early date and becoming familiar 
with every detail of the business was 
placed in charge of one of his father's 
mills at Jcwett City, Ct., when only sev- 



AN EEA OF PEINCELY GIFTS. 



747 



enteen years of age. As a result of close 
application to business, strict integrity, 
and rare judgment be soon became tbe 
bead of tbe entire business, bis father 
baving died in 1835, and rapidly accu- 
mulated an ample fortune. During the 
civil war be became interested in the 
cause of the freedmen, contributing liber- 
ally for their relief; and later be deter- 
mined to give to trustees one million dol- 
lars for the purpose of " uplifting the 
lately emancipated population of the 
Southern states, and their posterity, by 
eonfening on them the blessings of 
Christian education." When asked just 
what he meant by " Christian Education " 
he explained " that in tbe sense which he 
intended, the common school teaching of 
Massachusetts and Connecticut was 
Christian education. That is, leavened 
with a predominant and salutary Chris- 
tian influence." This gift aroused great 
interest in tbe United States. Tbe Con- 
gress passed a vote of thanks and caused a 
gold medal to be prepared and presented 
to Mr. Slater. The income from this gift, 
which has averaged above sixty thousand 
dollars a year, has been used in Normal 
schools to fit students for teachers, and 
for industrial education. Among tbe first 
trustees were ex-President Hayes, the late 
Bishop Phillips Brooks, and ex-Governor 
Colquitt, of Georgia. 

Closely following Mr. Slater's benefac- 
tion for the poor blacks came that of 
Daniel C. Hand, who was born at Madi- 
son, Ct., in 1>>01. At the age of sixteen 
be moved to Augusta. Ga., and entered 
the store of an uncle who had a large 
business in that city, and in Savannah. 
He eventually became his uncle's suc- 
cessor, and one of the most prosperous 
merchants of the South. During early 
manhood be lost his wife and their young- 
children, and for more than fifty years 
lived a lonely and secluded life. Though 
strongly attached to the Southern people 
from bis long residence among them, he 
ever abhorred slavery; and realizing the 
helpless condition of the emancipated 
slaves, in ISSS he transferred to the Amer- 
ican Missionary Society $l,000,89i to be 



known as the " Daniel Hand Educational 
Fund for Colored People," tbe income 
from which should be used " for the pur- 
Ijose of educating needy and indigent 
colored people of African descent, resid- 
ing, or who may hereafter reside, in the 
recent slave states of the United States 
of America ; " limiting, as he directed, the 
sum to be given to any one person in any 
one year to one hundred dollars. At Mr. 
Hand's death in 1891 it was found that 
be bad made the Missionary Society his 
residuary legatee for the purpose of in- 
creasing the same fund, and about five 
hundred thousand dollars was turned over 
to that body; while it is believed that the 
termination of certain life-uses will add 
two hundred thousand dollars more to the 
fund, which will make the total of bis 
gifts to the worthy cause about $1,750,0110. 
Another and recent benefaction for the 
uplifting of the negro in the South was 
tbe gift of a Philadelphia Quakeress, Miss 
Anna T. Jeanes. She had for many years 
been a generous giver in large and small 
amounts to local institutions and causes, 
her larger benefactions being $200,000 to 
the Spring Garden Institute; $100,000 to 
the Hicksite Friends; $200,000 to schools 
maintained by tbe Quakers in her native 
city ; and $200,000 to the " Home for 
Aged Friends," where she spent the later 
years of her life. In 1907 she trans- 
ferred to Booker T. Washington, of the 
Tuskegee Institute and H. B. Frissell, of 
the Hampton Institute, one million dol- 
lars to be known as tbe " Fund for Kudi- 
mentary Schools for Southern Negroes." 
to be used " in assisting in the Southern 
United States community, country, and 
rural schools for the great class of 
negroes to whom the small rural and com- 
munity schools are alone available." Miss 
Jeanes was, the same year, the innocent 
cause of a somewhat extended discussion 
of tbe question of intercollegiate athletics, 
as she offered to the President and Trus- 
tees of Swarthmore College the residue of 
her estate, upward of a million dollars, 
provided tbe students of the college 
should not thereafter ever engage in intei-- 
collegiate sports. After long deliberation 



748 



TEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWEE. 



the Trustees declined to accept the pro- 
posed gift on tlie ground that they had no 
right to determine the future policy of the 
college hy any such binding- agreements. 
The establishment by Mr. Peabody of 
the Institute in Baltimore, whose service 
is limited to students and those making 
special research, — a reference library, — 




JOHNS HOPKINS. 

prompted a wealthy merchant of that city 
to confer a like benefit on the general pub- 
lie; and in his benefaction Enoch Pratt 
was not only the follower of Peabody, but 
was also the forerunner of Carnegie. Mr. 
Pratt -was born in North Middleboro, 
Mass., in 1808. After graduating from 
the Bridgewater Academy, he entered a 
store in Boston. In 1831, when twenty- 
three years of age, he removed to Balti- 
more, establishing himself in business 
there as a commission merchant. A large 
measure of success attended all his busi- 
ness career, and he became one of the 
most prominent business men and influen- 
tial citizens of his adopted city. In 
1882 he gave to the city $1,058,000 to es- 
tablish a free public library, $223,000 of 
which should be devoted to the building, 
and the remainder to be invested by the 
city for the purchase of books. In con- 
sideration of the gift the city bound itself 



to raise fifty thousand dollars annually 
for maintenance of the library; and Mr. 
Pratt later provided fifty thousand dol- 
lars for four branch library buildings. 

Mr. John W. Garrett, who was presi- 
dent of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad 
from 1858 until his death in 1884, left 
among his papers a long account of a 
dinner he gave to bring George Peabody 
and Johns Hopkins together; and he em- 
phasizes the fact that at the feast Mr. 
Peabody dwelt long and lovingly upon the 
theme of how much the pleasure of giv- 
ing transcended the pleasure of making 
money. And Johns Hopkins University 
and Hospital were the results. Mr. Hop- 
kins was of Quaker descent, and was born 
in Anne Arundel County, Md., in 1795. 
His early life was sipent on the farm, 
though he obtained a good education at a 
private school. At the age of seventeen 
he went to Baltimore to become a clerk 
in his imcle's grocery store, and in a few 
years he had saved enough money to es- 
tablish himself with a partner in the same 
business. Three years later with his two 
brothers he founded the grocery house 
of Hopkins and Brothers. He amassed 
wealth rapidly, retiring from business in 
1847, when he became president of the 
Merchant's Bank, and a director of the 
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, being chair- 
man of the road's finance committee from 
1855 until his death in 1873. He was one 
of the staunchest friends that the cor- 
poration had, and on two or three oc- 
casions staked his entire fortune to carry 
it through financial crises. From early 
life he was a lover of good books, and 
until its end kept in touch with the best 
literature. He was also an intelligent 
and constant student of the Bible. In 
1867 he obtained from the State a char- 
ter for a corporation under the direction 
of a board of trustees " for the promotion 
of education in the State of Maryland." 
To further this cause he gave to the trus- 
tees the sum of $4,500,000 to found a Hos- 
pital which should be " free to all, re- 
gardless of race or color," and $3,500,000 
to endow a LTniversity. Just what form 
this new University should take was left 



AN EKA OF PKINCELY GIFTS. 



749 



to the determination of the trustees, which 
proved to be a serious question for them 
to decide. A careful investigation of con- 
ditions, however, led that body to believe 
that the imperative need was an institu- 
tion where young men could pursue 
courses of study in advance of the or- 
dinary college courses, particularly in 
those branches of learning not provided 
for in the schools of law, medicine, and 
theology. The opportunities then afforded 
in this country for post-graduate study 
were meagre in the extreme, and most 
students wishing to take higher academic 
degrees were driven to the German uni- 
versities. It was, therefore, determined 
that Johns Hopkins should be primarily 
a University with advanced courses of 
lectures and efficient laboratories, the 
undergraduate department being a sec- 
ondary consideration. In few cases have 
results so emishatically demoubtrated the 
wisdom and confirmed the judgment of 
trustees. The University, under the able 
direction of the President, Daniel Coit 
Gilman, at once took a position as the 
first institution in the country for post- 
graduate work, and has ably held that 
position down to the present day, although 
since about 1890 Harvard, Yale, Colum- 
bia, and Chicago, have offered such vastly 
increased facilities for advanced study 
that Johns Hopkins no longer has the free 
field that it had during the first fifteen 
years of its existence. Its department of 
History in particular, which was organ- 
ized, developed, and presided over by 
Professor Herbert B. Adams from 1877 
until his death in 1902, has done most 
efficient work; and it is undoubtedly true 
that at the beginning of this century 
more professors of history in the other 
colleges of the country had done their 
advance work and taken their doctor's de- 
gree at Johns Hopkins, than at all the 
other universities of the country com- 
bined. Unfortunately the University has 
suffered materially at times from lack of 
funds, as the bulk of its endowment con- 
sisted of securities of the Baltimore and 
Ohio Railroad; and as the value of these 
has fluctuated greatly in the past thirty 



years, and dividends have been somewhat 
uncertain, the results to the College have 
been dei^lorable. Since the rehabilitation 
of that road, however, the income has 
been more certain and abundant; and in 
1907 Mr. William Wyman of Baltimore 
donated a valuable tract of sixty-five 
acres in the suburbs for a new site to 
which the University could be moved 
from its present cramped quarters, con- 
ditioned upon its other friends raising 
one million dollars, which was quickly 
done. This, happily, promises renewed 
activity and increased efficiency for the 
years to come. Of all the great gifts for 
the advancement of learning which this 
chapter records few have been more ef- 
fective or produced more lasting results 
than that of Baltimore's princely mer- 
chant, Johns Hopkins. 

The Leland Stanford Junior Univer- 
sity is the noble expression of the grief 
of its founder and his wife for the loss of 
an only and dearly beloved son. Indeed 
all tlie accounts of the father's and 
mother's love for this son savor rather of 
worship than of a natural, jwrental love; 
and the benefaction of the parents took 
its form from the early avowed purpose 
of their son. In conveying the estates to 
the trustees, Mr. Stanford said : " Since 
the idea of establishing an institution of 
this kind for the benefit of mankind came 
directly and largely from our son and 
only child, Leland, and in the belief that 
had he been spared to advise us as to the 
disposition of our estate he would have 
desired the devotion of a large portion 
thereof to this purpose, we will that for 
all time to come the institution hereby 
founded shall bear the name and shall be 
known as the Leland Stanford Junior 
University." 

Leland Stanford was born at Water- 
vliet, N. Y.. JLarch 9, 1824. His father 
was a prosperous farmer, but was also 
deeply interested in construction of roads, 
bridges, etc., and was an ardent supporter 
of De Witt Clinton's scheme for the Erie 
canal to connect the great lakes with New 
York harbor, — a characteristic interest 
which Leland seems to have inherited. 



iM 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



The boy worked on the farm during his 
youth attending the local sehool and oc- 
casionally making extra money by some 
shrewd youthful venture. When eighteen 
years of age his father bought a piece of 
woodland and told Leland he might have 
all he could make from the sale of the 
wood if he would cut off the trees. From 
this undertaking, he cleared twenty-six 
lunidred dollars. He went to school at an 
Academy in Clinton, and later studied 
law in an otfice in Alliany and was ad- 
mitted to the bar. During the gold fever 
of 1848-50 two of his brothers went to 
California, and were making money rap- 
idly in merchandising, when in 1852 Le- 
land determined to follow them. For 
four years he managed a store at Michi- 
gan Bluffs. He quickly established a rep- 
utation for strict integrity and honesty, 
as well as for kindness and generosity, 
and made strong friends wherever he 
went, among all classes of men, and was 
thoroughly trusted by all. Previous to the 
Civil War Califurnia had been strongly 
Democratic; but Stanford had adopted the 
principles of the new Republican party ; 
and in 1860 he was elected a delegate at 
large to attend the National Convention, 
where he earnestly supported Lincoln. 
After the latter's inauguration, at his and 
Secretary Seward's request, Stanford 
spent several weeks in Washington, advis- 
ing as to the best means to keep Cali- 
fornia loyal to the Union, as the Southern 
leaders had hoped to create the same con- 
ditions in the frontier states of California 
and Oregon that existed in the border 
states of Missouri and Kentuck.y, which 
would necessitate the detachment of 
large bodies of troops from the Northern 
armies to control the situation on the Pa- 
cific Coast. In 1861 Stanford accepted 
the nomination for governor of California 
on the Republican ticket ; and though lie 
had been badly beaten in the contest for 
the same office in 1859, he was elected 
this time by a large majority. He early 
realized the importance of a trans-con- 
tinental railroad; and his interest was 
most heartily fostered at Washington, as 
the imperative need of some means for 



quickly transporting troops to the West 
Coast, in case of an emergency, was 
strongly felt. Although the undertaking 
to construct a road over the Rocky and 
Sierra Nevada mountain ranges was gen- 
erally regarded as wholly impracticable, 
yet his enthusiasm and energy finally en- 
listed the co-operation of C. P. Hunting- 
ton, a hardware merchant of Sacramento 
and his partner Mark Hopkins. Later 
Charles Crocker, who was then also a mer- 
chant in Sacramento, agreed to join 
forces with them, and the Central Pacific 
Railroad Company was organized, in 
June of 1861. Our space does not admit 
of any detailed account of the progress of 
that stupendous undertaking; only to say 
Governor Stanford turned the first shovel- 
ful of earth early in 1863, and drove the 
first spike that connected the Central 
with the Union Pacific at Promontory 
Point, Utah, May 10, 1869, thus estab- 
lishing through rail connection from 
Omaha, Neb., to the Pacific Coast. It 
was no easy matter to raise money for 
such an enterprise during the Civil War, 
and this difficulty had led the government 
to make unusually liberal land grants to 
encourage investment. At first alternate 
sections of land for ten miles on either 
side of the road were granted to the Com- 
pany, and $16,000 per mile in bonds for 
the easily constructed portions of the 
road, and from $32,000 to $48,000 per 
mile for the difficult portions over the 
mountains. In 1864 Congress increased 
the land grant to alternate sections in a 
belt extending twenty miles on each side 
of the track, making a total of 12,800 
acres per mile of road, and putting the 
company in possession of an aggregate of 
close to nine million acres. Of course 
the original contractors realized immense 
fortunes from the undertaking, and their 
wealth has since dominated all political 
and economic conditions in the state. Mr. 
Stanford, realizing the bright future be- 
fore California, invested heavily in large 
tracts in the fertile valleys, holding sixty 
thousand acres in one, twenty-two thou- 
sand in another, and smaller tracts in 
various localities. But his favorite ranch 



AN ERA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



'51 



was the Palo Alto Estate of 8,400 acres in 
the beautiful Santa Clara Valley, about 
thirty miles south of San Francisco. Here 
he made his home, erecting a costly house 
and great stables and conservatories. He 
was especially fond of his horses, and the 
Palo Alto stable soon became one of the 
most noted in the land. Here were raised 
some of the most royal members of the 
horse kingdom, as Electioneer, Arion, 
Sunol, Piedmont, and others, who were al- 
most literally worth their weight in gold. 
Mr. Stanford loved his horses as he loved 
his family; and Gen. Frank Walker once 
described a visit to the stables where he 
was struck by the gentleness of the horses, 
who would rub their noses all over their 
master, and fearlessly come up to visitors 
to be petted. Asking Mr. Stanford how 
he contrived to keep his horses so gentle, 
he replied, "I never allow a man to speak 
unkindly to one of my horses ; and if a 
man swears at one, I discharge him." 

Shortly after the death of his son, to 
turn the father's thought from his grief 
and enforce a change of scene, his friends 
urged him to allow his name to go before 
the Legislature as a candidate for the 
United States Senatorship ; and being 
elected, he took his seat March 4, 1885. 

The relation between Mr. and Mrs. 
Stanford and their only child seems to 
have been one of rare love and affection, 
as well as one of companionship. Born 
in May, 1868, Leland Junior was a bright 
and affectionate child, but was never 
strong or of good health. He was blessed 
with a sunny and bright disposition, and 
showed intellectual qualities that promised 
future usefulness. He was kind and gen- 
erous to a fault, and tender and con- 
siderate of everyone, and of animals. 
Many interesting stories are told to illus- 
trate these characteristics; and his collec- 
tion of stray, lame, and homeless dogs was 
a rare one. His father and mother were 
disposed to yield to his every impulse, 
and many of their earlier large benefac- 
tions were made at his suggestion. When 
an effort was being made to establish 
Kindergartens in San Francisco, a lady 
having the matter in charge called on 



Mrs. Stanford in the city home, where she 
told of the needs of the poor children; 
and it is related that Leland put his hand 
in his mother's, saying, " Mama, we must 
help these poor children." " Well, Le- 
land," said his mother, " what do you wish 
me to do?" "Give Mrs. Cooper five hun- 
dred dollars now and let her start a school, 
and then come to us for more." The 
money was at once given, and the account 
further states that between 1879 and 1892 
Mrs. Stanford gave one hundred and sixty 
thousand dollars as a fund for the San 
Franciscan Kindergartens, and that her 
name was down for eight thousand dol- 
lars a year for their support. 

Early in life Leland realized that he 
would sometime become possessed of great 
wealth, and he formulated many plans for 
its useful exijenditure ; and while yet a 
boy he had considered the founding of a 
great institution of learning. He was 




LELANIi STAXIuHD. 

greatly interested in a museum for which 
he earlj- began making collections, for 
which his parents gave him two large 
rooms in their San Francisco home; and 
he became deeply interested in art and 
archaeology. He was nearly ready to enter 
Yale when his parents decided to make a 
long trip abroad, of which he should have 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



the benefit; and in Athens, Eome, and all 
the art centres his father and mother al- 
lowed him to buy liberally of treasures for 
his museum and for the larger institution 
he ever had in mind. While in Home 
symptoms of the fever developed and he 
was hurried to Florence ; but in spite of 
all that medical art could do he passed 
away ilareh 13, ISS-i. The grief-stricken 
parents brouglit the body back to his first 
home at Palo Alto, where it was laid away 
in a costly tomb that had been prepared, 
on Thanksgiving Day, November 27, 1884. 
Then declared the father, " the cliiUlren of 
California siiall he our children." 
- " From this crushing blow," says Mrs. 
Bolton, " Mr. Stanford never recovered. 
For years young Leland's room was kept 
ready and in waiting, the lamp dimly 
burning- at night, and the bed clothing 
turned back b.y loving hands as if lie were 
coming back again. The horses the boy 
formerly used were kept unused in pas- 
ture at Palo Alto and cared for for their 
young owner's sake. The little yellow 
dog whose broken leg he had set was left 
at Palo Alto when the boy went to Eu- 
rope. When his body was brought back 
the dog knew only too well what had hap- 
pened; and after the body was placed in 
the tomb the faithful creature took his 
place in front of the door, from which he 
could not be coaxed even for his food, and 
where one morning he was found dead. 
He was buried near his devoted friend." 
And Congressman Sibley of Pennsyl- 
vania has told how, three years after the 
death of Leland, he and Mr. Stanford 
" went together to the tomb of the boy, 
and the father told amid tears and sobs 
how, since the death of his son, he had 
adopted and taken to his heart and love 
every friendless boy and girl in all the 
land, and that, so far as his means af- 
forded, they should go to make the path 
of every such an one smoother and 
brighter." This love for young people 
was manifested during their life in Wash- 
ington while Congress was in session. 
They gave an annual dinner to the Sen- 
ate pages, with a gift for each one. and at 
Christmas each received a five-dollar gold 



piece. A dinner was given every winter to 
the telegraph and messenger boys of the 
city, with gifts of money, gloves; etc. 
Evei-y Orphan Asylum and Charity Hos- 
pital in the city was also liberally remem- 
bered at Christmas. And Mr. Sibley fur- 
ther relates that he and his partner bought 
a young colt of the Senator for which 
they paid $12,500. He immediately took 
out his checkbook, and drew two checks 
for $0,250 each f(n' two different Homes 
for friendless children; and with a twinkle 
in his eye, he said, " Electric Bell ought 
to make a great horse, he starts in making 
so many people happy in the very begin- 
ning of his life." 

The bereaved father and mother lost no 
time in preparing their plans for the 
great monument to the memory of their 
beloved son and on the nineteenth anni- 
versary of his birth, May 14, 1887, the 
corner-stone of the first building of the 
University was laid at Palo x\lto; and in 
a little over four years, Oct. 1, 1891, the 
doors of the institution were opened for 
students of both sexes, the donor declar- 
ing to his trustees that " the rights of one 
sex, political or otherwise, are the same 
as those of the other sex, and this equality 
of rights ought to be fully recognized." 
And in reference to his imrpose in found- 
ing the University Mr. Stanford said: 
" The object is not alone to give the 
student a technical education, fitting him 
for a successful business life, but it is 
also to instill into his mind an apprecia- 
tion of the blessings of this government, 
a reverence for its institutions, and a love 
for God and humanity." 

Mr. Stanford lived to see his Univer- 
sity opened and doing successful work. 
The old Spanish Mission architecture, 
so common in Southern California, was 
adopted as the prevailing style for the 
buildings, the plans having been originally 
drawn by Richardson, the distinguished 
Boston architect. " The plan contem- 
plates a number of quadrangles in the 
midst of a great park of 8,400 acres. The 
central group, consisting of two quad- 
rangles, one entirely surrounding the 
other, is completed; and its twelve one- 



AN EEA OF PKINCELY GIFTS. 



753 



story buildings are connected by a con- 
tinuous arcade facing a paved court five 
hundred and eiglity feet long and two 
hundred and fifty vride, with an area of 
three and a quarter acres. This court is 
adorned with palms and many of the 
bright flowers that grow in such profu- 
sion in that country. The buildings are 
of a buff sandstone." 

Mr. Stanford and his trustees were for- 
tunate in being able to secure the services 
of the distinguished educator and natu- 
ralist David Starr Jordan for president of 



Francisco bay, and directly opposite the 
Golden Gate, has been the recipient of 
many valuable gifts from Mi-s. Phaba 
Hearst: and it is generally understood 
that it will later become an object of far 
greater benefaction from the same source. 
A notable gift was made to this Univer- 
sity by C. F. Doe, of San Francisco, in 
1907, he bequeathing si.x million dollars 
to the Regents to establish a memorial 
library. This sum becomes payable in in- 
stallments as the estate may warrant, but 
two and a half million dollars were set 




.^.^. — f t^"^^ tii ff ((wr"i(Bflit i i!liy ^¥ iimMM 




i3f?Jf:J6 




THE GREEK THEATRE, UNrVERSITT OF CALIFORNIA. 



the University, who is still doing noble 
work in that office. At his death Mr. 
Stanford left all his estate in his wife's 
control, as he always considered all bene- 
factions as much her interest as his own. 
She provided liberally for its needs until 
her death, when the entire estate passed to 
the University. The value was estimated 
at about thirty millions, making Stanford, 
for the present, the most liberally endowed 
educational institution in the world. 

The University of California, most 
beautifully situated at Berkeley on San 
48 



apart as the first installment, and a 
superb library building of majestic pro- 
portions is now being erected. 

Of course the most notable of the many 
princely gifts that are connected with the 
name of the city of Chicago, is the estab- 
lishment and endowment of its great 
T^niversity. As this has been so largely 
the work of one man, however, it will be 
more particularly referred to in connec- 
tion with Mr. Rockefeller's many bene- 
factions. The career of the Armours, and 
the development of their enormous pack- 



754 



TKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



ing business, is too well known to call for 
any mention here. One of the well-known 
institutions of the city is the Armour Mis- 
sion, of which the founder of the house, 
P. D. Armour, was a constant and liberal 
supporter. The Mission also has a free 
kindergarten, and a free dispensarj' ; and 
to insure for this work a constant 
revenue, Mr. Armour built the "Armour 
Flats " near it, having two hundred and 
sixteen apartments that rent from seven- 
teen to thirty-five dollars a month. Mr. 
Armour's principal gift, however, was a 
million and a half dollars to build and 
endow the "Armour Institute," a techni- 
cal school of high order which has done 
excellent work. His later gifts, and 
those of his sons, have increased the en- 
dowment to upwards of three million 
dollars. 

A few years ago extended accounts ap- 
peared in the papers of the visit to this 
country of the renowned Dr. Lorenz, of 
Germany, whom Mr. J. Ogden Armour 
had induced to come here in the hope that 
the doctor's system of "bloodless surgery" 
might restore to normal condition his 
little crippled daughter, Lolita. While in 
this country Dr. Lorenz treated also many 
cases of poor people gratuitously, and all 
his work, including that in the family of 
Mr. Armour, seemed to be uniformly suc- 
cessful. As a thank ofFering for the bene- 
fits received by his little daughter Mr. Ar- 
mour, in 1902, provided grounds and a 
building, and set aside three million 
dollars for the endowment of the " Lolita 
Armour Institute of Bloodless Surgery," 
under the direction of Frederick Mueller, 
an advanced student of Professor Lorenz, 
who had been his assistant in the opera- 
tion on Mr. Armour's daughter. 

One of Chicago's most generous givers 
has been Dr. D. K. Pearsons, who was 
born at Bradford, Vt., in 1820; and 
after graduating from college and the 
medical school, began the practice of his 
profession in Chicopee, Mass., in 1849. 
In 1857 he moved to the middle West, and 
was engaged in farming in Illinois for 
three years when he settled in Chicago, 
engaging in the real estate business. 



Having accumulated a large fortune he 
retired from active business in 1887, and 
has since interested himself in the wel- 
fare of many of the smaller colleges of 
the West, which he has helped liberally by 
donations ranging from fifty thousand 
to three hundred thousand dollars. In 
nearly every case, he has conditioned his 
gifts upon the raising of a considerably 
larger amount by the friends of the in- 
stitution to be benefited. In this way 
he has given during the last twenty years 
upwards of three and a half million 
dollars, placing him high up on the roll 
of liberal benefactors of educational 
institutions. 

Chicago has been particularly fortunate 
in the matter of endowments for libraries, 
and will soon have three of the finest 
libraiy buildings in the United States, 
with collections of books worthy of the 
buildings that house them. Walter L. 
Newberry, who was born at East Windsor, 
Ct., in 1804, having fitted for the Military 
Academy at West Point, was rejected on 
account of physical conditions. He then 
turned toward the West, engaging in the 
dry-goods business in Detroit from 1828 
to 1834, when he removed to Chicago, 
then a city of three thousand population, 
and started in the banking business. 
Shortly after settling there he invested a 
small amount of money he had brought 
with him in forty acres of land on the 
North side, in the very centre of the dis- 
trict that early became the aristocratic 
residence section of the city, and still re- 
tains that distinction. At his death, in 
1868, he left an estate valued at five 
million dollars to his wife and two 
daughters; if the daughters died un- 
married, lialf the property after the death 
of his wife should go to brothers and 
sisters, and half to found a library. 
Both daughters died unmarried, and the 
widow in 1885, so that the trustees came 
into possession of $2,500,000 for library 
purposes. As a result the " Newberry 
Library " was established on the North 
side, the building being three hundred by 
sixty feet, though the plan calls for the 
doubling of the latter dimension. There 



AN ERA OF PKIXCELY GIFTS. 



100 



is now room for one million books, wliicli 
will be increased to space for ft)ur million 
when the addition to the present library 
is made. The trustees made a most happy 
selection of a librarian, securing the serv- 
ices of Dr. William F. Poole, very 
familiarly known for his useful service to 
all students in the preparation of " Poole's 
Index " to periodical literature. Upon his 
death, in 1894, John Vance Cheney, the 
distinguished author and poet, was se- 
lected as his successor, — a case where its 
two librarians have conferred distinction 
upon the institution which they served. 
As the City Public Library was already 
well established and equipjied, it was de- 
cided to make the Newberry a public 
reference library. 

John Crerar, the son of Scotch parents, 
was born in New York and at the age of 
eighteen became a clerk in a mercantile 
house. In 1802 he went to Chicago and 
engaged in the iron business, as well as 
having interests in several railroads. He 
was never married, but lived quietly at 
the Grand Pacific Hotel until his death, 
in 1889. He was a very liberal man dur- 
ing his later life, and at his death left 
various sums ranging from five to fifty 
thousand dollars to several friends; 
"$20,000 to each of his first, $10,000 to 
each of his second, and $5,000 to each of 
his third cousins; " one hundred thousand 
dollars to his church (the Second Pres- 
byterian), and a like sum to its missions; 
to ten charitable organizations, fifty 
thousand dollars each; one hundred 
thousand dollars for a statue of Abraham 
Lincoln ; and from ten to twenty-five 
thousand dollars to each of several other 
organizations. The residue of his estate 
was left to trustees to establish the John 
Crerar Library on the South side of the 
City, the Newberry being already deter- 
mined upon for the North side. Referring 
to this bequest Mr. Crerar said in his will : 
" I desire the books and periodicals se- 
lected with a view to create and sustain 
a healthy moral and Christian sentiment 
in the community. / do not mean hy this 
that there shall not le anything hut hymn- 
hooks and sermons; hut I mean that dirty 



French novels, and all sTceptical trash, 
and works of questionahle mo7-al tone, 
shall never he found in this lihrary. I 
want its atmosphere that of Christian re- 
finement, and its aim and ohject the huihl- 
ing up of character." For tl\e home of 




JOHN CRERAR. 

this library a magnificent marble building 
will soon be completed on the Lake Front 
Park (Michigan Avenue) near the Art 
Museum, and but about four blocks from 
the City library. The trustees of the 
Crerar have adopted more particularly 
the scientific line for its development, 
while the special field of the Newberry is 
the arts, literature, and the humanities, 
with the City library to meet the ordinary 
demands of general readers. The libraries 
of the three institutions work together in 
perfect harmony, and by this arrangement 
each is enabled to do more in its particu- 
lar line than if it was obliged to attempt 
to cover the whole range of knowledge. 
As the distance from the Crerar to the 
Newberry is only about half a mile, with 
the City library situated on the direct 
line between them, together they practi- 
cally form one foundation not unlike the 



756 



PKOM CULOXY TO WOliLD POWER. 



Astor-Lonox-Tili'eri Foundation of New 
York ; but, we are disposed to believe, 
better able to serve the student public 
more conveniently in their separate quar- 
ters than will the New York Foundation 
be able to do in its one great building. 

The Washington University at St. 
Louis, ilo., was especially favored by 
many of its frieiuls toward the close of 
the last century. To further this move- 
ment two St. Louis merchants, E. S. 
Brookings and S. Cupples, transferred to 
the trustees of the University a business 
property known as Cupples Station, which 
was paying an income of ten per cent on 
five million dollars. As a recognition of 
his services in this undertaking, Mr. 
Brookings was made an honorary graduate 




PETEK COOPEK. 

of Yale in 1899, " in acknowledgment of 
services rendered to the cause of higher 
education as president of tlie Board of 
Trustees of Washington University, St. 
Louis, in which capacity he succeeded in 
interesting many citizens to contribute 
funds necessary to practically refound the 
University, including a site of more than 



one hundred acres, new buildings of the 
highest class and equipment, increased 
endowment, etc." 

One of the oldest and most useful in- 
stitutions of New York for the purpose of 
advancing technical education is the 
" Cooper Union for the Advancement of 
Science and x\rt," founded by Peter 
Cooper. It would be almost easier to 
enumerate the different enterprises that 
Mr. Cooper did not engage in during his 
early life than to name those that he did. 
His father was by trade a liatter, and 
Peter, born in New York in 1791, " as 
soon as his head could be seen above the 
table " began to assist in the work. After 
many experiments, in all of which he was, 
in a measure, successful, he purchased a 
largo glue factory located between 31st 
and 34th streets. New York ; and when 
a few years later the lease on the land ex- 
pired, he bought ten acres of land in 
Brooklyn, and moved the business there, 
where it has since been profitably con- 
tinued. In 1828 he bought three thousand 
acres within the city limits of Baltimore 
and erected the Canton Iron works, which 
was the first of the great works in this 
industry in the country. He determined 
to dispose of his Baltimore interests, and 
a part was bought by Boston capitalists 
who reorganized the Canton Iron Co., 
Cooiier taking a large part of his price 
for the property in stock of the new com- 
pany on the basis of forty-four dollars a 
share, which he afterwards sold at the rate 
of two hundred and thirty. He was also 
largely identified with the development of 
the iron industry throughout the eastern 
part of Pennsylvania. But not alone in- 
dustrial and commercial affairs received 
his attention, for he was identified with 
all the movements in his native city look- 
ing toward better civil conditions and the 
advancement of learning; and being a 
trustee of the first Public School Society 
founded to promote public schools in New 
York, when that body was merged in the 
Board of Education, he was made a 
School Commissioner. He has, however, 
been most widely known for his interest 
in industrial education, of the need of 



AN ERA or PRIISfGELY GIFTS. 



757 



which his own experience had profoundly 
convinced him. With the idea of furnish- 
ing a home for the proper instruction of 
tlie working classes he purchased the block 
bounded by Third and Fourth avenues and 
7th and 8th streets; and from his own 
plans the Cooper Union was formed. The 
corner stone was laid in 1854, and five 
years later, upon the completion of what 
was then one of the remarkable buildings 
of the city, Mr. Cooper transferred the 
property in fee simple to six trustees, who 
were empowered to devote the rents and 
income to a scheme of education which 
should include, in the founder's own 
words, " instruction in branches of knowl- 
edge by which men earn their daily bread; 
in laws of health and the improvement 
of the sanitary conditions of families as 
well as individuals; in social and politi- 
cal science, whereby cominunities and na- 
tions advance in virtue, wealth, and 
IJower ; and finally in matters which affect 
the eye, the ear, and the imagination, and 
furnish a basis for recreation to the work- 
ing classes." Free courses of lectures on 
social and political science were estab- 
lished, also a free reading room; and col- 
lections of works of art and of scientific 
subjects were provided, and a school for 
the instruction of women in the arV of de- 
sign, by which they may gain a liveli- 
hood. The building with its improve- 
ments has cost nearly $750,000, and an 
endowment of $200,000 was provided to 
maintain the reading room and library. 
The annual expense of the schools and 
lectures, varying from sixty to seventy- 
five thousand dollars a year, has been 
largely covered from rents derived from 
parts of the building not occupied by 
the Union. More recently endowments 
amounting to a half million dollars or 
more have been provided by Mr. Cooper's 
heirs, the Coopers and Hewitts; and the 
sphere of the Union's influence has been 
greatly enlarged. Few institutions in any 
city have a more enviable record for the 
real benefits conferred upon those most 
needing such assistance and entertain- 
ment, and for more than fifty years its 
great halls, and reading and lecture rooms. 



have nightly been filled to overflowing by 
an interested, eager body of men. Some 
few years since a large bronze statue of 
the venerable founder, executed by St. 
Gaudens, was set up in the little triangu- 
lar park in front of the building, between 
the junction of Third and Fourth avenues. 
It is hardly necessary to relate any in- 
cidents of the life of John Jacob Astor, 
so much has been written about the 
family. Born in the little town of 
Waldorf, near Heidelberg, Germany, in 
1763, he helped his father, a butcher, until 
he was sixteen, when he determined to 
join an elder brother in London, who 
worked in the piano and flute factory of 
an uncle. Having no money he set out 
on foot for the Rhine; and resting under 
a tree on his iirst day's walk he formu- 
lated his resolutions for his future life, 
it is said, in a brief sentence, — " I will 
he honest, indusirious, and never gamhle." 
Eventually reaching London he renuiined 
there until 1783, working with his brother, 
and learning the English language. Hav- 
ing saved seventy-five dollars, he invested 
twenty-five in seven flutes, purchased a 
steerage passage to New York for a like 
amount, and put the balance in his pocket. 
On the passage he fell in with a furrier 
who told him that nioney could be made 
by buying furs from the Indians on the 
frontier and selling them to dealers. As 
soon as he arrived in New York he 
entered the employ of a Quaker furrier, 
and learned all he could about the busi- 
ness, in the meantime selling his flutes 
and using the money to buy furs. How 
his business grew the whole world knows. 
As he accumulated money he invested it 
in real estate in the city; and as a result 
of his simple living, profitable business, 
and rapid advances in real estate values, 
he was worth twenty million dollars when 
he died in 1848. Wishing to leave some 
bequest of value and use to his adopted 
city he consulted his friends Washing- 
ton Irving, Dr. Cogswell, and Fitz-Greene 
Halleck, the poet, who advised him to 
found a public library. Accordingly he 
bequeathed to trustees the sum of four 
hundred thousand dollars for that pur- 



'o8 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



pose. His eldest son, William B. Astor, 
left and gave during his lifetime the 
further sum of live hundred and fifty 
thousand dollars; and in 18S9 Julm 
Jacob, the grandson, gave eiglit hundvrd 
and fifty thousand dollars further to en- 




JOHN JACOB ASTOE. 

large the building and increase its use- 
fulness. The completed building has a 
frontage of two hundred feet on Lafayette 
street, in 1848 far up-to\vn, but now in 
the heart of the wholesale business dis- 
trict of the city. The library was for 
many years the most used anJ most use- 
ful library in the country; and at the 
time of consolidation under the Tilikii 
foundation had about three hundred and 
fifty thousand volumes. It has many very 
rare and costly books, one of which is a 
copy of "Wyclif's translation of the New 
Testament made in 1390 A. D.. before the 
age of printing, which, sa.ys the learned 
librarian, Mr. Saunders, " so closely re- 
sembles the black letter tyi^e as almost 
to deceive a practiced eye." Here also is 
the second jn'inted Bible, on vellum, date 
14G2, for which nine thousand dollars was 
paid. 



Robert Lenox, a Scotch merchant who 
had accumulated a fortune, came to this 
country and settled in New York in 1784. 
Among his early ventures here was the 
purchase of a farm of forty acres whose 
centre would be approximately where 
Fifth Avenue and Seventy-second street 
meet to-day. For this he paid altogether 
about ten thousand dollars, which he con- 
sidered too much, but he forbade his heirs 
selling it for some years as he believed 
there " would ultimately he a village 
there." His only son, James, was born 
in New York in 1800, was educated at 
I'rinceton and Columbia, and studied law 
though he never practiced his profession. 
He went to Europe soon after completing 
his education and began to collect rare 
and curious books, which became the pas- 
sion of his life. He was hardly less de- 
voted to art than to literature; and gave 
fifty years of his life to the making of a 
library and forming a gallery of art which 
unquestionably surpassed any collection, 
in its combined features, which has been 
seen in the new world. He had fallen in 
love with, and proposed marriage to. a 
young lady who, for some reason, re- 
jected him; and both remained single for 
the remainder of their lives. Mr. Lenox 
then made his libraiy his mistress, be- 
coming a confirmed recluse and retiring 
entirely from the social world. In 1839 
his father died, leaving him several 
million dollars, which enabled him to 
gratify his tastes without stint. In IsTo 
he conveyed to his native city his library 
and art collection, together with the 
magiiificent building he had erected to 
contain them. This, the Lenox Library, 
covered the block on Fifth Avenue be- 
tween Seventieth and Seventy-first streets, 
the building being of limestone with a 
front of two hundred feet and depth of 
one hundred and fourteen feet. The 
Library and art collection were valued at 
one million dollars, and the building and 
grounds were worth as much more, mak- 
ing, all its features considered, one of the 
most royal gifts ever made to any city. 
The library is one of the richest in the 
world in Bibles, containing one of the 



1 



AN EKA OF PRINCELY GIFTS. 



r59 



three or four existing copies of the 
Mazarin Bible, the first book printed 
from movable type; and there are in all 
twenty-two hundred English Bibles, dat- 
ing from 1493, and twelve hundred Bibles 
in other languages, including five copies 
of Eliot's Indian Bible. It is hardly less 
rich in Americana, Shakesperiana, and 
the works of, and about, Milton. In 1887 
the last surviving sister of Mr. Lenox 
gave to the trustees ten lots adjoining the 
Library, which are of great value; and in 
1879 Eobert Lenox Kennedy, a nephew 
and president of the Board of Trustees, 
added to the Art Gallery Munkacsy's 
great painting, " Milton Dictating Para- 
dise Lost," which is said to have cost one 
hundred and fifty thousand dollars. 
James Lenox, the founder, was an ex- 
ceptionally peculiar man, though a most 
useful citizen. He was for several years 
president of the American Bible Society, 
to which he gave most liberally. Prince- 
ton College and Theological Seminary 
were each also greatly enriched by his 
bounty. In addition to these gifts which 
could hardly be kept from the public 
knowledge, he was constantly giving to 
worthy causes, but on condition that the 
name of the donor should be kept abso- 
lutely secret. On one occasion he gave 
seven thousand dollars to a lady for a 
charitable purpose, exacting from her the 
usual pledge of secrecy. But she failed 
to keep it. Sometime after she appealed 
to him to aid another worthy cause, which 
he acknowledged he was disposed to do, 
but declined because the lady had exposed 
him on the previous occasion. His home 
life, if such it may be called, was most 
secluded. Many distinguished people of 
this country and coming from Europe, in- 
cluding the Marquis of DufPerin when he 
was Governor General of Canada, desired 
to call on him, but he declined to see one 
and all. And it is related that a distin- 
guished and widely known scholar who 
was prosecuting some researches for 
which he could not find the material out- 
side of Lenox's collection appealed to him 
to be allowed access to it. The request 
was granted, but the scholar was not per- 



mitted to cross the threshold of the 
library. A large and convenient room was 
set apart for him in the spacious Lenox 
mansion for such time as should suit his 
pleasure to use it, and books were taken 
to him as he needed them by the private 
librarian ; but though his work continued 
for some weeks, the writer saw neither the 
library nor Mr. Lenox. And as he 
neared the end of life, his request was 
that no details should be given out for 
publication, nor even the hour of his quiet 
funeral announced. 

In 1886 Samuel J. Tilden, one of New 
York's most noted lawyers and most in- 
fluential citizens, died, leaving an estate 
valued at upwards of five million dollars. 
It was his intention that practically the 
whole of this, together with his private 
library of twenty thousand volumes, 
should go to the city to establish a public 
circulating library, which up to that time 
was practically unknown there. His will 
was contested, however, with the result 
that the library fund amounted to only 
about one-half of the original amount. 




SAMUEL J. TILDEN. 

x\.s the long legal battle delayed the exe- 
cution of the trust, the subject of a con- 
solidation of the Lenox and Astor libraries 
with the Tilden foundation came to the 
front, and it was finally decided to take 
such a step, and create one great central 



rGu 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



library. Accordingly the New York Pub- 
lic Library — Astor, Lenox, and Tilden 
fiiundations, — was established by consoli- 
dation on Jlay 23, 1895. The new cor- 
poration had an endowment of $3,440,500 
and owned besides the very valuable sites 
of the Lenox and Astor libraries. It pos- 
sessed at that time about four hundred 




J. PIERPONT MORGAN. 

thousand volumes, a number that has been 
nearly doubled up to the present day. 
Steps were successfully taken to secure the 
old reservoir site on Fifth Avenue between 
Forty and Forty-second streets as a loca- 
tion for a new library building; and au- 
thority was secured from the State legis- 
lature to issue bonds to the extent of five 
million dollars to erect a library building 
wiirtliy nf the city, and of the treasures 
that would be stored within it. Work on 
the new building was begun in 1902, and 
it is anticipated that it will be completed 
and read,y to open to the public in 1909. 
The structure is a massive and imposing 
edifice, built of white mai'ble, 366 feet 
long and 240 feet wide. As at present 
planned there will be shelf rooiu for a 
million and a half volumes; but an ample 
vacant Irit in the rear will admit of an ex- 



tension that would accommodate from 
four to five million volumes. In 1901 
Mr. Carnegie proposed to give to the city 
$5,200,000 to establish sixty-five branch 
libraries, on condition that the city would 
provide sites, and bind itself to raise ten 
per cent of the amount annually to sup- 
port these branches. The gift and con- 
ditions were both accepted, and several of 
the branches are alread.y in use, and others 
are being provided as fast as suitable sites 
can be iJrocured. 

A very generous giver of whom the 
world has heard little was Mrs. Mary 
Macrae Stuart, widow of Robert L. 
Stuart, the head of one of the old firms 
of sugar refiners. At her death in 1891 
she bequeathed the R. L. Stuart Fine 
Art Collections, valued at a half million 
dollars, to the Lenox Library, on condi- 
tion that the collection should not be ex- 
hibited on Sunday; and to various 
religious and charitable societies con- 
nected with the Presbyterian Church, and 
to hospitals and relief societies in New 
York city, she distributed more than six 
million dollars. It was her wish to give 
largely to the Museum of Natural History 
and the Museum of Art ; but her deadly 
fear that they would be opened on Sunday 
restrained her. 

One of New York's liberal benefactors, 
and with good reason, has been and 
is Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan. Various 
amounts from fifty thousand to a quarter 
of a million have been given by him to 
aid several good causes of which we have 
no record. But his known gifts during 
the past few years have amounted to more 
than six and a half million dollars, and 
have been distributed somewhat as fol- 
lows: To the University of the South, 
$2,000,000; to the Hai-vard Medical 
School, $1,000,000; to establish the Lying- 
in Hospital near St. George's Church, 
New York city, $1,350,000; to St. 
John's Cathedral, $500,000 ; to the Young 
Men's Christian Association of New 
York, $100,000; to the Loomis Cancer 
Hospital, $500,000; to a fund to preserve 
the Palisades of the Hudson, $125,000; 
for a library at Holyoke, Mass., $100,000; 



AN EEA OF PKINCELY GIFTS. 



161 



for a Parish House and Rectory for 
St. George's Qiureh, $300,000; and to 
the New York Trades Training School, 
$500,000. St. George's Church is one of 
the great democratic churches of the 
Episcopal communion, with a widely ex- 
tended parish embracing thousands of the 
poor on the east side. The mission work 
of the church covers a wide area and is 
lovingly prosecuted. Mr. Morgan has for 
years stood back of this work and has been 
liberal in its support. Many and costly 
have been his gifts to the Metropolitan 
]\Iuseum of Art, of which he is now the 
president; and while there is no public 
record of his liberality toward that insti- 
tution, it would undoubtedly represent at 
least another million dollars. 

The Vanderbilts have given in all over 
a million dollars to the Vanderbilt Uni- 
versity of Nashville, Tenn., and it is 
known that the gifts of the family to 
various hospitals in the city have been 
large. Difierent members of the family, 
too, have been generous benefactors of 
Yale University, having given the money 
for several of the finest buildings on the 
campus. For many years the Rev. Dr. 
Greer, of St. Bartholomew's Church, 
acted as the almoner of the private chari- 
ties of the family, which it is understood 
have been very liberal. 

A somewhat novel foundation was laid 
by Mr. Joseph Pulitzer, owner and mana- 
ging editor of the New York " World," 
when, in 1902, he gave two million dollars 
to establish a School of Journalism in 
connection with Columbia University. 
The donor had had this purpose in mind 
for many years, and as early as 1892 had 
laid his plans before President Low of 
lhe University, who rejected them. After 
studying the subject more carefully for 
several years Mr. Pulitzer again ap- 
proached the President, then Nicholas 
ilurray Butler, and his scheme was ap- 
proved and his gift accepted. In the 
North American Review for May. 1904. 
Mr. Pulitzer outlined his plans and ex- 
plained his purpose. " Before the century 
closes," he said, " Schools of Journalism 
will be as universally accepted as features 



of a general education as are schools of 
law and medicine. It is objected that the 
journalist must be born, not made; but the 
only position that it occurs to me a man 
in our Republic can successfully fill by 
simple fact of birth is that of idiot. The 
objection that everything needed is now 
taught in the regular college course ap- 
pears to have some force. It is possible 
that it may be advanced with sincerity by 
intelligent newspaper men who know noth- 
ing of colleges, or by intelligent college 
men who know nothing about newspapers. 
But it is superficial. It is true that many 
of the subjects needed for the general edu- 
cation of a journalist are already covered 
in college; but they are too much covered. 
The spirit of specialization is everj-where, 
and there is specialization in newspaper 
offices. The editor of a New York paper 
confined to the editorial page is as much 
surprised as the reader when in the morn- 
ing he reads the news column. The news 
editor does not know what editorials there 
will be ; the musical critic could not write 
of sporting events; the man with the 
priceless sense of humor could not record 
and interpret the movements of the stock- 
market. The men in all these fields are 
specialists. The object of the School of 
Journalism will be to dig through this 
general scheme intended to cover every 
possible career or work in life, every pro- 
fession, to select and concentrate only 
upon the things which the journalist 
wants, and not waste time on things he 
does not want." 

One of New York's richest men had 
long held an unenviable reputation for 
niggardly and even miserly character- 
istics, and that was Russell Sage. Though 
interested financially in many railroads, 
banks, and financial institutions, one of 
his chief sources of great profits in recent 
years has been the loaning of money " on 
call " to brokers and others who get into 
tight places when there is a panicky condi- 
tion or crisis on the stock market. For 
such loans enormous rates of interest are 
charged, running sometimes as high as 
fifty per cent, or even, in extreme cases, 
to one hundred per cent. For this pur- 



i62 



FKOM COLON V TO WORLD POWER. 



pose Mr. Sage, of course, always kept 
millions of ready money in the banks, and 
could act at once. These transactions, 
coupled with general hardness in busi- 
ness relations, scarcely tended to establish 
a position of honor and esteem among his 
business associates, nor to make for him 
a warm place in the hearts of his fellow- 
men, though his integrity and public and 
private life were above reproach. He had, 
f o • some reason, been led to make some 
gifts to Cornell LTniversity, amounting in 
all, perhaps, to half a million dollars ; but 
beyond that, so far as we can learn, he 
had not opened his heart or purse to 
further any public causes. Consequently 
when he passed away there was but little 
public mourning, and few regrets were 
expressed ; but an eager curiosity was 




Photo. Copyrighted by Rockwood^ N. T. 

MRS. RUSSELL SAGE. 

manifested to know what disposition he 
had made of the very many millions of 
dollars he was known to possess. It was 
somewhat of a disappointment, therefore, 
when it was learned that all had been left 
to his wife, without public bequests of any 
significance. In 1907, however, Mrs. Sage 



announced gifts to various institutions 
and organizations aggregating $4,180,000, 
at the same time stating that she had 
set aside ten millions for the perpetual 
endowment of the " Russell Sage Founda- 
tion," whose object was stated to be the 
" improvement of social and living condi- 
tions in the United States^" The means 
to be employed in this beneficent work 
are very broad, including " research, pub- 
lication, education, the establishment and 
maintenance or aid of charitable or benev- 
olent activities, agencies, and institu- 
tions." With its extensive resources and 
freedom in the range of means to be em- 
ployed, it is anticipated that the Founda- 
tion will take up the larger and more 
difficult problems connected with the 
" cause of adverse social conditions in the 
LTnited States, including ignorance, pov- 
erty and vice." The administration of 
the Fund is ^'j the hands of eight trustees 
who are responsible for the expenditure of 
the income, and who are permitted to in- 
vest any part of the Fund " in plans for 
social betterment which themselves pro- 
duce income." At the end of the year 
only the more general plans for the ad- 
ministration of the Fund had been formu- 
lated ; and it was expected that some 
montlis would be required to survey the 
tlehl, determine lines of policy to be fol- 
lowed, and to organize working ma- 
chinery. The Board of Directors is 
unique in the proportion of women it 
includes, and is as follows: Mrs. Russell 
Sage, Pres., Robert W. DeForest, Cleve- 
land H. Dodge, Helen Gould, Robert C. 
Ogden. ilrs. W. B. Rice, and Louisa Lee 
Schuyler. 

Lowell wrote: 
" Not what we give but what we share. 

For the gift without the giver is bare." 
If the poet's measure of the value of a 
gift is the true one, then it is difficult to 
classify Mr. Rockefeller and Mr. Carnegie 
as " great givers " in the same sense that 
we have classed nearly all those mentioned 
in the preceding record. Of course, 
everything that is given is a gift; but the 
virtue of the act is popularly felt to lie 
in the fact that the gift has cost the 



AN ERA OF PKIXCELY GIFTS. 



763 



giver some little sacrifice, or lias per- 
ceptibly cut into his wealth if the gift is 
a great one. In other words, the essence 
of the gift-idea seems to be lacking if one 
only turns over to another what he can- 
not under any circumstances use, and the 
parting with which he cannot under any 
circumstances feel. In nearly all the 
cases we have described above the donor 
parted with the bulk of all his property, 
with the result that it meant something 
to him, though he may still have retained 
enough to enable him to live in affluence, 
and have an ample residue to divide 
among relatives and friends at his death. 
But in the case of the great so-called 
philanthropists just named it is hardly 
possible that either should ever in any 
degree have felt the loss of the amounts 
they have distributed during the past fif- 
teen years. Indeed it would probably bo 
found true, if the facts could be known, 
that, averaging the amounts donated by 
these men over the years during which 
they have been indulging in their pro- 
digality, neither of them has ever given 
more than a good jjercentage of his income, 
without touching the principal at all. 
Moreover, as we have before suggested, the 
conditions under which the great givers 
previous to about 1890 acquired their 
wealth were vastly different from those 
which have since obtained. Then fifty 
or even sixty years of earnest, self-deny- 
ing, unceasing struggle barely seiwed to 
accumulate a few million dollars under 
tlie most favorable circumstances ; while 
latterly a few years have sufiiced to en- 
able the especially privileged to roll up 
more millions than the rich merchant of 
thirty or forty years ago had thousands. 
And it is not unreasonable to look upon 
Mr. Rockefeller and Mr. Carnegie and 
their class, who have acquired millions 
of dollars as the result of special legis- 
lation and privilege, as self-appointed 
trustees to collect from the people of the 
country great amounts which they take 
great satisfaction in returning to them 
in a measure, but in such a way as may 
suit their particular fancies, or most 
effectually exalt the trustees themselves 



in the estimation of amazed and admir- 
ing peoples. That this is not mere fancy, 
Mr. Carnegie himself has boi'ne witness. 
At the great celebration in 1907 of the 
eleventh anniversary of the founding of 
the Carnegie Institute at Pittsburg, wlien 
the distinguished founder had gathered 
about him noted men from all parts of 
the world as his guests from thi.^ time each 
left his home until he should reacli it 
again, Mr. Carnegie made a somewhat re- 
markable address. Referring to the 
grandeur of the buildings and the mag- 
nificence of all their appointments and 
accessories, he said : " I have been in a 
dream all the moi'ning and I am not 
awake yet. I really cannot understand it 
all. I confess to you as I have had 
to confess to several, that I am totally 
unable to realize that I have had any 
part in creating tliis Institute (up to 
that date he had given it nineteen million 
dollars). Yesterday when I was telling 
Mrs. Carnegie that I felt that Aladdin 
and his lamp had been at work, that genii 
had created this Institute, she said: ' Yes; 
and we did not even have to rub the 
lamp ' . . . I said to myself, ' Yes, 
you gave Mr. Frew (president of the 
Board of Trustees) a little piece of paper 
addressed to Mr. Franks, saying he wouhl 
honor the draft. Very well, I did, but I 
have never seen the bonds which they tell 
me I possess, — never ! I know Mr. Franks 
says he has them, and that is all . . . 
As far as I know 'there are as many bonds 
lying in tlie vault as there were before." 
This being Mr. Carnegie's mental attitude 
there can be but little of the giver in the 
gift, which, measured by Mr. Lowell's 
dictum, must be very bare. 

Mr. Rockefeller first achieved the repu- 
tation of a great benefactor by his gifts 
to establish and help maintain the Uni- 
versity of Chicago. There is one admi- 
rable feature in his disposition of his 
riches and that is the modest manner in 
which it is done. There are no great ban- 
quets, there is no sounding of trumpets, 
nor any noise ; and so far as we can learn 
he has never but once allowed his name to 
be made a -part of the title of any fund 



iGi 



FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWKK. 



that he has created. As a devoted member 
of the Baptist Church, yery many of his 
lariicr benefactions have taken the direc- 
tion of its activities. His custom in giv- 
ing to the University has been to provide 
funds alone, others being looked to to pro- 
vide the buildings and the working para- 
phernalia of a great university; and it is 




Tlwto. Copyrighted by XJnderwood d> Underwood^ N. T. 
JOHN D. HOCKEKELLER. 

only on rare occasions or emergencies tliat 
he has departed from that usage. The 
total of his gifts to the University to date 
is not far from twenty-four million dol- 
lars. Mr. Eoekefeller's. methods in mak- 
ing his donations have been most sys- 
tematic and are based on the following 
rules : 

1 — The gift must be proportionate to 
the need of the cause. 

2 — Gifts are practically always condi- 
tioned upon the raising of an equal or 
larger amount by other parties interested 
in the beneficiary institution or cause. 

3 — A rigid investigation of the worth of 
the cause is made by an expert before the 
gift is made. So true is this the case that 
before he would contribute toward tlie 
erection of the new buildings of so old and 
well-known an institution as the Harvard 
Medical School he required a written re- 
port from his agent as to every feature 



of the work of the school, its equipment, 
and its measure of usefulness in its field. 

In 1902 President Harper of the Uni- 
versity of Chicago reported gifts to the 
amount of eight million dollars from 
anonymous benefactors to establish and 
endow the Rush Medical School as a de- 
partment of the University. It was later 
made public that Mr. Rockefeller con- 
tributed six million dollars of this 
amount. 

As his benefactions have been so 
numerous in sums ranging from fifty 
thousand to five hundred thousand dollars, 
chiefly to colleges, theological seminaries, 
and professional schools in all parts of the 
country, it is only possible for us here 
to refer to his most notable gifts. These 
include $1,000,000 to the Harvard Medical 
School ; $3,600,000 to establish the Rocke- 
feller Institute of Medical Research; 
$2,000,000 to the Louisville, Ky., Univer- 
sity; $2,000,000 to the City of Cleveland 
for a park; $500,000 to the Teachers Col- 
lege of New York City. His most re- 
markable benefaction, for which the 
foundation was laid by a gift of $1,000,- 
000 in 1902, has been the endowment of 
the General Education Board. His origi- 
nal donation was supplemented by one of 
ten million dollars three years later; and 
in 1907 the world was astonished by the 
announcement that he had turned over to 
the Board of Trustees a further sura of 
thirty-two millions. This was, of course, 
the greatest single gift ever made, and 
brought the total of his benefactions for 
that cause up to forty-three million 
dollars. 

]\Ir. Carnegie's great donations have 
been directed toward the erection of fine 
library buildings all over the country. In 
every case he has a representative look 
the field over to determine about how 
much the existing conditions in any town 
or city, and the outlook for the future, 
would warrant his giving. The size of 
the gift is proportioned to the size of the 
city or town to be benefited and under 
all circumstances a guarantee is required 
that the city will annually raise an 
amount equal to ten per cent of the gift 
(in some cases fifteen per cent) for the 



AN ERA OF PRIXCELY GIFTS. 



■65 



maintenance of the library. These dona- 
tions have varied in amount from the 
$5,200,000 given to New York City, the 
$3,000,000 given Philadelphia, and the 
$1,000,000 given to St. Louis, down to the 
ten or fifteen thousand dollars that build 
the modest but attractive library building 
in the smaller cities and towns, — in the 
far West particularly. It is impossible to 
get any reliable estimate of the total 
amount that has been dispensed in this 
way but it must be upwards of seventy- 
five million dollars. In nearly all cases 
the name " Carnegie " appears on the face 
of the building, so that the benefactor has 
enduring monuments in every part of the 
land to perpetuate his name. 

The most favored recipient of Mr. 
Carnegie's bounty has been the Carnegie 
Institution at Pittsburgh, Pa. Starting 
in 1889 with the modest donation of 
$500,000 for a library in that city, his 
total gifts to it aggregate more than nine- 
teen million dollars, — the purpose and 
scope of the original institution having 
been steadily broadened, until it has now 
become a very important institution of 
learning. Including this foundation the 
total of Mr. Carnegie's gifts to the City of 
Pittsburgh now exceed thirty-two million 
dollars. In 1901 « The Carnegie Institu- 
tion for Higher Research " at Washing- 
ton, D. C, was endowed with $10,000,000, 
and the same year the fund of $4,000,000 
for the super-annuated and disabled em- 
ployees of the Carnegie Company was es- 
tablished; in 1903 he gave $10,000,000 to 
the Scotch universities; $2,500,000 to his 
native city of Dunfermline; and $1,500,- 
000 for the " Temple of Peace " at The 
Hague, as a home of future Peace Con- 
ferences and the permanent Board of 
Arbitration ; and in 1904, the " Hero 
Fund" was endowed with $5,000,000. 
Among his more recent benefactions, also, 
should be mentioned one of $1,500,000 for 
a club house in New York City for the 
American Society of Engineers, and one 
of $750,000 to erect in Washington a head- 
quarters and office building for the Bureau 
of American Republics. In 1905 Mr. 
Carnegie created the Teacher's Pension 
Fund, giving to trustees $10,000,000 for 



the purpose, which carried joy and re- 
joicing to the faculties of many American 
colleges. By the deed of gift teachers 
in State institutions are exempted from 
its provisions, as, also, are those of any 
institution requiring that a majority of 
its trustees, faculty, or students should 
belong to any specified sect, or which im- 
pose in any way theological tests. Ex- 
cluding these classes it was found that 
ninety-three colleges and technical schools 
could derive benefits from this fund. 
These institutions have now about thirty- 
nine hundred professoi-s, whose salaries 




photo. Copyrighted by Rockwood, N. Y. 
ANDREW CAHNEGIE. 

aggregate $7,720,000; and the effort will 
be made to give to each professor upon 
retirement an annuity equivalent to one- 
half of his salary. 

We have endeavored to give some idea 
of the men and women who have been the 
chief actors in the great movement of 
beneficence that has so distinctly marked 
the last century of American life as 



"66 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



unique in a high sense, as well as a brief 
account and summary of their notable 
benefactions. We are prone to look upon 
the last quarter of the period ijarticularly 
as one of pure commercialism, character- 
ized by a waning of the nobler sentiments 
and aspirations that dominated the earlier 
era of more simple life. But the thought- 
ful regard for others that has led so many 




ROBERT C. WINTHROP. 

to give largely of their means that un- 
known thousands — yes, millions — may be- 
gin life in greater comfort and become 
better equipped for its strifes, is reassur- 
ing and prophetic of a more extended cul- 
tivation of the sympathetic spirit that 
makes all life brighter and more whole- 
some. As was stated in the beginning of 
this chapter, however, even the great sum- 
maries made of gifts covered only the 
known henef actions in excess of five 
thousand dollars. How many more 
millions have been given in smaller 
amounts, where the giver has more truly 
been given with the gift, is only known 
to Omniscience and the parties directly 
concerned. But surveying the whole 
movement, it is certainly an uplifting and 



cheerful oncj and touches the heart of the 
reader as it has moved the affections 
of the recipients of the blessings flow- 
ing from the beneficence of the givers. 
If one has read this record of noble 
generosity with any attention, he will 
have been impressed with the far- 
reaching influence of George Peabody's 
liberal impulses and acts. Many have 
acknowledged that their inspiration came 
directly from him, while the character of 
the gifts and the methods of giving of 
many others look back to the same source. 
President Daniel C. Gilman, who, as the 
head of Johns Hopkins University for 
twenty-five years, then as president of the 
Carnegie Institute in Washington, and 
as trustee of two or three of the great 
benefactors, has had the wide&t opiior- 
tunity to study and become acquainted 
with the motives and thoughts of great 
givers, has suggested an interesting 
point. In a brief paper on five benefac- 
tions, which appeared in the " Outlook," 
he said : " To the present writer it has 
always been a matter of curiosity to dis- 
cover who was the author of the instru- 
ments by which Mr. Peabody completed 
his endowments. It is his belief that 
much is due to the Hon. Robert 0. Win- 
throp, of Boston, whose wise counsels, un- 
usual foresight, and remarkable gifts of 
expression are shown in all the provisions 
laid down by Mr. Peabody. He was an 
admirable ally of that great benefactor. 
Freedom from political and ecclesiastical 
control, large liberty of action as to the 
methods to be employed, and confidence 
in the integrity, wisdom, and experience 
of the men selected to be trustees are 
among the chief characteristics, first, of 
Mr. Peabody's gifts, and then, of all that 
have followed in their train." 

If this be true, and no one can read the 
life of Mr. Peabody without being im- 
pressed with his close reliance upon Mr. 
Winthrop's advice and help, then a place 
high on the roll among the " princely 
givers " should be made for the cultivated, 
refined, eloquent. Christian gentleman, 
whom fifty years ago Boston and Mas- 
sachusetts ever delighted to honor, Robert 
C. Winthrop. 



LVII. 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



Polar Exploration Prosecuted for nearly Four Centuries. — Its Historj- Divided Naturally 
into Three Periods. — Characteristics of Each. — Importance of Ancient and Medireval Com- 
merce between Europe and the Orient. — Early Trade Routes. — Tlie " Wealth of the 
Indies." — Effect of the Mohammedan Conquests. — Europe Shut in upon Herself. — Birth of 
Polar Exploration in Commercial Distress that Followed. — Significance of Voyages of 
Columbus and ilagellan. — Beginning of the Search for a Northwest or Xortheast Passage 
to Cathay. — History of Early English and Dutch Ventures. — Well Determined Routes 
for Exploration at Beginning of Nineteenth Century. — Most noted Expeditions of the 
last Century. — Sir William Parry's Four Ventures. — Sir John Franklin's Notable 
Achievements and Melancholy Fate. — Great Number of Relief Expeditions. — Discovery 
of the Northwest Passage. — Amundsen and the Gjoa. — Exploits of the Three Noted- 
American Explorers, — Kane, Hayes and Hall. — Terrible Experience of the Crew of the 
Polaris.^— De Long and the Jeannette Expedition. — Nordenskifild Makes the Northeast 
Passage. — Nansen's Famous Drifting Expedition in the Frain. — Notable Expedition of 
the Duke of the Abruzzi. — Attempts to reach the Pole by Balloon and Air Ship. — An- 
nouncements of Cook and Peary that They had Reached the Pole. — Previous Experiences 
of Each. — The Voyage of the John R. Bradley. — Dr. Cook's Dash for the Pole. — His return 
and Reception. — The 'Roosevelt and Commander Peary's Remarkable Achievements. — 
Some Considerations Regarding the Controversj^ Over the Claims of the two Explorers. 
— Both Successful, though Dr. Cook first at the Pole. — Only Alternative. — Chronology of 
Arctic Exploration. 



" It is not what Man does which exalts him. but what Man would do," — Bhownino. 



OME thirty years ago an English historian of Arctic ven- 
tures, himself an explorer of considerable note, wrote as 
follows: " While scientific research is the actuating mo- 
tive now-a-days for expeditions toward the polar regions, 
it has not always been so. Various causes have impelled 
men in this work during past ages. The hopes of finding 
an open northwestern or northeastern route to the Orient, 
the formation of colonies, reported mineral discoveries, 
fisheries, and other commercial speculations have been the 
direct causes of hundreds of ventures. Now, the motive is 
nobler. We have no need for an icy route to Cathaia; we 
have no expectation of commercial advantage from the 
exploration of the North Pole. We simply hope once and 
forever to settle a scientific problem, or set of problems. 
If it is to be done, England will do it." The writer was then inspired with the en- 
thusiasm which possessed all Englishmen of the period over the preparations, already 
about completed, for the departure of the Alert and Discovery for the North Pole, — 
an expedition which was designed as the supreme effort of the greatest naval i>ower of 
the world, the " ruler of the seas," to surmount all obstacles, and " settle forever " aU 
the scientific problems connected with polar research, including the discovery of the 




768 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



Pole itself. This was a government un- 
dertaking, and represented tlie best ma- 
terial and the highest intelligence of the 
Royal Navy, as well as the accumulated 
experience of a long succession of re- 
nownel explorers of Arctic seas. It was 
the full flowering of a period of heroic 
endeavor that spanned fully three cen- 
turies. Every detail of the preparation 
was supervised by men of long experi- 
ence in frozen zones. The Alert was a 
Royal Navy steam sloop of seven hundred 
and fifty tons, and one hundred horse 
power, which had been greatly strengi^h- 
ened for this particular service. The 
Discovery was a powerful whaling-bark 
purchased by the government, and fitted 
with auxiliary steam power; while a third 
vessel, the Valorous, accompanied the 
other vessels to Greenland as a storeship 
and base of supplies. The chief com- 
mand of the expedition was given to the 
then Captain, later Admiral Sir George 
Nares; while the other one hundred and 
twenty officers and men who constituted 
the crews of the vessels were " selected 
from the very pick " of the whole British 
Navy. No expedition designed for polar 
research ever set out with a more com- 
plete and expensive equipment of every 
character than did this; and never did a 
a people place their entire confidence in 
the complete and absolute success of an 
imdertaking apparently with better rea- 
son than did the English people base their 
hopes on the ultimate success of this ven- 
ture. But when., after fifteen months of 
by no means fruitless investigations in 
the Arctic region, the Alert anchored at 
Queenstown, October 27, 1876, the first 
message her commander wired to the 
British Lords of the Admiralty contained 
these words : " The Pole is impracticable." 
During the week ending September fi, 
1909, however, each of two American ex- 
plorers announced to the President of the 
United States the results of their separate 
endeavor, in practically the same words: 
" I have the honor to place the North 
Pole at your disposal." 

Polar exploration has now been prose- 
cuted for nearly four hundred years. AH 



through these centuries expeditions have 
followetl each other with considerable 
regularity; yet there have been inten'ala 
when constant and repeated disasters have 
dulled the spirits of the keenest adven- 
turers. Hardly a decade has passed, how- 
ever, without one or more efforts being 
made to penetrate the frozen seas of the 
Arctic or the Antarctic zone; and the un- 
paralleled sufferings and hardships en- 
dured by survivors have seemed only to 
whet the appetites of hardy navigators 
for ever more dangerous enterprises. 
But, paradoxical as it ma.v seem, the far 
greater number of these ventures have not 
aimed at reaching the Pole, nor, appar- 
ently, have even had its existence espe- 
cially in mind. The history of Arctic ex- 
ploration divides itself quite naturally 
into three periods, — the first, from the 
early part of the sixteenth century to the 
nineteenth; the second, covering the first 
three quarters of the nineteenth century; 
and the third ending with the arrival at 
the coveted Pole of Cook in 190S, and 
Peary in 1909. The ventures of the first 
period were purely commercial, represent- 
ing efforts to find a route north of Amer- 
ica or Asia to the Orient. In studying 
the record of these expeditions one hardly 
finds a reference to the Pole itself, except 
as it may be mentioned in the sailing di- 
rections of a navigator, just as a reference 
would be made to any other point of lati- 
tude or longitude. During the second 
period the search for the northwest and 
northeast passages was continued and re- 
warded: but the interests of Science 
rather than of Commerce began to re- 
ceive the chief consideration, though 
towards the end of the period incidental 
reference is found to the determination 
to reach the Pole. In the third period, 
scientific research is still the nominal pur- 
pose of the numerous and costly expedi- 
tions, and the search for the Pole is in- 
cidental ; whereas, in fact, the moving 
consideration with the explorers them- 
selves has been a keen ambition to be the 
first at the Pole, with the claims of 
Science as incidental. The " Call of the 
Wild " has never been made to deaf ears; 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NOETH POLE — 1909. 



769 



and it is ■well that curiosity and ambition 
have at last been gratified, and the con- 
ditions existing at the " top of the world " 
have been investigated. The real situa- 
tion has been well summed up by one of 
the most distinguished of the recent ex- 
plorers, Nansen. " Of itself," be aays, 
" that mathematical point which makes 
the northern termination of the axis of 
our earth is of no more importance than 
any other point within the unknown polar 
area; but it is of much more importance 
that this particular point be reached, be- 
cause there clings about it in the imagina- 
tion of all mankind such fascination that 
till the Pole is discovered all Arctic re- 
search must be affected, if not overshad- 
owed, by the yearning to attain it. For 
this reason I want the Pole discovered, 
and it ought to be discovered, that we may 
get it out of the way, and leave a clear 
field for pure scientific exploration." Cer- 
tain it is, that the expeditions that have 
been truly fruitful in discoveries of bene- 
fit to humanity were those of the second 
period, with a few scientific explorations 
of the third. The othera have been spec- 
tacular, and have borne about the same 
relation to the true interests of polar ex- 
ploration that the races for the America's 
Cup bear to the real interests of ocean 
navigation. 

Much of the romance of early history 
is associated with the active trade rela- 
tions which existed for more than thirty 
centuries prior to the discovery of Amer- 
ica between the far East, and the lands 
bordering on the Mediterranean Sea. 
Tyre and Sidon were but the earlier repre- 
sentatives of this intercourse, and their 
names were for centuries the synonyms of 
commercial power and wealth; while the 
glories of Solomon's kingdom but reflected 
the advance in civilization which this 
commerce had fostered. Though this in- 
terchange of Oriental and Occidental 
products had gone on for hundreds of 
years, the conquests of Alexander the 
Great (B. 0. 336-323), extending to the 
far confines of India, greatly accelerated 
the means of intercourse and the facilities 
for trade. Very early three or four dis- 



tinct trade routes were established be- 
tween the Indian and Mediterranean 
ports, which were hardly varied for nearly 
two thousand years. Of these, one led 
from the Mediterranean across the Isth- 
mus of Suez, and thence to Ceylon and 
India by the Red Sea and Indian Ocean; 
a second reached the Indian Ocean by 
way of Antioch, Bagdad, and the Persian 
Gulf; a third followed the coast of Africa 
by land from Tangiers to Egypt, and 
thence by Damascus to Bagdad ; while the 
fourth, which from the seventh century of 
our era onward became the one most used 
by Christian nations, passed farther to 
the north through Asia Minor and south 
of the Caspian Sea, thus avoiding con- 
flict with the " infidel Mohammedans." 
Over these various routes vast caravans of 
merchants with their wares were con- 
stantly passing, bringing to Europe the 
riches of India, as well as of the far East, 
which Chinese traders brought to the 
Indian ports. The first three of these 
caravan routes have an interest apart 
from their commercial importance; as it 
was to traders traversing one of the first 
two on their way to Egypt that Joseph's 
brethren sold him, while the third route 
passed through Galilee and down the 
plain of Esdraelon to the Phoenician 
coast. Over it were constantly swarming 
the merchants of all nations and tongues 
to whom such frequent reference is made 
in the Gospels, and in the history of the 
very early Christian Church. 

After the rise of the Mohammedan to 
power the northern route became vastly 
the most important and rich cities grew 
up all along its course. During the tenth 
and eleventh centuries the Byzantine 
country was the richest in the world, and 
probably the most hig'hly civilized. " Con- 
stantinople," says Finlay, the Greek his- 
torian, speaking of this period, " was as 
much superior to every city in the civil- 
ized world, in wealth and commerce, as 
London now is to other capitals." 

But during all these centuries Europe 
could produce for its people little more 
than the bare necessities of life. Every- 
thing savoring of luxury, whether for 



I i 







FKOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWER. 



food, clothing, or house comforts and 
adornment, came over these trade routes 
from the Orient; and it is but natural 
that the eyes of the civilized world were 
largely tuni'ed toward its shores. As one 
has said : " Europe stood with her back 
to the Atlantic;" that was. as it was often 
described on the maps of tliat day. Mare 
Tenelirositm, the "Sea of Darkness." It 
was from the East alone that the people 
looked for light, comfort, and culture. 
There lay the spice islands ; the lands of 
ivory, of ebony, and of gold; of diamonds 
and pearls, sap]ihires and all preeious 
stones; of cotton and silks, and all the 
beautiful fabrics and fonns into which 
they were worked ; of fragrant gums, and 
all curious things a;nd curious arts. Into 
this land of faliled wealth, riches, and 
delight, no European was known to have 
entered before the thirteenth century; 
with the result that all scholars, geog- 
raphers, and merchants gave free rein to 
their imagination, picturing its .shores 
and streams as dotted with beautiful 
cities, all of whose buildings were of ivory 
and marble and the rarest s'ones. roofed 
with pure gold; while the very walks were 
paved with rare and costly gems. Even 
the apocalyptic vision of the New Jeru- 
salem which entranced the vision of the 
Seer of Patmos paled before the glory and 
beauty of the cities of Cathay and Ci- 
pango, as pictured by the credulous 
writers of the Middle Ages. 

But with the advent of the fifteenth 
century a blighting change threatened the 
commerce and civilization of Europe. 
The Turk had begun his advance through 
Asia Minor, and was slowly investing 
Constantinople; and with his advance 
came the obstruction of all means of com- 
munication with the far east by land, and 
the ruin of all the commerce of the great 
western trade centres. Europe was more 
shut in upon herself than ever before or 
since; and Polar Exploration had its birth 
in the commercial distress which followed. 
The eager attention of kings, statesmen, 
merchants, and navigators was directed 
toward the discovery of a new route to the 
Orient; and gradually the conviction grew 



that it must be sought over the western 
ocean, and not toward the east. Steadily 
the belief gained streng-th that by sailing 
due west across the Atlantic Ocean the 
land of spices and of gold would be 
reac'hed by a safe and easy route. Fortu- 
nately, too, a wrong conception of the 
geography of the earth favored this l>elief. 
For. thoug'h the geog-raphers had esti- 
mated the total circumference of the globe 
with a good deg-ree of exactness, they had 
so far over-estimated the extent of the 
land area from the west coast of Europe 
to the east coast of Asia as to reduce the 
breadth of ocean to be traversed in going 
west to Cathay to less than three thou- 
sand miles. 

It can hardly be questioned that the 
two most momentous voyages in the 
world's history were those of Columbus 
and Magellan. One revealed to an un- 
suspecting world the existence of a new 
continent ; the other demon.strated beyond 
question the sphericity of the earth, and 
that in the southern seas, at least, one 
sailing continuously in an easterly or 
westerly direction must surely arrive at 
the point of his departure. As is well 
known Columbus died in the belief that 
he had found the new route to the Indies; 
and it was not until in l.'il2 Balboa, from 
a " peak in Darien," discovered the broad 
Pacific Ocean, that the truth began to 
dawn upon the consciousness of Europe 
that a new continent, and not Cathay, had 
been reached, and that the way to the 
coveted isles of spice and of pearls must 
be sought anew. In 1.577-RO, the globe 
was circumnavigated a second time by Sir 
Francis Drake. Naturally, therefore, 
when the full meaning of Magellan's and 
Drake's achievements was realized, geog- 
raphers and merchants began to draw the 
inference that, if both the new continent 
and Africa were surrounded at the south 
by navigable seas, it was undoubtedly true 
that the same conditions existed at the 
north; and it was not long before the 
search of three centuries for a Northwest 
or Northeast Passage to Cathay and Ci- 
pango (Japan) began. 

As an extended chronological record of 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



771 



arctic exploration is presentetl at the end 
of this chapter, no attempt will be made 
in our limited space to ^ve detailed 
accounts of more than the especially 
notable voyages of the second and third 
periods, covering practically the last one 
Inmdred years, those being selected 
which most conspicuously illustrate the 
sublime courage and heroic endurance of 
the men who have, step by step, disclosed 
the secrets of the Polar regions. But to 
properly appreciate any narrative of the 
conquests achieved by these hardy ad- 
venturers, one should endeavor to get 
some clear idea of the conditions tliat 
really confronted them. Looking at 
modem maps one sees the bays, straits, 
islands, and capes of what is now known 
as British North America, of Greenland, 
and of northern Europe and Asia, all 
clearly indicated, their connections and 
bearings shown, and the latitude and 
longitude of each locality definitely 
marked. The so-called Arctic Explorers 
of the present generation set out in large, 
powerful, completely and comfortably fur- 
nished and equipped steam vessels, to ex- 
plore waters and lands that have all been 
mapped out for them and charted, or, at 
least, have been so thoroughly investigated 
as to enable one to judge intelligently of 
the conditions and obstacles that must be 
encountered and overcome in any particu- 
lar region, at any given season of the year. 
But when the inquisitive navigators of 
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries 
started out to explore these regions, in 
their little cockle-shells hardly larger than 
the tenders of the modern vessels, ahso- 
hitely notliing was Icnown of the entire 
area north of Newfoundland on the east, 
or of Columbia river on the west coast of 
America. The same was true of all the 
region north of the mainland of Europe 
and Asda. The few majw and charts that 
were in use simply misled those who 
trusted to them in every case, as all their 
drawings and data were imaginary and 
bore no relation to the conditions that 
were found to exist, as successive expedi- 
tions gradually opened up the country. 
Each explorer worked upon the basis of 



the few facts which his predecessors had 
established; and each in turn "added to 
the known something from the unknown." 
But the modern maps of North America 
and of Asia could not be outlined as to 
their northern lands and waters for nearly 
three centuries after the explorations 
chronicled here began. It is necessary, 
also, that one should attempt to realize the 
immense distances and areas that the 
plans of these daring adventurers em- 
braced. Greenland, for example, which 
has stood across the path of so many ex- 
plorers, is more than 1500 miles long, and 
over 600 miles wide. The distance from 
its east coast to Bering Strait is more 
than 4000 miles; while from the southern 
end of Hudson Bay to the northern ex- 
tremity of Grinncll Land is upwards of 
2000 miles. A roughly drawn parallelo- 
gram, measuring 2500 miles from north 
to south, and 3000 miles from east to 
west, with an extension of another thou- 
sand miles of its northern line, would 
indicate approximately the area within 
which North American exploration has 
been conducted. Nor has the search for 
the Northeast Passage been a less arduous 
undertaking. From North Cape, the ex- 
treme northerly point of Europe to the 
eastern shore of Kamchatka, or to Bering 
Strait, the distance is more than 5000 
miles; while the northern cape of Siberia 
projects farther into the Arctic region, 
about 78° lat., than had been reached by 
more than a half dozen expeditions prior 
to the last quarter of the nineteenth cen- 
tury. Only by keeping such facts as these 
somewhat clearly in mind can one value 
rightly the magnificent courage and en- 
terprise of the men who undertook these 
ventures, or intelligently sympathize with 
them in their indescribable sufferings, and 
dismal and heartbreaking failures. 

The expeditions that have been notably 
successful in achieving beneficent results 
during the last century have been those 
of Parry, Franklin, Kane, McClure, 
Hayes, Hall, Nordcnskiokl, Greely, Nan- 
sen, Amundsen, Due d'Abruzzi, and Peary. 
All of these have played distinguished 
parts in determining the course of the 



772 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



long soufflit northern passajrcs to the East, 
in the collection and classification of valu- 
able scientific data, in mapping and chart- 
ing hitherto unknown lands and seas, and 
in settling beyond question the most avail- 
able routes for Arctic exploration, and the 
best methods of meeting and overcoming 
the various obstacles that must be en- 
countered. The expeditions that have 
become most impressed upon the popular 
mind, however, because of their unique 
and original methods, or on account of 
the unparalleled sufferings and hardships 
endured, have been those of Franklin, 
Hall (the Polaris), De Long (the Jean- 
nette), Andree, and Nansen (the Fram). 
William Edward Parry, who became 
one of the most persistent and, in many 



closing the bottom of the Sound," though 
seen by few or none in the ship except 
himself. These he named Croker Moun- 
tains, and they have served to furnish one 
of the very few humorous features of 
Arctic exploration. Without attempting 
to verify the existence of these mountains. 
Ross put about, and returned to England. 
The following year, 1819, Parry sailed as 
commander of an expedition, in the 
Hecla, with Lieut. Liddon, as second in 
command, on the Griper. Their aim was 
the common one of discovering the elusive 
Noi-thwest Passage, and to this end they 
entered Lancaster Sound, and, sailing 
directly over the mountains seen by Ross 
the year before, reached the south side of 
Melville Island, where the ships were 




IN WINTER 

respects, one of the most successful ex- 
plorers, was born in 1790, and at the early 
age of thirteen entered the navy. During 
the war of 1812 he served on the Ameri- 
can coast, and in 1818 made his first Arc- 
tic voyage under Captain Ross. The lat- 
ter rendered a marked service to his fol- 
lowers by confirming the accuracy of 
Baffin's survey of the bay bearing his 
name. But while entering Lancaster 
Sound, Ross was arrested, as is reported, 
" by a vision of a range of mountains 



QUARTERS. 

caught in the ice, and they were forced to 
establish winter quarters. But this one 
season's work had well nigh demonstrated 
the existence of the passage they were in 
search of, as reference to a large map or 
globe will clearly show. Winter Harbor, 
where the ships were locked in, was nearl.v 
at the westerly limit of the many lands 
and islands that lie between Baifiii Bay 
and the broad expanse of ocean that 
stretches away beyond Bering Strait. 
But it was late in August of the follow- 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



/ 1, 



ing year before the ships were released 
from the ice, when it was determined to re- 
trace their course and return to Eng-land. 
This expedition reached a point farther 
west within the Arctic Circle than had 
been attained by any other explorer, and 
so was awarded the prize of £5000 which 
the English government had promised. 
In 1821, and ag'ain in 1824, Parry led 
other expeditions into the same regions, 
discovering new channels and straits, 
which ultimately made possible the south- 
erly route to the west, that, when outlined 
by the work of several explorers, became 
the accepted Northwest Passage. In 1827 
Parry made his fourth, and in many ways 
his most celebrated, attack vipon the Polar 
seas. On this venture he planned to sup- 
plement the use of his vessel by t.he use of 
small boats and sledges, — the first at- 
tempt at a new inethod of exploration that 
has since become universal. In the HerJa 
he reached a safe haven in Spitzbergen on 
June 18, and on the 22d set out on lii-» 
journey in small boats, provisioned for 
seventy-one days. With a few com- 
panions he reached the ice after covering 
about eighty miles, when the boats were 
transferred to runners, and the advance 
Continued. But the smooth ice they had 
been led to expect by many reports did 
not materialize; and the greatest speed 
they could attain was nine or ten miles 
in a day, being constantly delayed by 
huge ice hummocks, and soft snow. The 
party traveled by night entirely, when 
the glare of the sun on the snow was less 
blinding, and when its heat did not soften 
the snow as at mid-day. The slow prog- 
ress made forced him to abandon all idea 
of reaching the Pole, though after a few 
days smoother ice was gained. The effort 
was then to reach the " farthest north," 
which was eventually attained at 82° 45', 
an altitude not gained by any other ex- 
plorer for nearly fifty years. He had 
thus placed to his credit the record both 
for the " farthest west," and " farthest 
north." In the meantime, however, the 
prevailing winds changed, and Parry dis- 
covered that however many miles they 
covered each day, they did not get farther 



north, as the ice was bearing them in the 
opjx)site direction faster than they could 
go forward. In fact, a summary of their 
record showed that though they had 
traveled more than three hundred miles 
over the rough ice and through half 
frozen water they had advanced but about 
one hundred and seventy miles. He was, 
therefore, forced to abandon the quest and 
return. In recognition of his distin- 
guished service, Parry was knighted in 
1829, arid in 1832 was made a Ilear- 
Admiral in the Royal Navj'. 




SIB JOHN FRANKLIN. 

Captain, or as he is more commonly 
known. Sir John Franklin had a long and 
varied experience as a seaman in every 
part of the world before he entered upon 
his career of Arctic exploration. As his 
biographer says : " Like Cook, Dampier, 
and Nelson, his first essay was on board a 
merchant ship (into which he had been 
sent to disgust him of the sea), and like 
them the hardships of a sailor's life were 
more than counterbalanced in his opinion 
by the charms of its unceasing change, 
novelty, and excitement." At the age of 
fourteen, in 1800, he entered the Royal 
Navy as a petty officer, participating the 
following year in the famous sea-fight 
at Copenhagen; and in 1806, as midship- 



774 



FKOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



man on the Bellerophon, lie took part in 
the battle of Trafalgar. During the fol- 
lowing: years he served chiefly in the 
Southern seas and the Pacific Ocean. 
Though his fame rests mainly upon his last 
expedition, his greatest results as an ex- 
plorer were achieved on his land journeys 
in 1819-22. and 1S2.5-27. Leaving York 
Factory, the Hudson's Bav Company post 
at the mouth of the Nelson River, in Sep- 
tember, 1819, his party wintered at Fort 
Enterprise. The ice did not break up in 
the Coppermine River until June, when 
the party descended it in birch canoes to 
the Arctic Sea, which they found com- 
paratively free of ice. Turning to the 
east, the shores of a great bay, which 
Franklin named " George the Fourth's 
Coronation Ba.v," were ex]ilored, the party 
reaching a cape at 110° W. longitude, 
which was named Point Tumagain. 
From this time until they arrived at their 
old quarters at Fort Enterprise, and 
secured relief from Chipewyan, the suffer- 
ings of the party defy description. Day 
after day, without food, with a tejni>era- 
ture of from 30° to 50° below zero, they 
endured tortures worse than death. 
Mosses, old boots, leather clothing, were 
their only subsistence for days. But even 
under such adverse conditions, more than 
.'JSOO miles had been covered by the part.v 
before they again reached York Factory, 
and a very important land area explored, 
as well as one of the important parts of 
what was to prove the true course of the 
Northwest Passage determined. 

One would suppose that the hardiest 
adventurers would have been content with 
these experiences. But in July 1825, 
Franklin, Dr. Richardson, and Back, with 
Kendall and Drummond, new members of 
the part.v, again arrived at Chipewyan, 
and at once proceeded to Great Bear 
Lake, where the.y wintered. In the Spring 
the.y descended the Mackenzie river about 
1.100 miles to the sea. Franklin then took 
a westward course, while Dr. Richardson, 
with Kendall, went to the east. Frank- 
lin explored the coast for more than four 
hundred miles, until stopped by an im- 
mense barrier of rock and ice, which he 



named Return Reef. At the very time 
that Franklin and his party were at Re- 
turn Reef, Captain Beeehey, in the Blos- 
som, who had been sent out to supplement 
Franklin's work, was at Point Barrow, 
only one hundred and forty miles farther 
west. Beeehey had entered the Arctic 
Ocean through Bering Strait. Leaving 
Return Reef, Franklin made his way back 
to Great Bear Lalie, where Dr. Richardson 
and his party soon joined him, after hav- 
ing explored the coast east as far as the 
Coppermine river, thus uniting the dis- 
tances explored by the Franklin parties on 
their two expeditions. 

Li 1845 the British Admiralty deter- 
mined to make one more effort to find the 
Northwest Passage. Two vessels, the Ere- 
hiis and Terror, were accordingly fitted 
out, furnished with auxiliary steam power, 
and provisioned for three years. The com- 
mand was given to Sir John Franklin, 
then about sixty years of age. The expe- 
dition sailed May 19, and reached Disco, 
on the west coast of Greenland, early in 
July. On the 26th of July the fleet was 
sighted by a whaler, after which every 
trace of the party was lost. For nearly two 
years no fears were entertained as to their 
safety. Then, however, English naval au- 
thorities, many of whom had served in the 
polar seas, concluded that the vessels were 
probably fast in the ice of Melville Sound, 
and movements were begun to rescue them. 
More than forty relief and search expe- 
ditions were sent out during the next 
fifteen years, only two or three of them 
finding any clues, or securing any evi- 
dence of the fate of the Franklin party. 
In 1853 Dr. Rae set out in the service of 
the Hudson's Bay Company, and the fol- 
lowing year incidentally learned from a 
party of Esquimaux that six years before 
about forty white men were seen dragging 
a boat and sledges, who made signs to 
indicate that their vessels had been 
crushed in the ice, and that they were in 
search of a place where they would find 
deer, as their provisions were exhausted 
and they were starving. Later, the 
natives reported, they found more than 
thirty bodies, and some graves, on the 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



775 



mainland. Dr. Rae also succeeded in se- 
curing many relics from the Esquimaux, 
silver plate and other things that were 
known to have been in possession of the 
officers of Franklin's expedition. This re- 
port, and the evidence of the relics Dr. 
Rae brought back, was so conclusive that 
the English nation was convinced as to 
the fate of the great explorer and his com- 
panions, and a reward of £10,000 that had 
been long promised to any who should 
furnish certain evidence of the fate of 
the expedition, was given to Dr. Rae and 
his party. 

Notwithstanding this discovery, how- 
ever, expeditions continued to be sent out, 
in the hope that the remainder of Frank- 
lin's much larger force might yet be found 
alive. The most successful of these was 
the one organized through the efforts of 
Lady Franklin, which sailed from Eng- 
land in June, 1857, in the Fox, under the 
command of Captain McClintock. Early 
in the fall the vessel was caught in pack 
ice and drifted in it for 242 days, in 
constant danger of being crushed. On 
April 24 of the following year a storm 
broke up the ice, and the Fox was re- 
leased', and repaired on the Greenland 
coast. McClintock then pushed into and 
carefully examined Eclipse Sound, Peel 
Strait, Regent's Inlet, and Bellot Strait, 
where he was obliged to go into winter 
quarters. In February he was able to 
send out sledge parties in different direc- 
tions. Little by little further evidence of 
the loss of the Franklin party was dis- 
covered; and it was not long before one 
of the sledge parties found important rec- 
ords of the expedition at Point Victory, 
on King William Land. One item of the 
record read as follows : " April 2.5, 1848- 
H. M. Ships Terror and Erehus were de- 
serted on 22 April, five leagues N. W. of 
this, having been beset since 12th Sep- 
tember, 1S46. The officers and crews, con- 
sisting of 105 souls, under command of 
Captain F. R. Crozier, landed here in lat. 
69° 37' N., long. 98° 41' W. Sir John 
Franklin died on the 11th June, 1847, 
and the total loss by deaths in the ex- 
pedition has been to this date, nine offi- 



cers and fifteen men." This report was 
signed by Captains S. Crozier and Fitz- 
james. Below, a supplementary line was 
added: "And start to-morrow, 26th, for 
Back's Fish River." On that melancholy 
journey, one by one they fell by the way, 
and, as an Esquimau reported, " As they 
fell, they died." Not one survived to tell 
the tale of their exploits, nor of their 
sufferings. It is most interesting to note, 
however, that the point at which the 
vessels foundered was not far from the 
identical spot, Point Turnagain, which 




A CONSTANT COMPANION. 

Franklin had reached on his first land ex- 
pedition; so that he was, in reality, the 
first discoverer of the Northwest Passage, 
though he did not live to report his dis- 
coveries, and to enjoy the honors that 
were his due. His fame has, however, en- 
dured; and even down to the present day 
it is unquestionably true that when one 
speaks of, or discusses, Arctic exploration, 
the name and distinguished services of 
Franklin first come to mind. 

Of the twelve vessels sent out from 
England in 1850 to search for traces of 
the Franklin party, two, — the Investi- 
gator, under command of Captain Mc- 
Clure, and the Enterprise, Captain Col- 
linson, — were despatched by way of the 
Pacific Ocean and Bering Strait. In 
1852, among the six sent out were the 
Resolute and the North Star. These 
entered the Arctic Archipelago through 
Lancaster Sound, then proceeding through 
Barrow Strait to Melville Island. Im- 
mediately upon going into winter quarters 



77(5 



FROM COLOXY TO WORLD POWER. 



at Dealy Island, on the south side of 
Melville Island, parties were sent out 
from the Resolute to deposit provisions at 
pertain points for the use of sledge par- 
ties the following spring. One of these 
parties found at Winter Harhor, where 
Parry made his winter quarters in 1819, 
records left by Captain McClure, which 
showed that in April 18.51, he. with his 
vessel, was in Mercy Bay, juat across 
Banks Strait, thus demonstrating that the 
discovery of the Northwest Passage had 
been completed, after more than three cen- 
turies of heroic endeavor. Of course, all 
were ignorant of what Franklin had ac- 
complished. The two discoveries, however, 
in no way conflicted, as Franklin's route 
was to the east and south of Prince Al- 
bert Land and Banks Land, and much 
more circuitous; though if either had 
been practicable for navigation, the south- 
erly would have been less obstructed by 
ice as a rule than the other, as the experi- 
ence of Amundsen later proved. Mc- 
Clure's course had been very direct from 
Bering Strait to Melville Island, whore 
he reached from the east the " farthest 
west " attained by Parry. The Investiga- 
tor was held fast in the ic« for two years. 
when, in 1853, assistance reached McClure 
from the Resolute. Owing to the unusual 
ice conditions both vessels had to be alian- 
doned, and their officers ajid crews re- 
turned to England the following year on 
the North Star, McClure and his crew 
thus being the first men to pass through 
Bering Strait, traverse the Northern 
Sounds and Straits, and reach the Atlan- 
tic Ocean through Baffin Bay. This ac- 
complishment of the Northwest Passage 
was officially recognized by the English 
government by the bestowal upon Mc- 
Clure and his companions of the bounty 
of £10,000 which had been pledged for 
this purpose. 

The first vessel, however, to make the 
entire Northwest Passage was the little 
Norwegian fishing smack, the Gjoa, under 
command of Roald Amundsen. The Ojoa 
was only seventy feet long, sixteen feet 
beam, and of forty-seven tons burden. 



She was cutter-rigged, and a small pe- 
troleum engine furnished auxiliary power. 
Amundsen's primary object was scientific 
observation and investigation, though ho 
had in mind the making of the North- 
west Passage if the conditions should be 
auspicious, just as, in 1907, Dr. Cook's ex- 
pedition was fitted out primarily for hunt- 
ing, but with an eye to a dash for the 
Pole if conditions were favorable. Leav- 
ing Christiania, Norway, June 16. 1903, 
the little Gjoa passed from Baffin Bay 
through Lancaster Sound to Beechey Is- 
land, thence through Barrow Strait and 
Peel Sound, to the west of Boothia Pe- 
ninsula, and then through Ross Strait to 
the east of King William Land, where 
she found a safe haven in Gjoa Harbor 
on the south side of King William Land, 
September 17, 1903. As illustrating how 
successive explorers have built upon the 
observations of their predecessors, it is 
interesting to note that Amundsen was 
chiefly influenced in his choice of tho 
course to the east of King William Land 
by the observation of McClintock, some 
fifty years before, that " perhaps some 
future voyager, profiting by the experience 
acquired by the Franklin expedition, may 
succeed by this [the easterly] route in 
carrying his ship from sea to sea." It 
will be remembered that the Erehus and 
Terror, Franklin's vessels, were held two 
years in the ice and finally had to be 
abandoned, in Victoria Strait to the west 
of King William Land. As one of the 
chief aims of Amundsen was again to de- 
termine the location of the Magnetic Pole 
which had not been attempted since it 
was first established by Ross in 1831, he 
went into winter quarters in Gjoa Harbor, 
where he remained for two years, con- 
ducting all the time the most careful 
scientific experiments and researches. 
This work was begun November 2, 1903, 
and continued by a great number of 
sledge journeys to various points until 
August 13, 1905. The Gjoa had traversed 
770 miles from Baffin Bay, leaving but 760 
to be covered before reaching Cape Bath- 
urst and the open sea. — technically the 
end of the Northwest Passage. Leaving 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



77 



(ijoa Harbor, Amundsen entered Simpson 
Strait, and thence passing through Vic- 
toria Strait, Dease Inlet, Franklin's 
"Coronation Bay," and Dolphin and Union 
Straits, on August 20. east of Cape Bath- 
urst, lie fell in ■with the first American 
whaler. Proceeding on his course, an ac- 
cident to the Gjoa's propeller forced him 
to winter at King Point, on the Yukon 
coast. There he took a sledge and reached 
Eagle City, Alaska, December 12, 1905, 
from whence he sent out to the world the 
news of his remarkable voyage; and re- 
turning to the Gjoa, he passed on west 
through Bering Strait to San Francisco, 
the following spring. 

All things considered, this was imques- 
tionably the most remarkable and success- 
ful Polar voyage ever made. Amundsen's 
vessel was hardly as large as the twentieth 
century racing sloop yachts, and he had 
in his party only nine men, including the 
scientific investigators. Dashes for the 
Pole are spectacular, and appeal to the 
popular mind; but one such voyage as 
Amundsen's far outweighs in value all 
the attempts that have been made to reach 
the " top of the world." He possessed the 
true scientific spirit, as well as the valor 
and daring of the old Norse sea-kings. 
But there was nothing theatrical in his 
make up. No arctic clubs backed him, nor 
did any press agents whet the popular 
imagination with glowing accounts of 
what he would accomplish. He was not 
a lime-light explorer, and no costly expe- 
ditions had to be sent out each year to 
rescue him. Yet it is doubtful whether 
any other expedition in the whole history 
of Polar exploration has been more truly 
successful in every sense of the word ; and 
it is certain that few names will ulti- 
mately stand higher on the long roll of 
explorers than Amundsen's. 

Aside from his purely scientific investi- 
gations, his long stay in Gjoa Harbor en- 
abled Amundsen to determine many 
things of value to succeeding navigators, 
as well as of popular interest. It was 
demonstrated, for example, that the big 
game is migratory, passing over the frozen 
channels and straits from land to land. 



and that the Esquimaux follow it in its 
migrations. It was on King Williani 
Land that Franklin's party perished by 
starvation because no game could be 
foiuid. Yet Amundsen's little company 
killed in one month, October, 1903, one 
hundred deer, shortly after which the 
Esquimaux appeared. It was shown, too, 
tiiat the climatic changes from season to 
season are very marked. The winter of 
1903^ was clear and vei-y cold, the aver- 
age temperature for February being 41° 
below zero, while a record of 79° below 
zero was made. During that winter the sea 
ice attained a thickness of from twelve to 
thirteen feet. The winter of 1904—5 was, 
however, much milder, the lowest tem- 
perature recorded being 49° below zero, 
while the thickness of the ice rarely 
reached six feet. 

After nearly four centuries of strenu- 
ous eiforts one vessel had at last made 
the northwest passage, and the quest of 
hundreds of brave and hardy men had 
been gained. In the meantime a like 
success had attended the efforts of an- 
other Scandinavian to make the North- 
east Passage. The expedition of Norden- 
skiold was a much more pretentious one 
than tliat of Amundsen. Twenty thou- 
sand pounds were subscribed to further 
his work, and he had the active support 
of the Swedish government. The Vega, a 
full rigged bark of three hundred tons 
register, with engines of sixty horse 
power, was bought and especially fitted 
out for the voyage, and provisioned for 
two years. The party consisted of nine 
officers, including two botanists, a zoolo- 
gist, and an astronomer, and eighteen 
seamen, selected from the best material of 
the Swedish navy. Leaving Gothenberg 
July 4, 1878, the Yega began her long 
voyage, accompanied by three other ves- 
sels, which were to make attempts to 
enter the Siberian rivers. On the 19th 
the party reached the most northerly point 
of the eastern hemisphere, variously called 
Cape Chelynskin, Cape Severo, and North 
East Cape. But little serious ice inter- 
ference was encountered through the 
summer, and at various points along the 



778 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



coast landings were made to prosecute 
scientific researcli. These delays resulted 
most unfortunately, as at the end of Sep- 
tember the atmospheric conditions sud- 
denly changed, and the Vega was caught 
in the ice at a distance of less than one 
hundred and fifty miles from Bering 
Strait, where she was forced to remain 
until the following year. After 264 days' 
detention in the ice, on the ISth of July, 
ISVO. the vessel was released, and passed 
through Bering Strait two days later, thus 
having made for the first time the com- 
plete northeast passage; and after cross- 
ing to the American shore, where two or 
three islands were visited, and scien- 
tific investigations made, on the 22d of 
September the battered craft dropped her 
anchor in the harbor of Yokohama, and 
news of Nordenskiold's great achievement 
was proclaimed to the civilized world. It 
seems, however, like the irony of fate that, 
just as the routes were determined which 
had been so eagerly sought for by gener- 
ations of heroic men, the fast ocean steam- 
ships and great transcontinental railroad 
systems should have made their discovers^ 
of no account, although it is probable that 
under no circumstances could these Arc- 
tic highways ever have possessed any 
commercial value. 

It was not until 18.50 that the Fnited 
States began to engage actively in Arctic 
exploration, and then it was through the 
interest of one of its broad-minded mer- 
chant princes in the fate of Sir John 
Franklin. Henry Grinnell was born in 
New Bedford in 1800, and passed his 
>outh in that bustling centre of Arctic 
commerce, the headquarters of the great 
whale fishing industry. The adventures 
of the hardy whalers naturally aroused 
his enthusiasm, and he retained through- 
out his life an active and practical inter- 
est in all that concerned the welfare of 
sea-faring men. Moving to New York in 
1818, with his brothers he engaged in 
the commission and whale-oil business, 
rapidly accumulating a large fortune. 
The three most notable Polar expe- 
ditions of the third quarter of the last 
century were all from the United States, 



and all were made possible by the liberal- 
ity of Mr. Grinnell. In 1850 he assumed 
the entire expense of the expedition sent 
out to search for Franklin, with Lieut. 
Dellaven as commander, and Dr. E. K. 
Kane, as surgeon and naturalist. Apart 
from discovering the land to which the 
name of the generous patron of the ex- 
pedition was given, little was accom- 
plished by this party. But in 1853 Mr. 
Grinnell again financed an expedition, 
with material aid from George Peabody, 
of London, which was placed under the 
command of Dr. Kane. This proved to be 
one of the most noteworthy undertakings 
in the whole history of Polar exploration. 
It was the first of such expeditions to 
start out with the deliberate purpose of 
remaining one, two, or more years in the 
Arctic regions, and was also the earli- 
est to study the habits of the Esquimaux, 
and to rely upon them for aid in the 
prosecution of their work. Dr. Kane was 
also the first to use dogs in sledge work, 
the sledges of previous expeditions having 
been drawn by the members of the parties 
themselves. Dr. I. I. Hayes accompanied 
Captain Kane as surgeon and naturalist. 
Not only did this expedition arouse an 
interest in that x>eculiar people, who have 
ever since been of great service to Kane's 
successors in Arctic work, but it also 
added greatly to the knowledge of the 
geography of the northern lands. Its 
scientific obseiwations were considered 
more valuable than those of any previous 
exjiedition. Dr. Kane and his party were 
given Arctic medals by vote of the Con- 
gress of the United States, and the 
Queen's medal was presented to all. while 
the leader was honored by the British and 
French Geographical Societies. 

The mantle of Dr. Kane fell upon con- 
secrated shoulders, and his countrymen 
found another worthy representative, 
when Dr. I. I. Hayes took up his former 
leader's work. Again Mr. Grinnell 
stepped into the breach, and made it pos- 
sible for Dr. Hayes to purchase the United 
States, a schooner of one hundred and 
thirty tons, in which, with a party of 
eighteen, he sailed from Boston, July 6, 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE- 



■1909. 



779 



1860. While with Dr. Kane in Kane 
Basin, Dr. Hayes had convinced himself 
that they were then at the very entrance 
to an open Polar Sea ; and it was now his 
determination to push farther North, 
enter that sea, and try to reach the Pole. 
But the ice did not admit of his getting 



exhaustive search that had been made, he 
firmly believed that some of the Franklin 
party were still alive; and in 1800 his 
enthusiasm led Mr. Grinnell and others to 
give him a meagre support, wliieh enabled 
him to spend two years in a fruitless 
search for survivors. The knowledge he 




ESQUIMAU WOMEN AND CHILDREN. 



beyond Etah, where the party passed the 
winter. From this point he made an ex- 
ceedingly hazardous and rough sled jour- 
ney across the Sound to Grinnell Land, 
and passed north to 81° .35', from whence 
he believed he again looked out upon the 
Polar Sea. But he and his companions 
were too weak to go farther, and barely 
survived to reach the ship again, which 
returned to the United States the follow- 
ing summer. 

Captain Charles F. Hall completes the 
trio of famous American explorers of the 
second period, and hia experience was 
more varied and protracted than that of 
all his predecessors. Notwithstanding the 



gained of the language and habits of Es- 
quimaux, however, proved most valuable. 
On a second expedition Hall lived with 
the Innuits, as he generally calls them, 
five years, becoming more familiar with 
them, and with their Arctic life, than any 
other white man has ever become. So 
great knowledge of the conditions exist- 
ing in the Far North did he gain that 
upon his return to the United States, in 
1879, he was accorded the highest honors; 
and Congress vei-y early made an appro- 
Ijriation for a national expedition to be 
placed under Hall's command. Before 
starting on this third voyage Hall said: 
" I have demonstrated in my own person 



780 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



that wiiite men can live, with no extra- 
nrdinary snflFerings, for years in the 
depths of the Arctic regions. I have lived 
there for years, and can teach my associ- 
ates liow to do so. Upon this new ex- 
pedition I shall be amply provided with 
all means for a tlioroug-h exploration. . . 
Thus abundantly supplied, and aideil l)y 
my own experience of more than ten 
years, T tlilnk I shall be able to accomplish 
sometliins worthy of the means placed at 
my disposal." 

On this third expedition Hall's party 
numbered thirty-three, and they sailed 
from New London, on the Polaris, July 3, 
1871. This vessel had been esijeeially 
strengthened and fitted out by the Navy 
Department, and was the first steamship 
to attempt to reach the Polar Sea. From 
the start all conditions were most favor- 
able, and Hall was aide without serious 
opposition to pass through Smith Sound, 
Kane Basin, Kennedy Channel, and ILill 
Basin, into a previously unexplored strait, 
which he named Robeson Channel, in 
honor of tlie then Secretary of the Navy, 
and thence into the Arctic Ocean. On 
August 30. however, his progress was 
stopped by heavy pack-ice in 82° 10' lati- 
tude, at a higher point than had ever 
before been reached by a vessel. In en- 
deavoring to return, the Polaris was seized 
b.y pack-ice and carried fifty miles south, 
where the expedition wintered in Thank 
God Harbor. After establishing winter 
quarters Hall set out on a sledge journey, 
reaching Cape Brevoort, from which he 
sighted the north shore of what is now 
known as Grant Land. Shortly after his 
return Hall was stricken with apoplexy, 
and, dying November 8th, he was buried 
among the iciPcliffs. Few explorers have 
accomplished so much with such limited 
means as did Captain Hall. His life 
among the Esquimaux had endeared him 
to them, and the uniform kindness Kane, 
Hayes, and Hall ever showed them, es- 
tablished a warm place in their hearts for 
American explorers. Of the value of his 
scientific work, one not over generous of 
praise for the achievements of others. 
Commander Peary, has said: " The geo- 



graphical results of this expedition were 
very important. Hall was the first civil- 
ized man to look east and west along the 
northern shores of Greenland and Grin- 
nell Land, to reveal Hall Basin and Robe- 
son Channel, and to see the ocean beyond 
tliem. His surprising voyage, and sup- 
posed sighting of land far to the north, 
aroused renewed interest in this [the 
Smith Sound] route." But his invalua- 
ble service in studying the character and 
habits of the Esquimaux, and in gaining 
their friend^ihip and confidence, has not 
been so frankly acknowledged by some of 
his successors, who have placed to their 
sole credit results that were made possi- 
ble chiefly by Hall's wise, humane, and 
Christian conduct and activities. His 
British brethem were more generous 
when, in 1876, the Nares E.xpcdition 
placed over Hall's grave a stone, with an 
epitaph proclaiming him as one " who 
sacrificed his life in the advancement of 
Science, and who has. by his experience, 
benefited us, his followers." 

Early in the autumn following Captain 
Hall's death. Captain Buddington, the 
.'ailing master of the Polaris, upon whom 
the command of the exjiedition had de- 
volved, attempted to steam south, but the 
vessel was caught in pack-ice and slowly 
drifted out of Smith Sound. Wliile oflF 
Northumberland Island a terrible storm 
disrupted the pack, and the vessel neai-ly 
foundered. A part of the supplies and 
a boat had already l>e^n transferred from 
the ship to the ice floe, where Captain 
Tyson and eighteen men were at work, 
when they were suddenly separated from 
the vessel. Then began a drift of one 
hundred and ninety days, the party being 
exposed to all the horrors of the long 
winter night on a floating field of ice. 
Down through Bafiin Bay, Davis Strait, 
and out into the Atlantic they slowly 
drifted, until, when over fifteen hundred 
miles had been covered, the party was 
rescued off Labrador on April 30, 1873. 
by the whaler Tigress. The limits of this 
chapter do not admit of any detailed ac- 
count of this most marvelous experience 
in the whole story of Polar exploration. 



THE COXQUEST OF THE XORTH POLE — 1909. 



781 



and of the miraculous escape, after terri- 
ble suffering's from exposure and hunger, 
of the entire party. Not only was there 
not a death while they were on the ice, but 
their original number was increased by 
the birth of an Esquimau baby. The 
fourteen men who remained on the Polaris 
wore forced to abandon her near Littleton 
Island. In the spring- they attempted to 
reach Uppemavik in small boats, and 
were rescued off Cape York by a whaling 
vessel. 

Thus ended a most remarkable expedi- 
tion, whether viewed from the standpoint 
of its achievements, or of its unique and 
varied experiences. When the survivors 
had returned to the United States, and 
the public became familiar with their in- 
dividual stories, the criticism of Captain 
Budding-ton's actions was sharp and hos- 
tile. Many believed that Captain Hall 
had not died a natural death; and Captain 
Tyson and his companions on the ice 
tloe were certain that Buddington had in- 
tentionally left them to their fate, as on 
two occasions the Polaris came -within 
easy sight of the ice party, but no atten- 
tion was paid to their signals of distress. 
In due course an investigation of all the 
circumstances was instituted by the Naw 
Department; but the evidence produced 
failed to prove more than that there had 
been dissensions on board the Polaris be- 
fore Captain Hall died. 

There are few more pathetic cliapters 
in the long record of three hundred years 
of Polar navigation than that which tells 
of the futile mission of the Jeannette and 
the cruel disappointment of her com- 
mander, Lieut. George W. DeLong. After 
graduating from the Naval Academy, De- 
Long became deeply interested in the 
whole problem of Arctic research ; and 
when, as Lieutenant on the Juniata, sent 
north to search for the Polaris, he got his 
tirst real taste of Arctic life, he did not 
rest until he had succeeded in interesting 
James Gordon Bennett, and had secured 
his support for a new expedition to the 
Pole. With his characteristic liberality 
^[r. Bennett gave DeLong a free hand in 
tilting out the expedition, which sailed 



from San Francisco on the Jeannette, 
July 8, 1879. The party numbered thirty- 
two persons, and the Bering Strait route 
had been chosen because of DeLong's be- 
lief that the warm Japan current must 
somewhere create a practically clear pas- 
sage to the Pole. But the whole record so 
carefully kept by the Commander is one 
of mishaps and accidents. He had pene- 
trated the Arctic Ocean but a short 
distance before the vessel was caught in 
the ice, and carried north and west with 
the movement of the slowly floating mass 
for nearly two years. As one has said, 
" instead, therefore, of a voyage of inter- 
esting discovery and abundant incident, 
the Jeannette and her company were 
doomed to an Arctic prison." DeLong 
had by far the best literary ability of all 
the explorers who have written of their 
experiences; and his journal supplies a 
more vivid and fascinating view of the 
explorer's life and thought than can be 
found elsewhere. His descrijition of the 
terrible monotony of his imprisonment, 
the same that hundreds of others have 
been forced to endure, is so realistic that 
we quote it in part : " There can be no 
greater wear and tear on a man's mind 
and patience than this life in the pack. 
The absolute monotony; the unchanging 
round of hours; the awakening to the 
same things and the same conditions that 
one saw just before losing one's self in 
sleep ; the same faces ; the same dogs ; the 
same ice; the same conviction that to- 
morrow will be exactly the same as to- 
day, if not more disagreeable; the ahsolute 
impotence to do anything, to go anywhere, 
or to change one's situation an iota; the 
knowledge that nothing has been accom- 
plished thus far to save this expedition 
from being denominated an utter failure; 
all these things crowd in with irresistible 
force on my reasoning powers each night 
as I sit down to reflect upon the events of 
the day; and but for some still, small 
voice within me that tells me this can 
hardly be the ending of all my labors 
and zeal, I should be tempted to despair." 
Early in the first winter the Jeannette 
sprang a leak, and every in-jenious device 



782 



FEOM COLO^'Y TO WOKLD POWER. 



and grrcat labor only sei-ved to keep her 
afloat. On June 12, 1881, the ice-pack 
broke up enough for her to get free, only 
to be seized again the next day, and so 
badly damaged that she sank in forty 
fathoms of water only five hours after the 
party abandoned her. They were then 
three hundred and fffty miles from the 
barren Siberian coast. The party was at 
once divided among three boats, which 
were quickly separated in their efforts to 
reach the mainland. On September 10, 
Engineer Melville and Lieut. Danenhower 
with their companions reached a small 
fishing camp in the Lena Delta, and were 
safe. The boat and crew in charge of 
Lieut. Chipp were never heard from, and 
all were iindoul)tedly lost in the open 
ocean. Some time later Melville, who 
had maintained an eager search for the 
other boats, found two suiwivors of Pe- 
Long's party, who had been sent ahead of 
the others, who were too sick to walk 
farther, to find relief, if possible. In this 
way a clue as to the Captain's where- 
abouts was obtained. But relief came too 
late. As the Esquimaux briefly described 
by a line the sad fate of Franklin's party. 
— " They fell as they walked, and as they 
fell they died." — so the closing entries in 
DeLong's journal picture with marvelous 
vividness the end that l>ofcll too many 
heroes engaged in such x>erilous ventures. 
The silence that follows the last record 
is more eloquent than any written des- 
cription could be: 

"October 23d, Sunday, 13.3d day. 
Everybody pretty weak. Slept or rested 
all day, and then managed to get enough 
wood in before dark. Head part of divine 
service. Suffering in our feet. No foot 
gear. 

October 2-tth, Monday, 134th day. A 
hard night. 

October 2.5th, Tuesday, 135th day. 

October 26th, Wednesday. 13(;th day. 

October 27th, Thursday, 137th day. 
Ivcrsen broken down. 

October 28th. Friday. 13Sth day. Iver- 
scn died during early morning. 

October 29th, Saturday, 139th day. 
Dressier died during the night. 



October 30th. Sunday. 140th day. Boyd 
and Gortz died during night. Mr. Collins 
dying." 

The remarkable drift of the Jeanneffe, 
and the fact that it was alleged that some 
articles belonging to the shij^ had been 
found on the Greenland coast, led the 
bold Norseman, Fridtjof Nansen, to at- 
tempt the conquest of the Pole by a drift- 
ing cxjiedition. He originally planned to 
enter the Arctic Ocean by way of 
Bering Strait, but eventually changed his 
course, and started north by way of the 
coast of Norway, through the Kara Sea. 
He built for this service the little vessel 
named the Fram, so constructed as to rise 
iipon the surface of the ice when squeezed, 
and so avoid being crushed. Leaving 
Christiania in July, 1893, on the 25th of 
September the Fram was pushed into the 
ice off the northwest of the Siberian 
Islands, and her long drift began. She 
was provisioned for five years, and 
carried a party of thirteen. After drift- 
ing for nearly two years in a northwest- 
erly direction, the intolerable montony 
drove Nansen to take a sledge. With 
one companion he left the ship March 
14, 1895, while she was in lat. 84° 4', and 
pushed farther north, reaching the farth- 
est point yet gained in lat. 86° 14', on 
April 7. He then turned southwest and 
reached Franz Joseph Land late in Au- 
gust, where he wintered. Starting south 
the following' spring he arrived at the 
headquarters of Jackson, the British Ex- 
plorer of that region, and returned home 
in the Fall. After Nansen left her, the 
Fram continued to drift northerly and 
westerly until in November, 1895, she 
reached a northing only twenty miles be- 
low that of Nansen. Her drift then 
became southwesterly until, on Augrust 
13, 1896, she was released from the ice 
just south of Spitzbergen. The success of 
this voyage placed Nansen high on the 
roll of Arctic explorers, and gained a 
strong following for his drift method. 
The knowledge of conditions existing in 
the Arctic Ocean was also materially in- 
creased by the observations of the Fram's 
party, and the absence of land through a 



THE CONQUEST OE THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



783 



great area previously unexplored was 
clemonstrated, as well as the existence of 
a deep polar basin. 

Franz Josef Land was discovered in 
1873 by Wej-precht and Payer, command- 
ing' an Austrian expedition in search of 
the Northeast Passage. Their vessel, the 
TcgpHhof, was caught in the ice off the 
north coast of Nova Zembla in August, 
1872, and the party drifted 375 days, " no 
longer discoverers, but passengers against 
our will," as Lieut. Payer stated the 
conditions. But when the fog lifted on 
the morning of August 30. 1873. a bold 
coast line was revealed, hitherto unknown, 
which they named Franz Josef Land in 
honor of their Emperor. During the 
spring of 1875, by sledge journeys, more 
than four hundred miles of the land was 
travereed and mapped. It was not until 
1894, however, that the new land was 
carefully explored by F. G. Jackson, who 
spent three years there with a party 
financed by Sir Alfred LTarmsworth. By 
boat and sledge journeys they practically 
determined the limits of what proved to 
be an archipelago, rather than one con- 
tinuous land, or island. In the years 
1898-9 Walter Wellman, the celebrated 
correspondent of the Chicago Becnrd- 
Herald. made a strike for the Pole from 
Franz Josef Land: but an accident to Mr. 
Wellman forced him to abandon the 
undertaking. 

The name most closely, and probably 
finally, associated with this route, how- 
ever, is that of the Italian Duke of the 
Abruzzi, and his navigator. Captain 
Cagni. The Duke bought the Norwegian 
whaler Jason, and had her refitted and 
strengthened in Norway, after which she 
was re-christened the Stella Polare. Sail- 
ing from Christiania, in June, 1899, the 
expedition easily reached the highest 
Xwint attained by vessel over this route. 
in lat. 82° 4'. and then wintered in Tep- 
litz Bay, Crown Prince Rudolph Land, 
close to the northern extremity of Franz 
Josef Land. In the spring Captain 
Cagni and a party, by a sledge journey 
directly north, reached the highest alti- 
tude attained by any person previous to 



the twentieth century. 80° 34' N.. only 
two hundred hundred and thirty miles, 
direct distance, from the Pole itself. 
This was an epoch making expedition. 
As Commander Peary has said : " It 
showed most conclusively what an efFec- 
tive sledge party may accomplish when 
starting from a base with a high north- 
ing." It was thus the rare privilege of the 
distinguished Italian nobleman, within 
one year, to determine the limits of Franz 
Josef Land and to prove the open sea 
beyond ; and also to establish a precedent 




THE DUKE OF THE ABRUZZI. 

for future procedure, which, followed by 
Cook and Peary in 1908 and 1909, added 
the Pole itself to the knovm possessions of 
Ihe human race. This, one of the most 
successful of all exploring expeditions, 
was planned, supervised, and directed in 
evei-y detail by the Duke of the Abruzzi 
himself, when only in his twenty-sixth 
year. He has since placed many other 
daring and scientific achievements to his 
credit, the latest being the ascent of Mount 
Goodwin-Austin in the Himalaya range, 
when he reached an altitude of 25.000 
feet, the highest ever attained by any 
human being. Not without reason are 



784 



FRO:\l COLONY TO WOULD I'OWEK. 



the Italian people isroud of this member 
of their royal family; and with equal rea- 
son the American people have viewed the 
Duke's attentions to the daug'hter of a 
distingnished Senator of the United 
States with more respect and kindness 
than they usually bestow upon the quest 
of titled foreigners for wives among the 
rich American women. 

The summer of 1009 was Just drawing 
to a close, and the people of the country 
were settling down to the routine work of 
another business year, when that latest 
of wonderful discoveries, the wireless tele- 
graph, proclaimed to the world that on a 
Danish steamship approaching civiliza- 
tion was a comparatively unknown man, 
named Cook, who claimed to have gained 
the goal of centuries of endeavor, by 
planting the flag of his countiy, the 
United States, at the North Pole, on April 
2L 1908. The familiar simile of a light- 
ning- flash from a clear sky but faintly 
suggests the astonishment and wonder 
with which the announcement was re- 
ceived. Probably not one in one thou- 
sand of the American people had ever 
heard of Dr. Cook, and a much smaller 
number knew that he had been in the 
Arctic seas, or had designs upon the Pole. 
Peary, every one knew, had gone north 
to seek the trophy; but a widespread spirit 
of incredulity greeted- the story of the 
unkno^^Tl adventurer. Upon his aiTival at 
Copenhagen, however. Scientists, Arctic 
Explorers, and a hundred or more of the 
most famous press correspondents of the 
■n'orld seized him, and so pressed him to 
obtain all his stoi-y that the embrace of 
a Polar ice-pack would have been a relief 
to the bewildered man. Very quickly, all 
were convinced of his sincerity, and the 
belief became well nigh universal through- 
out the civilized world that Cook had dis- 
covered the Pole. Friends of Commander 
Peary, however, with rare lack of .iudg- 
ment, did all in their power to check the 
enthusiasm of the public, and to discredit 
Dr. Cook's statement; and days of 
frenzied discussion ensued. But all this 
■was as a calm before a storm compared 
■with the wild agitation which followed, 



when, five days later, the wireless tele- 
graph again electrified the world by a 
message from Labrador, stating that 
Commander Peary had reached the Pole, 
and, as he claimed, had been the first to 
plant the stars and stri[)es above the dome 
of the world, on April 6, 1909. It is 
doubtful whether any such feverish ex- 
citement has possessed the American 
jjeople since the day the telegraph an- 
nounced that Sumter had been fired upon. 
Sides were immediately taken and a 
merry war ensued between the adherents 
of the two explorers. An old Oreek his- 
torian, describing the dominant character- 
istics of his counti-ymen, places a dis- 
putatious nature in the foreground. They 
timk sides, he declares, on the most trivial 
t;uestions, and argued and wrangled in- 
cessantly. To illustrate his position, he 
tells of a celebrated law suit that was 
brought in the city of Abdera, over the 
owmership of an Ass's shadow; and 
naively i-emarks that the question was so 
hotly discussed by the people, that every 
Abderite became either an ass or a 
shadow. And it certainly appeared for a 
time, as if those of the American x)eople 
who were not transformed by the discus- 
sion of the Cook-Peary question into 
quadrupeds with long ears, must inevit- 
ably become shadows very quickly. Hap- 
pily, however. Commander Peary came to 
their rescue. By his offensive and inteni- 
perate denunciation of a fellow explorer, 
whose every word and act were proclaim- 
ing him an honest man and a gentleman, 
and were hourly winning for him friends 
from among his most hostile critics, the 
Commander so shocked the American 
spirit of fair play that discussion soon 
ceased, and a sentiment akin to disgust 
became common. The so-called contro- 
versy degenerated into a monologue by 
the later claimant, which received only 
painful attention from a few of his most 
intimate friends and personal admirers. 
During the iieriodi of comparative calm 
that has followed, intelligent and thought- 
ful men and women are studying the 
claims of both explorers with as little per- 
sonal bias as the peculiar circumstances 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



785 



•will peniiit; and in the near future a 
measure of certainty will undoubtedly be 
reached which will be acceptable to the 
g-reat public; though, as in the case of 
all momentous discoveries, some will 
never be convinced. It is probable that 
the question, " Wlio was first at the North 
Pole," will long be debated, and the 
validity of the generally accepted con- 
clusions be disputed by many. 

Doctor Frederick Albert Cook was born 
at Callicoon. Sullivan County, N. Y., June 
10. 1865. His family name was Koch. His 
father was born in Hanover, and his 
mother in southern Germany. About the 
middle of the last century the family 
migTated to the United States, the father 
commencing the practice of medicine in 
the little country town where his now 
famous son was born. During the Civil 
War the father joined the army, and on 
the roll of the medical service, by the 
carelessness of a Government clerk, bis 
name was entered as Cook, instead of 
Koch, and the name was retained, though 
all the father's family are still Koch«. In 
1870 the father died, the mother being 
left without means, and with five children, 
of whom the present Doctor was the 
youngest. In order to gain better facili- 
ties for educating her children, and 
greater opportunities for work, the family 
removed to Brooklyn, N. T., where Fred- 
erick received his early education in tin- 
public schools. Later he earned enough 
to take a course at the LTniversity of New 
York, from which he received his degree 
of Doctor of Medicine in 1890. As he 
was without means, the waiting for a 
paying practice became intolerable to 
him; and while chafing under such con- 
ditions, about six months after bis grad- 
uation, he saw in the papers that Peary 
was organizing an expedition to explore 
the Arctic regions, and that a surgeon 
was wanted to accompany the party. He 
made application for the position, was ac- 
cepted, and spent the greater part of the 
next two years in that service. Of his 
fitness for this work, and adaptability to 
the necessary conditions of Arctic life. 
Commander Peary has said (Northward 



Over the Great Ice): "To Dr. Cook's 
care may be attributed the almost com- 
plete exemption of the party from even 
the mildest indispositions, and personally 
I owe much to his professional skill, and 
unruffled patience and coolness in an 
emergency. In addition to his work in 




FREDERICK A. COOK. 

his special ethnological field, in which he 
has obtained a large mass of most valu- 
ahle material concerning a practically 
unstudied tribe, he was always helpful, 
and an indefatigable worker." In speak- 
ing of this expedition at a later day. Dr. 
Cook said: "There was no money in it, 
but there was a living, honor, and — ■ 
what I did not expect to find — a new 
and absorbing passion." We have before 
iu this chapter spoken of the irresistible 
charm of the Arctic region for all who 
have once been subject to its spell. No 
matter what hardships and dangers have 
been encountered, all through the history 



786 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



of Arctic exploration wo find survivors 
seizing the first opportunity to return. 
In speakiu": of his own surrender to this 
Wanderlust, Dr. Cool': has said: "It is a 
mystery, but it is a fact. Often and 
often I have asked myself what are the 
pleasures of the Polar seas. Privation, 
cold, hunger, peril of frostbite and of 
death, solitude, increasing and sustaining 
exertion, — these are manifest enough. 
In themselves they are not very fascinat- 
ing. You sometimes revolt from them 
and wonder why you ever pushed into the 
great wilderness of ice. You escape, vow- 
ing never to return. But after a time 
something revives in you. Your mind 
dwells more and more on the indefinable 
delights of the Arctic. Something keeps 
calling, calling, calling, night and day. 




JOHN R. BRADLFA'. 

until at last you can stand it no longer, 
and you return, spell-drawn by the magic 
of the North." 

It is hardly to be wondered at, there- 
fore, that, though he had commenced to 
practice his profession in Brooklyn after 
his return from Greenland, when in Sep- 
tember, 1897, he received a cablegram 
from the commander of the Belgian 
Antarctic Expedition just about to start 



from Ostend, asking if he could join the 
Ijarty at Montevideo late in the month, 
Dr. Cook at once cabled " Yes." " I had 
only a few days," he says, " to prepare 
myself and my outfit for a journey which 
might take one year, or ten, or a life- 
time." Like many another, he did not 
find in the Antarctic region the fascina- 
tion that has lured so many to return to 
the North. Though the Antarctic had 
been one of the dreams of his life, and 
" to be on the way to it was then my 
ideal of happiness; to he on the way from 
it was an ambition quite as strong two 
years later." 

After returning from this cruise. Dr. 
Cook resumed his professional duties, and 
in 1902 married Mary Fidell Hunt. In 
100^, the old cry rang in his ears, and a 
sop was thrown to the Siren in the form 
of a summer expedition to Alaska to try 
the ascent of Mt. McKinley. After three 
months of effort-, however, the undertaking 
was abandoned. But three years later he 
returned, and after a long period of in- 
vestigation he struck a route that took 
him to the sunmiit of the mountain, 
20,390 feet above sea level, in September, 
190(>. ITis experience in this arduous un- 
dertaking stood him in splendid stead for 
his subsequent attack on the Pole. As he 
said : " IJfy forty pound kit per man was 
the pioneer of my irreducibly minimized 
outfit for the run to the Pole. We started 
three men for the summit of Mt. McKin- 
ley and three for the Pole." 

Dr. Cook's Arctic journey, which has 
resulted so gloriously, was made possible 
by the liberality of a wealthy young man 
of New York, John E. Bradley, who has 
found his pleasure in exploration and 
hunting in obscure portions of the globe. 
Mr. Bradley has been in the interior of 
Africa, in out-of-the-way parts of South 
America and India ; and in casting about 
in his mind for some new field to visit, 
he was directed toward the Arctic regions 
by the preparations that Peary was then 
making to go north again. Just at that 
time he happened to meet Dr. Cook, with 
whose susceptibility to the " call of the 
wild" Bradley was familiar; and the lat- 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



787 



ter at once proposed the expedition to the 
Doctor, as a summer hunting trip, ^\-ith 
the possibility of Cook's making a dash 
for the Pole, if everything seemed to 
favor such an effort. Dr. Cook at once 
said the only obstacle veas the expense, 
about which Mr. Bradley assured him he 
need have no concern, as he would stand 
hack of him in any expenditure he might 
think it necessary to make. Not a day 
was lost, but both men entered heart and 
soul into the project. A Gloucester fish- 
ing schooner was purchased, and refitted 
for Arctic work. Every conceivable thing 
that could minister to the necessities of 
either a hunting or Polar expedition was 
provided, though the vessel was not en- 
cumbered with anjrthing that savored of 
luxury, or that a most careful foresight 
did not consider absolutely requisite. As 
Dr. Cook has said : " I had everything 
that could be carried on such a small ex- 
pedition. My friend, Mr. Bradley, gave 
me carte hlanche. I had twice as much 
money placed at my disposal as I cared to 
spend. If I had had a million dollars 
and an army of men, I could not have 
been better equipped." 

The expedition left Gloucester, Mass., 
harbor on July 3, 1907; and after some 
days spent in hunting in the far north, 
reached Etah, where they learned that the 
Eskimos were assembled at Annootok, 
about thirty miles farther north, and just 
inside Inglefield Cape, for a hunt. The 
Bradley party immediately made for that 
point, where Dr. Cook found so many 
men and dogs, as well as food and furs, 
that he decided to make the attempt to 
reach the Pole. The veteran English 
journalist, W. T. Stead, who met Dr. Cook 
upon his arrival at Copenhagen, and re- 
ported a detailed interview with him in 
the October issue of the American Re- 
view of Reviews, quotes a letter written 
by Dr. Cook at this time to Herbert L. 
Bridgman, Secretary of the Peary Arctic 
Club, of New York City, which has an 
important bearing in this case. As re- 
ported, under date of October 5, 1907, 
Dr. Cook wrote : " I have hit upon a. 
new route to the North Pole, and will 



stay to try it. By way of Buchanan 
Bay and Ellesmere Land and northward 
through Nansen Strait over the Polar 
Sea, seems to me to be a very good route. 
There will be game to the 83d degree, 
and here are natives and dogs for the 
task. So her© is for the Pole." This let- 
ter not only gives the reasons why 
Dr. Cook determined to make his attempt 
to reach the Pole, but also shows that in 
the fall of 1907, nine months before 
Peary left New York, Mr. Bridgman was 
advised of Dr. Cook's purpose; and it is 
certain that what Mr. Bridgman knew 
was the common knowledge of Com- 
mander Peary and the members of the 
Peary Club. Moreover, the letter would 
be hardly intelligible, unless Dr. Cook 
had previously talked the matter over 
with Mr. Bridgman, and told him of his 
intention to strike for the Pole if he 
found conditions in the north favorable. 
This should certainly negative all the 
charges that have been persistently made 
by Peary's friends that Dr. Cook's move- 
ments and plans were secret, and that the 
expedition was organized in an " under- 
hand " manner. 

Early in October, the Bradley, with all 
the party except Dr. Cook and Otto 
Francke, returned to New York. The lit- 
tle party at Annootok, with the aid of 
the Eskimos, at once erected a hut for 
their winter quarters. The winter night 
was fast setting in, and all were busily 
engaged preparing for the projected jour- 
ney. Furs were collected and made into 
garments suitable for the trip, sledges 
made, and many jKJSsible contingencies 
provided for. At length, on February 19, 
1908, the main expedition, consisting of 
eleven men, with eleven heavily loaded 
sledges, and one hundred and three dogs, 
left the Greenland coast, crossed Smith 
Sound on the ice, thence proceeding over 
Ellesmere Land to Heiberg Land, from 
the northern point of which the dash for 
the Pole was made. This first part of the 
undertaking was hardly less diifieult than 
the run over the ice of the Polar Sea; 
as the ice conditions in Smith Sound are 
always of the worst character, and the 



7S8 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



most intense cold was encountered, the 
thermometer once registering 83° below 
zero. Before the Polar Sea was reached 
Dr. Cook had been able to test his men 
and dogs; and for the final and crucial 
run of more than five hundred miles to 
the Pole, two young men. Etukishuk and 
Ahwelah, each about twenty years of age, 
were chosen. Twenty-six dogs were se- 
lected, and supplies for eighty days were 



well nigh worn out. But when, on the 
morning of April 19, the obsei-vations 
showed that they were but two average 
marches from the " tigi shu " (the big 
nail), a new spirit possessed the Eskimo 
beys, who danced and shouted for joy. 
Even the dogs caught the enthusiasm, the 
Doctor tells us; and all set out to cover 
the few remaining miles with high spirits 
and light feet, the Eskimos singing and 




RECONNOITERING. 



loaded on two sleds. Early on March 
18 the other Eskimos, with the remain- 
ing dogs and sleds, were sent back to 
Annootok, after a cache had been estab- 
liNhed, at which a sled was also left. 
Then, as soon as a heavy wind and storm 
had somewhat subsided, the little party 
of three faced the unknown north. It 
is impossible here to give any details of 
the journey, which Dr. Cook has so in- 
terestingly described in the story pub- 
lished in the New York Herald. Before 
reaching the Pole, however, the party had 
endured great hardship, and the men were 



shouting, the dogs barking and howling 
as they ran. On the morning of the 21st 
the pedometer showed that they had cov- 
ered the distance necessary to reach the 
Pole, as shown by their last observation ; 
and anxiously they waited for the time 
to determine their exact position, which 
proved to be only a quarter of a mile 
from the boreal centre. This was quickly 
covered, and with mingled feelings of ela- 
tion and weariness, an igloo was built, and 
preparations made to pass two full days 
at the apex of the earth. After the first 
excitement of victory had subsided, how- 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1900. 



789 



ever, their abounding- joy slowly yielded 
to the depressing influence of the place. 
Not a sign of life in any direction, not 
a spot to break the monotonous outlook 
over endless fields of purple snows, and an 
absolute silence that could really be felt ! 
Everywhere was a barren, dead world of 
ice. Added to the dreariness of the place, 
too, came the gradual realization of the 
diiBculties still to be encountered. The 
supreme tests of strength and endurance 
were yet to come. After two full series 
of observations had been taken, to make 
certain that they had really reached the 
Pole, the little party turned their faces to 
the south, and began the homeward march 
April 23. Seven days later they had cov- 
ered one hundred and twenty-one miles. 
Wearily they worked their way south, the 
ice conditions constantly becoming worse, 
and the drift more pronounced as the sea- 
son advanced. It soon became evident 
that they were being carried too far west 
to admit of the return to Annootok, or, 
what was more serious, to reach their 
caches on Heiberg Land. And after tragic 
weeks of suffering from hunger, exposure, 
and disappointment, the three brave men 
were forced to go into winter quarters in 
September near Cape Sparbo, on Jones 
Sound, fully two hundred and fifty miles 
south of Annootok, the drifting ice hav- 
ing carried them far to the west and 
south of Ellesniere Land. Having built 
an underground den of stones and turf, 
with bows and arrows, and other prim- 
itive weapons (their ammunition had al- 
ready been exhausted), they killed bears, 
musk-oxen, and other animals, so procur- 
ing food and skins as well as fuel, by 
which death by famine was averted. The 
winter night of 1908-9 was spent in pre- 
paring food and equipment for the re- 
turn; and on February 18, 1909, with 
remodelled sled, the start was made for 
Annootok, where the party arrived about 
the middle of April. But before reach- 
ing camp their provisions had again be- 
come exhausted, as they had not been 
able to get any game during the later 
weeks of the march; and some miles from 
tbe camp the three weak and starving 



men were forced to abandon their sledge, 
and make the last desperate struggle to 
reach Annootok. About eight miles from 
the place the weary strugglers, mutually 
supporting and dragging each other over 
the ice, were met by Mr. Whitney, who 
was hunting in the region with a party 
of Eskimos, and were carried to the camp 
and tenderly cared for. After a very 
few days of rest, dniring which he told 
Mr. Whitney of his route and what he 
had accomplished, Dr. Cook, anxious to 
get back to civilization and to acquaint 
the world with his achievement, proceeded 
by sled and boat to LTppernavik, where 
he caught a Danish steamship which took 
him to Copenhagen, reaching the Danish 
capital September 4th. 




HOBEHT E. PEARY. 



Robert Edwin Peary was bom at Cres- 
son, Pa., May 6, 1856. During his early 
youth the family removed to Maine, 
where young Peary received his educa- 



790 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



tion, graduating' from Bowdoin Colloge. 
in 1877. In the year 1881 he entered the 
I'nited States Navy as Civil Engineer, 
and sei-ved as Assistant Engineer of the 
Nicaragua Ship Canal in 1884-5. In 
1888 he married Josephine Diehitsch. of 
Washington, who has iigured only less 
prominently than her husband in the an- 
nals of Arctic exploration. Mrs. Pear>' 
accompanied her husband as far north as 
the vrinter quarters in Greenland on his 
expeditions of 1891 and 1893, and was. 
so far as known, the first white woman 
to winter within the Arctic Circle. Wliile 
in Greenland, a daughter, Marie Ahnighi- 
to, later familiarly known as the " Snow 
Baby," was born to Lieut, and Mrs. Pear;\', 
— the infant gaining the distinguished 
honor of having reached, while in Arctic 
swaddling clothes, the " farthest north " 
of any of the millions of white babies 
born in modern times. Mrs. Peary again 
went north in 1900 with her child, to 
meet her husband. The vessel was caught 
in the ice, and mother and child passed 
the long winter night in lat. 78° 42'. 

Even during his college days Peary is 
credited with having been deeply inter- 
ested in all that pertained to Arctic ex- 
ploration. In the introduction to his 
'■ Northward over the Great Ice." he says : 
" One evening, in one of my favorite 
haunts, an old book-store in Washington, 
I came upon a fugitive paper on the In- 
land Ice of Greenland. A chord, which, 
as a boy, had vibrated intensely in me at 
the reading of Kane's wonderful book, 
was touched again. I read all I could 
upon the subject, and felt that I must 
see for myself what the truth was of this 
great mysterious interior. My summer 
reconnaissance of the Inland Ice was the 
outcome." 

Commander Peary's Arctic experience 
now covers twenty-three years, about eight 
of which have actually been spent within 
the Arctic Circle. He has, during this 
period, worked under particularly favor- 
able conditions, as he has been carried 
upon the rolls of the Navy Department, 
and been paid a liberal salary, though he 
has done no active service for eighteen 



years. This has allowed him to prosecute 
his ambitious schemes without anxiety as 
to his own support, or that of his family, 
an enviable position that has been the lot 
of no other American explorer for any 
long ix?riod. In 1886 he made his first 
investigation of the ice of Greenland, in 
which country nearly all his work had 
been done down to 1905. On that expe- 
dition he started from a point near Disco, 
and sledged across the ice to within fifty 
miles of the eastern coast. In 1891-2 he 
was in charge of the exploring expedition 
of the Academy of Natural Sciences, of 
Philadelphia, and visited North Green- 
land for the first time. It was on this 
expedition that Dr. Cook served as sur- 
geon of the party, which left New York 
in June, 1891, on the Kite, and wintered 
in McCormiek Bay, southeast of Smith 
Sound. The following spring a sledge 
journey was made over the inland ice 
to the northeast, a distance of six hun- 
dred and fifty miles and return. The 
north coast of Greenland was discovered, 
demonstrating that it was an island, and 
that an archipelago of islands lies to the 
north, separated from Greenland by In- 
dependence Bay and the Peary Channel. 
In 1893 Commander Peary again went 
north, remaining in North Greenland two 
years, during which time he made a sec- 
ond sledge journey across the ice-cap, as 
well as a detailed sun'ey of the Whale 
Sound country, and discovered the great 
Cape York meteorites. Up to 1885 prac- 
tically nothing was known concerning the 
interior of Greenland, and Commander 
Peary's account of what he discovered is 
so interesting that we quote his words 
(Introduction, " Northward Over the 
Great Ice"): "All there is of land, as 
we understand the term, in Greenland, is 
a ribbon five to twenty-five (and in one 
or two places sixty to eighty) miles in 
width, along the coast, made up of mount- 
ains and valleys and deep branching 
fiords, surrounded by the Arctic Sea, 
jilayground of the iceberg and the pack 
ice, and itself in turn surrounding and 
supporting, like a Titan dam, the great 
white ice-cap beneath which the interior 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



791 



of the country is buried. . . . There 
the accumulated snow precipitation of 
centuries, in a latitude and altitude where 
it is practically correct to say that it 
never rains and the snow does not melt 
even in the long summer day, has gradu- 
ally filled all the valleys of the interior, 
until it has leveled them even with the 
mountain summits, and still piling higher 
through the centuries, has at last buried 
the highest of these mountain summits 
hundreds and even thousands of feet deep 
in snow and ice. The interior of Green- 
land to-day is simply an elevated, un- 
broken plateau of snow, lifted from five 
thousand to eight, and even ten, thousand 
feet above the level of the sea; a huge 
white glistening shield some twelve hun- 
dred miles in length and five hundred 
miles in width, resting on the supporting 
mountains. It is an Arctic Sahara, in 
comparison with which the African Sa- 
hara is insignificant. For on this frozen 
Sahara of inner Greenland occurs no 
form of life, animal or vegetable; no frag- 
ment of rock, no grain of sand is visible." 

During the summers of 1896 and 1897 
Peaiy made excursions to Greenland, and 
on the second succeeded in bringing back 
to this country the great meteorite dis- 
covered at Cape York, said to be the larg- 
est in the world. In 1899-1900 he made 
his first strictly Polar expedition, reach- 
ing the north of Greenland and surveying 
its shores, but was unable to advance be- 
yond lat. 83° 54'. In 1902, in another 
attempt to reach the Pole, he attained lat. 
84° 17'. His most successful etiort, pre- 
vious to the 1908 expedition, was made 
in the Roosevelt in 1905-6, when he 
skirted the north coast of Grinnell Land, 
and in a dash for the Pole attained lat. 
87° 6', on April 21, 1906, the farthest 
north ever reached until Dr. Cook gained 
the Pole, exactly two years later. 

Commander Peary had planned to leave 
for the Arctic regions again in the Roose- 
velt during the summer of 1907; but the 
steamer's boilers and machinery could not 
be put in proper condition, so the start 
had to be postponed until the following 
year. For this expedition the Commander 



was most completely equipped, the Peary 
Arctic Club, and others, having responded 
liberally to his persistent solicitation for 
funds. A dramatic send-off was given by 
President Eoosevelt, the steamer having 
gone to the President's summer home at 
Oyster Bay for that purpose; while the 
expedition and the movements of its 
Commander were the all-absorbing theme 




THE ROUSEVliLT. 

of the summer season. Commander 
Peary went by rail to Sydney, N. S., 
where he joined the steamer and the 
party on July 17, and all arrived at Cape 
York about the end of the month. They 
left Etah August 18, reaching Cape 
Sheridan, on the north coast of Grant 
Land, September 5, when the vessel went 
into winter quarters. On February 15, 
1909, the removal of supplies from the 
Roosevelt to Cape Columbia, a few miles 
west of Cape Sheridan, which was to be 
the point of departure for the Pole, was 
begun ; and by the 27th the transfers had 
been completed, and the start was made 
March 1. The Polar party consisted of 
seven members of the expedition and sev- 
enteen Eskimos, with one hundred and 
thirty-three dogs and nineteen sledges. 
As Dr. Cook's account of his adventures 
has been published in the New Yorh Her- 
ald, so the New Yorh Times secured " ex- 
elusive rights " to publish Commander 
Peary's personal account of his exploit; 
but while the former is replete with in- 
teresting details regarding the progress 



792 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



made and the perils encountered, as well 
as with informing accounts of the ice 
and atmospheric conditions experienced, 
the latter contains little more than a de- 
scription of the masterly manner in which 
the Conunandor handled and turned back 
his supporting parties, with occasional 
reference to the gaining of a new paral- 
lel, and particularly to the dates when 
he passed the " farthest north " of pre- 
vious explorers. Of any enlightening de- 
scription of the physical features of the 



informed, however, that at various pointa 
" supporting parties " were sent back, the 
last to return being Captain Bartlctt's, 
which turned about at 87° 48', about one 
lumdred and fifty miles from the Pole. 
The remaining party consisted of the 
Commander, his negro servant, Henson, 
and three Eskimos; and then followed 
the most phenomenal runs that have ever 
been recorded in the annals of Polar ex- 
ploration. The distance from Cape Sheri- 
dan to the Pole is close to four hundred 




area covered, or of lively interest as a 
narrative of travel, it is as barren as the 
fields of snow and ice which the party 
traversed. It is, too, lacking in data 
which would enable one to follow the 
party's course intelligently. While Dr. 
Cook gives the results of ten or more ob- 
servations at different points as he ad- 
vanced, with the latitude and longitude 
shown in each case. Commander Peary 
gives but three, including the first made 
at the Pole; and in no case does he give 
any longitude, so that it would be im- 
possible for one to determine his course 
with any measure of exactness. We are 



and eighty miles. To cover three hun- 
dred and thirty miles of this distance it 
had taken the party from March 1 to 
April 2; but the remaining one hundred 
and fifty miles, after his supporting par- 
ties had all returned, the Commander 
covered in four days, although all his 
dogs must have been well nigh worn out, 
and his sleds in far from perfect condi- 
tion. So far as one can judge from his 
narrative, he found practically the same 
conditions at the Pole, which was reached 
April 6, 1909, that were noted by Dr. Cook 
the year before, — an unspeakable desola- 
tion. Dr. Cook, however, was moved by 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



793 



the iinvisual occasion and the magnitude 
of the event, and gave utterance to senti- 
ments that one reads -with interest. But 
Commander Peary, though commonly so 
generous in his expressions of apprecia- 
tion of unusual sitviations, seems to have 
found nothing in the surroundings nor 
in the achievement of especial note, 
though he does quote from his journal a 
prosaic and commonplace entry "made 
some hours later," to the effect that the 
Pole, the prize of three centuries, his 
dream and goal for twenty years, was his 
at last. And he gives, with evident ap- 
proval, the sublime and poetic sentiment 
expressed by Bartlett Just before he turned 
back, " it's just like every day." 

After remaining at the Pole about 
thirty hours. Commander Peary and his 
little party began the marvelous run back 
to Cape Columbia, which was accom- 
plished in sixteen days, at an average 
rate of over thirty miles a day, they hav- 
ing left the Pole April Y, and arrived at 
the Cape on the 23d. With reason, it 
would seem, one of the Eskimos re- 
marked : " The devil is asleep or having 
trouble with his wife, or we never should 
have come back so easily." After some 
time spent in gathering up provisions 
left at the caches, and in getting members 
of the party together, the Roosevelt left 
her winter quarters July IS, and reached 
Cape Sabine August 8. At Etah Harry 
Whitney was taken on board, but was re- 
fused permission to bring with him some 
instruments and papers which Dr. Cook 
had left with him; and clearing from 
Cape York August 26th, the party reached 
Indian Harbor September 5th, " whence," 
as Commander Peary has said, " the mes- 
sage ' Stars and Stripes nailed to North 
Pole ' was sent southward through the 
crisp Labrador air." 

While Dr. Cook was receiving the con- 
gratulations of the world in general, and 
of the people of Copenhagen in particu- 
lar, the message from Commander Peary 
was received, which called from the Doc- 
tor a spontaneous expression of pleasure 
that his rival had also been successful in 
his quest for the Pole. But within two 



or three days the wireless messages from 
Labrador began to proclaim Dr. Cook a 
liar, and negotiator of gold bricks, and 
a spirit wholly " unbecoming an ofBcer and 
a gentleman," not to say a sportsman, 
was manifested by Commander Peary. 
The details of the controversy that has 
since been maintained are so widely 
known, and the occurrences so recent, that 
no recital of them here is necessary. 
Unfortunately every one who has ever 
seen an iceberg or a dog sledge, or has 
at any time lived in the same county 
with either of the explorers, constituting 
himself an expert on Arctic explorations, 
or a competent authority as to the honor 
and veracity of the two leaders, has rushed 
into print to commend or criticize their 
actions: with the result that the real is- 
sue has become so befogged by these liter- 
ary efforts, and by the loose utterances 
of newspaper men anxious to make rec- 
ords, that it is well for the general reader 
to analyze the various charges made, and 
so endeavor, in some measure, to arrive 
at just conclusions. 

The attitude of the press, and of some 
scientific societies, has been that no proof 
whatever is needed of any statement or 
claim Commander Peary may make; but 
that Dr. Cook must establish every posi- 
tion he may take by the most detailed 
and convincing evidence, — a proposition 
that is hardly consistent with the boasted 
Anglo-Saxon love of fair play. Justice 
and law both assume that a man is hon- 
est and innocent, until the negative is 
proved; but with the powerful interests 
supporting Commander Peary, as well as 
with the Commander himself, the assump- 
tion has been that Dr. Cook was dishon- 
est from the start, and mu.st establish his 
innocence. It is interesting to note, 
however, that, notwithstanding the search- 
ing investigation his enemies have made, 
no evidence that would carry weight with 
a judicial mind has been produced to im- 
peach the Doctor's standing as an honest 
man; while eveiy one who has met him 
during these trying days, even those dis- 
posed to question his achievement, have 
been convinced of the man's simple. 



794 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWER. 



straishtforward, manifest sincerity. Such 
beinf>: the attitude of the press, and of 
Commander Peary's adherents, however, 
it could but follow that his rival explorer 
should become the storm centre of a most 
virulent and hostile criticism; and in 
view of this fact, it seems but just that a 
few of the positions taken by his adver- 
saries should be briefl.v considered. Such 
a course may serve somewhat the cause 
of .iustice, and clear the hazy atmosphere. 
Great stress has been laid upon the 
character and material of Dr. Cook's out- 
fit, as well as upon what is assumed to be 
the totally inadequate amount of provi- 
sions he carried on his dash for the Pole. 
In this connection it is necessary for one 
to recognize that an orthodox standard 
for Arctic exploration has been set up in 
this countn', from which one may not 
vary without subjecting: himself to all the 
inquisitions and penalties heres.v entails. 
For twenty years Commander Peary ha? 
had no American competitor in the field 
of Polar research, with the result that, 
in his own estimation and that of his im- 
mediate supporters, his methods and plans 
have been accepted as those in accordance 
with which all similar work must be pros- 
ecuted. Unlpss one iises his style of 
sledge, his particular harness for the dogs, 
his personal fancy for a- tent or boat, and 
adopts his estimate as- to the kind and 
quantity of provisions requisite for any 
proposed undertaking, all results achieved 
are open to suspicion, if not at once de- 
nounced as necessarily fraudulent claims. 
A grand campaign of two or three seasons 
of i>reparation has come to be considered 
an absolutely essential condition of suc- 
cess. Bases for work must be established 
by preliminary expeditions; caches dug 
at various points, and filled with provi- 
sions; an imposing array of "supporting 
parties" must accompany the chief: and 
every detail of the proposed expedition 
must be exploited in magazines and news- 
pajiers. These are now the orthodox pre- 
liminaries for any Polar explorations. A 
McClellan rather than a Napoleon is the 
ideal commander of the orthodox party. 
And the head and front of Dr. Cook's 



offending has been that he achieved suc- 
cess in an unorthodox manner. Scant 
attention has been given to the fact that 
he spent two years in the Arctic with the 
Master, and two more in the Antarctic 
with competent explorers, and so might 
reasonably have gained some knowledge 
that would entitle him to an independent 
opinion. Unfortunately he bad not learned 
that there is no place in the American 
economy of Arctic exploration for ideas 
that do not bear the orthodox imprint. 
Consequently he selected the style of 
sledge, the character and quantity of food, 
and the number of men for his party, 
ihat his own study and experience had 
taught him were the most fit, and would 
prove the most efficient. A leading critic 
has stated emphatically that it would be 
absolutely impossible for one to carry ou 
two sledges provisions sufilcient for three 
men and dogs on a dash to the Pole, or 
for any sledge journey of seventy days. 
The critic had proved it by his own expe- 
rience in Siberia. But. impossible or not, 
that was all Dr. Cook and bis two com- 
panions had for over thirteen months; 
and he and his companions returned to 
Annootok alive, though very hungry. His 
theory was that the lightest equipment 
and the smallest possible party, best met 
the conditions that he was to face; and 
the results prove his theory correct. Had 
Dr. Cook had at his command a powerful 
steamship that could have taken him to 
the north of Grant Land, as had Com- 
mander Peary, so that he could have com- 
menced his dash for the Pole earlier, he 
would unquestionably have reached his 
starting point the same summer, and have 
returned to the United States in August 
1908, instead of 1909. But the precious 
time he was forced to consume in cover- 
ing the four hundred miles from Annoo- 
tok to the extremity of Heiberg Land 
delayed his start for the Pole fully three 
weeks beyond the date of Commander 
Peary's departure the following year; with 
the result that when he neared the con- 
tinent on his return the summer sun had 
broken the ice badly, and he was carried, 
an unwilling passenger on the moving 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



795 



masses, so far to the west that an entire 
year was lost. Dr. Cook's methods were 
similar to those demonstrated by Captain 
Cagni to be the most effective; and Com- 
mander Peary's own indorsement of them 
we have quoted in our account of the ex- 
pedition of the Duke of the Abruzzi. 

It should also be recognized that, as 
has been intimated before, during the last 
two decades the race for the Pole has 
reduced itself, or has been reduced, to a 
great sporting event. An effort has gen- 
erally been made to give dignity to the 
expeditions by associating with the ven- 
tures some attempts to secure scientific 
data ; but this research has been so very 
incidental that it hardly deserves serious 
consideration. Commander Peary, Dr. 
Cook, Nansen, Lieut. Shackleton, and 
others have repeatedly acknowledged this 
in their writings, and it is well that the 
public should realize it. The various ef- 
forts to reach the " top of the world " 
have, too, at bottom, been those of purely 
personal ambition. Expeditions have been 
undertaken by nearly every man who has 
once been far north, and so become in- 
oculated with the Arctic bacillus, who 
could secure such financial backing as 
would enable him to advance his ambi- 
tious interests. No one will question that 
hardships have been endured ; but they 
have been so eagerly courted by men thor- 
oughly familiar with them, that direct or 
covert api^eals by friends of the explor- 
ers, through press interviews and other 
channels, to the sympathy of the public 
merit little consideration. Sportsmen in 
all other fields accept dangers and perils 
as part of the game; they exult in vic- 
tory, and cheer the victor. They accept 
defeat with outward complacency, though 
it may be with inward pain and heart- 
break. And it is difficult to understand 
why the same standards of honor and gen- 
tlemanly conduct should not obtain among 
sportsmen engaged in the race for the 
Pole. 

It has been clearly implied, if it has 
not been directly claimed, that the Arctic 
polar region, so far, at least, as Ameri- 
can endeavor is concerned, has become the 



private preserve of one individual; with 
the result that any attempt by another to 
reach the coveted goal must necessarily 
constitute a breach of honor, and do vio- 
lence to the " ethics " of Polar explora- 
tion, whatever that may mean. But one 
has only to state the proposition to make 
its absurdity apparent. It is an untracked 
waste; and for three centuries prior to 
1908 no one had been able to get within 
two hundred miles of its centre, though 
daring men of nearly every civilized na- 
tion had made the attempt. At the open- 
ing of that year, the Pole was, as it had 
ever been, the fair and honorable prize of 
anyone who might first reach it. In view 
of this fact it seems passing strange that 
one should seriously undertake to be- 
smirch Dr. Cook's reputation by raising 
the question of " courtesy," or " ethics." 
The game was an open one; and such 
questions have no more bearing upon the 
case than they would in a fairly contested 
yacht race, or ball game. In the winter 
of 1906-7 Lieut. Shackleton, on his second 
expedition to the Antarctic regions, 
reached a point within one hundred and 
eleven miles of the South Pole, at least 
one hundred miles nearer that Pole than 
Conunander Peary ever got to the North 
Pole prior to 1909. It is well known, too, 
that Shackleton is organizing another ex- 
Xicdition, and has no doubt that he will 
this time reach the Pole. If any explorer 
might have a valid claim on such a terri- 
toi-y he certainly could establish one. Yet 
at least two other Englishmen are organ- 
izing exi^editions for the same purpose, 
without public criticism; and it is cer- 
tainly curious to note that the same ethi- 
cal critics who have denounced Dr. Cook's 
action, see no impropriety in the proposed 
attempt of Captain Bartlett, or Com- 
mander Peary, to make an assault on the 
South Pole, thus, on their own theory, 
poaching upon the sporting ground of 
Lieut. Shackleton. But such tactics are 
ancient. As far back as 1840, Sir James 
Ross was shocked at the lack of courtesy 
and honor displayed by Lieut. Wilkes, who, 
with a fleet of five American vessels, had 
made explorations in the Antarctic coun- 



796 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



try, as it happened, in a region Sir James 
was planning: to invade. In the published 
narrative of his explorations, Ross wrote: 
" I would have expected the national pride 
of the American Commander to have 
caused him rather to choose any other 
path for penetratins southward than the 
place for the exploration of which my ex- 
l^edition was preparinfr." And hardly any 
better reply could be made to the captious 
criticism of Dr. Cook's course, than was at 
that time made to Ross' contention, by a 
friendly writer in the North British Ro- 
ripw. "We cannot," he says, "concur 
with our excellent author in blaminp: the 
American Commander. The British ex- 
pedition might never have sailed or mir/ht 
never have reached its destination : and in 
such an event the Commander could never 
have justified himself to his Government, 
liad he omitted, from any feelings of deli- 
ency, to tal-c the hest path to the Anfarc- 
iic Pole." 

Recoarnizing the validity of these con- 
siderations, one may brush aside the mass 
of irrelevant matter that has been pul>- 
lished, and fairly face the only question 
at issue, which is. whether the claims of 
the individual contestants for the honor 
of being firs;t at the Pole can be substan- 
tiated by their official records, which must 
bo examined and passed upon by compe- 
tent scientific bodies, and the claims of 
both should receive the same impartial 
scrutiny. No testimony of i responsible 
Eskimos, nor affidavits of interested gnides, 
nor the incomprehensible record of runs 
made, should prejudice an intelligent i>er- 
son in his consideration of the STibject. 
All such evidence is too clearly tainted 
with personal animosity, if not by money 
considerations. That both Dr. Cook and 
Commander Peary reached the Pole we 
believe will be ultimately established be- 
yond a reasonable doubt, by rational and 
conclusive evidence. That Dr. Cook 
placed the Stars and Stripes above the 
dome of the world a year before Com- 
mander Peary evidenced his loyalty to the 
flag in the same manner, we believe will 
bo as clearly demonstrated. Otherwise, a 
large niche must ultimately be reserved 



in some Hall of Fame for the bust of the 
most colossal imaginative genius, as well 
as the most consummately realistic actor, 
the world has ever known. 



CHRONOLOGICAL RECORD OF ARCTIC 
EXPLORATION DOWN TO THE TWEN- 
TIETH CENTURY, TAKEN. WITH PER- 
MISSION. FRO.AI LARNED'S HISTORY 
FOR READY REFERENCE. 

1553. — Voyage of Willoughby and Chan- 
cellor from London, in search of a northeast 
passage to India. Chancellor reached Arch- 
angel on the White Sea and learned that he 
was in the dominions of the sovereign of 
Muscovy or Russia. Witli much dilKculty 
he obtained permission to visit the court at 
Moscow, and made the long journey to that 
city by sledge over the snow. There he was 
admitted to an interview with the Tsar and 
returned with a letter which permitted the 
opening of trade between England and Rus- 
sia. Willougliby. with two vessels and their 
crews, was less fortunate. His party, after 
wintering on a desolate shore, perished the 
next year in some manner, the particulars 
of which were never known. The chartered 
company of London merchants which sent 
out tliese expeditions is believed to have been 
tlie first joint .stuck corporation of share- 
licilders formed in England. As the Russia, 
or Muscovy. Company it afterwards became 
a rich and powerful corporation, and its 
success set other enterprises in motion. 

1576-1578. — Voyages of Frobisher to the 
coast of Labrador and the entrance to Davks 
Strait, discovering the bay which bears his 
name, and which he supposed to be a strait 
leading to Cathay; afterwards entering Hud- 
son Strait. 

1585-1587. — Three voyages of John Davis 
from Dartmouth, in search of a northwestern 
passage to India, entering the strait between 
Greenland and Baffinland which bears his 
name and exploring it to the 72nd degree 
north latitude. 

1594-1595.— Dutch expeditions (the first 
and second under Barentz) to the northeast, 
passing to the north of Nova Zembla, or 
Novaya Zemlya, but making no progress 
beyond it. 

1596-1597. — Third voyage of Barentz, 
when he discovered and coasted Spitzbergen, 
wintered in Nova Zeml>la with bis crew, lost 
his ship in the ice. and perished, with one 
third of his men. in undertaking to reach 
the coast of Lapland in open boats. 

1607. — Polar voyage of Henry Hudson, for 
the Muscovy Company of London, attaining 
tlie northern coast of Spitzbergen. 

1608. — Voyage of Henry Hudson to Nova 
Zembla for the Muscovy Company. 

1609. — Voyage of Henry Hudson, in the 
Half Moon, for the Dutch East India Com- 
pany, in search of tlie northeast passage. 
Finding the ice off Nova Zembla impassable, 
he crossed the Atlantic Ocean to try for a 
western passage, and discovered the river 



THE CONQUEST OF THE NORTH POLE — 1909. 



797 



which now bears his name, which he explored 
as far as the present site of Albany. 

1610. — Voyage of Henry Hudson, in Eng- 
lish employ, to seek the northwest passage, 
being the voyage in which he passed through 
the Strait and entered the great Bay to 
which his name has been given, and in which 
he perished at the hands of a mutinous crew. 

1612-1614. — Exploration of Hudson Bay 
by Captains Button, Bylot, and Baffin, prac- 
tically discovering its true character and 
shaking the previous theory of its connection 
with the Pacific Ocean. 

1616. — Voyage into the northwest made by 
Captain Baffin with Captain Bylot, which re- 
sulted in the discovery of Baffin Bay, Smith 
.Sound, Jones Sound, and Lancaster Sound. 

1670. — Grant and charter to the Hudson 
Bay Company, by King Charles II. of Eng- 
land, conferring on the Company possession 
and government of the whole waterslied of 
the Bay, and naming the country Prince 
Rupert Land. 

1728. — Exploration of the northern coasts 
of Kamtschatka by the Danish Captain 
Vitus Bering, in the Russian service, and 
discovery of the Strait which bears his name. 

1779. — -Exploration of the Arctic coast, 
east and west of Bering Strait, by Captain 
Cook, in his last voyage. 

1789. — Ex|doring journey of Alexander 
Mackenzie, for the Northwest Company, and 
discovery of the great river flowing into the 
Polar Sea, which bears his name. 

1818. — Unsatisfactory voyage of Com- 
mander .John Ross to Baffin Bay and into 
Lancaster Sound. 

1819-1820. — First voyage of Lieutenant 
Parry, exploring for a northwest passage, 
through Davis Strait, Baffin Bay, Lancaster 
Sound, and Barrow Strait, to Jlelville Island. 

1819-1822. Tourney of Captain (after- 
wards .Sir John) Franklin, Dr. Richardson, 
and Captain (afterwards Sir George) Back, 
from Fort York, on the western coast of Hud- 
son Bay, by the way of Lake Athabasca, 
Great Slave Lake, and Coppermine River, to 
Coronation Gulf, opening into the Arctic 
Ocean. 

1820-1824. — Russian surveys of the Si- 
berian Polar region by Wrangel and Anjou. 

1821-1823. — Second" voyage of Captain 
Parry, exploring for a northwest passage to 
the Pacific Ocean, through Hudson Strait 
and Fox Channel, discovering the Fury-and- 
Hecla Strait, the northern outlet of the Bay. 

1824^1825.— Third voyage of Captain 
Parry, exploring for a northwest passage, by 
way of Davis Strait. Baffin Bay, and Lan- 
caster Sound, to Prince Regent Inlet, where 
one of his sliips was wrecked. 

1825-1827. — Second journey of Franklin, 
Richardson, and Back, from Canada to the 
Arctic Ocean. 

1827. — Fourth voyage of Captain Parry, 
attempting to reach the North Pole, by ship 
to Spitzbergen and by boats to 82° 45' north 
latitude. 

1829-1833. — Expedition under Captain 
Ross, fitted out by Jlr. Felix Booth, to seek 
a northwest passage, resulting in the dis- 



covery of the position of the north magnetic 
pole, southwest of Boothia, not far from 
which Ross' ship was ice-bound for three 
years. 

1837-1839. — Expeditions of Dease and 
Simpson, in the service of the Hudson Bay 
Company, determining the Arctic coast line 
as far east as Boothia. 

1845. — Departure from England of the 
government expedition under Sir John Frank- 
lin, in two bomb vessels, the Erebus and the 
Terror, which entered Bafiin Bay in July and 
were never seen afterwards. 

1850-1851.— United .States Grinnell Expe- 
dition, sent to assist the search for Sir .John 
Franklin and his crew. 

1850-1852. — Franklin search expedition un- 
der Cajitain CoUinson, through Bering Strait 
and eatsward into Prince of Wales Strait, 
sending sledge parties to Melville Island. 

1850-1854. — Franklin search expedition un- 
der Captain McClure, through Bering Strait 
and westward, between Banks Land and 
Prince Albert Land, attaining a point within 
25 miles of Melville Sound, already reached 
from the East ; thus demonstrating the exist- 
ence of a northwest passage. 

1853-1855. — Grinnell expedition, under Dr. 
Kane, proceeding straight northward through 
Baffin Bay, .Smith Sound and Kennedy Chan- 
nel, nearly to the 70th degree of latitude. 

1857-1859. — Search expedition sent out by 
Lady Franklin, under Captain McClintock, 
which became ice-bound in Melville Bay, Au- 
gust, 1857, and drifted helplessly for eight 
month.s, over 1,200 miles. 

1860-1861.— Expedition of Dr. Hayes to 
Smith Sound. 

1868. — Swedish Polar expedition, directed 
by Professor Nordenskiiild, attaining latitude 
81° 42', on the 18th meridian of east longi- 
tude. 

1869-1870. — German Polar expedition, un- 
der Captain Koldewey, one vessel of which 
was crushed, the crew escaping to an ice floe 
and drifting 1,100 miles, reaching finally a 
Danish .settlement on the Greenland coast, 
while the other explored the east coast of 
Greenland to latitude 77°. 

1871-1872. — Voyage of the steamer Polaris, 
fitted out by the U. S. Government, under 
Captain Hall. 

1872-1874. — -Austro-Hungarian expedition, 
under Captain Weyprecht and Lieutenant 
Payer. 

1875-1876.— English expedition under Cap- 
tain Nares. in the Alert, and the Discovery, 
attaining by ship the high latitude of 82° 27', 
in Smith Sound, and advancing by sledges to 
83° 20' 26", while exploring the northern 
shore of Grinnell Land and the northwest 
coast of Greenland. 

1878-1879, — Final achievement of the long- 
sought northeast passage, from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific ocean, by the Swedi-sh geog- 
rapher and explorer, Baron Nordenskiold. 

1879-1882. — Polar voyage of the Jeannette, 
fitted out by the proprietor of the New York 
Herald and commanded bv Commander De 
Long. U. S. N. 



798 



FEOM COLOoS^Y TO WORLD POWER. 



1881-1884. — International undertaking of 
expeditions to establisli Arctic stations for 
simultaneous meteorological and magnetic ob- 
servations: by the United States at Smith 
Sound and Point Barrow, by Great Britain 
at Fort Rae; b3' Russia at tlie mouth of the 
Lena and in Nova Zembla ; by Denmark at 
(iodliaab, in Greenland: by Holland at Dick- 
son's Haven, near the mouth of the Yenisei ; 
by Germany in Cumberland Sound, Davis 
Strait; by Austro-Hungary on Jan Mayen 
Island; by Sweden at Mussel Bay in Spitz- 
bergen. The United States expedition to 
Smith Sound, under Lieutenant Greely, es- 
tablished its station on Discovery Bay. Ex- 
ploring parties sent out attained the highest 
latitude ever reached, namely 83° 24'. After 
remaining two winters and failing to receive 
expected supplies, which had been interce]ited 
by the ice, Greely and his men, twenty-five 
in number, .started southward, and all but 
seven perished on the way. The survivors 
were rescued, in the last stages of starva- 
tion, by a vessel sent to their relief under 
Captain Schley, U. S. X. 

1886. — Reconnoissance of the Greenland 
ice by Civil Engineer R. E. Pearv, U. S. N. 

1891-1892.— Expedition of Li'eut. Peary, 
U. S. N., with a party of seven, including 
Mrs. Peary, establishing headquarters on 
McCormick Bay, northwest Greenland; 
thence making sledge journeys. 

1893. — Exjjedition of Dr. Xansen, in the 
Fram from Cliristiania. 

1893-1894.— Expedition of Lieut. Peary 
and party (Mrs. Peary again of the number), 
landing in Bowdoin Bav, August, 1893. 

1894.— Expedition of Mr. Walter Wellman, 
an American jovirnalist. purposing to reach 
Spitzbergen via Xorway, and to advance 
thence towards the Pole, with aluminum 
boats. The party left Tromsoe ilay 1. but 
were stojjped before the end of the month bj- 
tlie crushing of their vessel. They were 
]iicked up and brought back to Norway. 

1895. — ^ Return of Peary relief expedition 
with Lieut. Robert E. Peary and liis com- 
panions. In spite of great difficulties Lieut. 
Peary had again crossed the ice-sheet to In- 
dependence Bay, determined the northern 
limits of Greenland, charted 1,000 miles of 
tlie west coast, discovered eleven islands and 
the famous Iron Mountain (three great 
meteorites), and obtained mucli knowledge 
of the natives. The purely scientific results 
of the expedition are of great value. The re- 
lief expedition was organized by Mrs. Peary. 

1897. — Seventh Peary expedition to Green- 
land. Accompanied by parties for scientific 



research. Relics of Greely's expedition found 
on Cape Sabine, and the great meteorite at 
Cape York brought away at last. 

1897. — Balloon voyage of Salamon August 
Andree and two companions, Mr. Strindberg 
and Mr. Fraenkel, starting from Danes' 
Island, north of Spitzbergen, in the hope of 
being carried to the pole. 

1897. — Return of Jackson-Harmsworth ex- 
pedition from three years' exploration of 
Franz Josef Land and the region north of it. 
Franz Josef Land was resolved into a group 
of islands and almost entirely mapped. Small 
parties journeying northward over the ice, 
establishing depots of supplies, the most 
northern in latitude 81° 21', discovered and 
named Victoria Sea. the most northern open 
sea in the world. 

1898-1899.— Second attempt by Walter 
Wellman to reach the north pole. Wintered 
in Franz .Josef Land, establishing an outpost, 
called Fort McKinley. in lat. 81° N. In Feb- 
ruary Mr. Wellman, with three companions, 
started northward and seemed likely to suc- 
ceed in their undertaking, but a serious acci- 
dent befalling Jlr. Wellman. and an ice- 
quake destroying many dogs and sledges, a 
hurried return to headquarters was neces- 
sary. Here important scientific observations 
were made. The 82d parallel was reached 
bj' the explorer. 

1898. — Carefully planned expedition of 
Lieut. Peary, purposing to advance toward 
tlie pole by west coast of Greenland. 

1898. — Expedition of Capt. Sverdrup to 
northern Greenland — Lieut. Peary's especial 
field. Having planned a polar expedition 
similar to Peary's he sailed up the west coast, 
but the Fram was frozen in near Cape Sabine. 
Sverdrup therefore explored the western part 
of Ellesmere Land, then sailed again in an 
attempt to round the northern coast of Green- 
land. 

1899-1900. — Arctic expedition of the Duke 
of tlie Abruzzi, His ship, the Stella Polare, 
was left at Crown Prince Rudolf Land during 
the winter. The Duke became incapacitated 
by a fall and by the loss of two joints from 
tiie fingers of his left hand, incurably frost- 
bitten; but a small party under Capt. Cagni 
pushed northward till provisions were ex- 
hausted. Xansen's record was beaten, the 
Italian party reaching lat. 86° 3,3', at about 
56° E. long! No land was found north or 
nortliwest of Spitzbergen. Three men were 
lost from Cagni's party. 

1900. — Seward peninsula, the most west- 
ward extension of Alaska, explored and sur- 
veyed by five government expeditions. 



LVIII. 
THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER - 1909. 



Influence of Catch-words and Plirases on Sentiment of People. — Old Ideas of World Powers. ■ 

\\liat Constitutes tlie \\'orld Power of To-day. — The " Powers " of the Nineteenth Century. 
— The Concert of the Powers. — " Spheres of Intiuence." — Europe No Longer the World. — 
The Recognized World Powers; England, France, Germany, Russia, and the United States. — 
Riches of China. — Outbreak of European Nations in 1897. — Murder of French and German 
Missionaries. — "The Battle for Concessions." — Attitude of Administration Leaders Toward 
Spanish War. — Despatch to Commodore Dewey at Hong Kong. — " Offensive Operations in the 
Philippine Islands." — The Annexation of Hawaii. — Underlying Purpose of Many Congress- 
men. — "Point of Vantage for Acquiring Dominion in Far East." — Causes of War. — 
Political and Commercial and Xot Merely Humanitarian. — Terms of the Protocol 
Concluding Peace. — The American Commissioners to Paris. — Proceedings of the Joint 
Commission at Paris to Agree upon Treaty of Peace. — " The Cession Must Be of Whole 
Archipelago or None."— Change in Public Sentiment as Result of War. — Views of Senator 
Hoar. — The Teachings of the Fathers Become "Glittering Generalities." — "Those Nursery 
Rhymes that were Sung Around the Cradle of the Republic." — ■ Deljate Over the Spanish 
Treaty. — Possessions Acquired by the Treaty. — ^Increasing Responsibilities and Ex])eiises 
as Result of War. — Already More than One Thousand Two Hundred and Fifty Million 
Dollars Directly Chargeable to that Cause. — "The Parting of the Ways." — Contrasted 
Views of World Powers. — The One Militant and Aggressive ; the Other Peaceful and iloral. 
T— United States Always a World Power in Latter Sense. — Illustrations of that Fact. — • 
The Outlook. 



" If, drunk with sight of power, we loose 
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe. 
Such boasting as the Gentiles use 
Or lesser breeds, without the Law — 
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet. 
Lest we forget. — lest we forget! " 

— KlPLINQ. 




force 



T would bo a most interesting study to trace through history 
the influence upon its development of phrases and catch- 
words. There have been few periods of political, social, 
or religious ferment when some phrase uttered casually, 
j^erchance, by a leader of public opinion, or a natural 
growth based upon some ideal, has not caught the popular 
ear, and had a more potent influence than studied argu- 
ments, or eloquent appeals. Such, in a sense, was the high- 
sounding title the " Holy Eoman Empire," which Voltaire 
declared was neither Holy, Roman, nor Empire. Though 
in fact only an ideal, it was the most powerful political 
in the world for centuries. Based upon the concept that as God rules the 



spiritual world through his representative the Pope, so there must be a representative 
of his authority in the material world who should be supreme in all matters of state, 
there gradually grew up a guasi-universal National Power, under the rule of an 



800 



FEOM COLONY TO WOULD POWER. 



emj)eror, to whom all other states and 
rulers were theoretically subject ; and 
though even the appearance of an entity 
which the phrase suggested became practi- 
cally inoperative three hundred years ago, 
the title itself appealed to the imagination 
of rulers and peoples alike until early in 
the last century; so that even Napoleon's 
proposal to re-establish the Holy Roman 
Empire aroused an enthusiasm that for a 
time went far toward stifling an opposition 
to the crimes which his ambition led him 
to perpetrate. When the Fathers of our 
American Commonwealth enunciated one 
of the basic principles of Democratic 
Government in the pregnant sentence 
" No taxation without representation," 
they gave currency to one of those xArases 
which have never failed to arouse and stir 
the popular mind, whether the principle 
underlying the phrase has been compre- 
hended or not. The latest of these effec- 
tive catch-ijhrasos is " World Power," — 
an idea that touches the pride of a people, 
and puts in the hand of the political 
leader and the demagogue a powerful in- 
strument wherewith to fire their thought, 
for good or evil, however little they ai)- 
preciate what the phrase really stands for. 
There have, of course, been World Powers 
since the dawn of history, but in such an 
application the term had a different sig- 
nificance. Rome in the first century of our 
Era and Spain in the sixteenth were 
rightly called World Powers because in 
fact they controlled the destinies of the 
whole or greater part of the then known 
world. But in the twentieth-century use 
of the term another idea is conveyed. 
The World Power of to-day does not of 
necessity embrace a greater part of the 
territory of the earth than other nations; 
hut it is that power which with greater or 
less interest in various parts of the world, 
is so dominant and influential by virtue 
of its own material and moral resources 
that its voice is listened to with respect, 
perhaps with fear, by all the other nations 
of the earth. This modern use of the term 
is new, having become common only 
within the last fifteen years, as the result 



of the phenomena] political changes that 
have characterized that period. 

As the nations revived after the disin- 
tegrating and crushing blows of Na- 
poleon's restless activity, five of them came 
to the front as the controlling forces in 
the reconstruction of Europe, — England, 
France, Russia, Prussia, and Austria. 
These became " The Powers," and a sixth 
was added after the unification of Italy, 
while after a process of mighty develop- 
ment the German Empire succeeded in the 
early seventies to the place of the Iving- 
dom of Prussia. Europe during the first 
three-quarters of the nineteenth century 
was politically the World; and these 
Powers directed its affairs. The United 
States, the lusty and growing youth, even 
though its material strength and moral 
influence before the end of the period had 
surpassed those of some of the European 
States, was held aloof from interference 
in European affairs by its i^olicy as voiced 
in the Monroe Doctrine. The united ac- 
tion and interests of these great European 
States gave rise to another catch-phrase, 
the " Concert of the Powers," which be- 
came a favorite expression with journal- 
ists and popular speakers, though the 
manner in which they referred to it too 
often indicated that they had little knowl- 
edge as to whether it stood for a political 
or musical combination. vSo effective was 
this phrase that the " Concert of the 
Powers " gradually assumed in the public 
opinion of the nineteenth century the 
force of an entity, and meant to it much 
the same that the Holy Roman Empire 
meant to the people of the middle ages. 
England, it is true, had been a World 
Power in the latest sense for many years, 
as its flag floated over territory in every 
part of the world; but the interests of the 
other Powers, excepting Russia, were 
centered in Europe. Suddenly, however, 
during the nineties, a fever for territorial 
expansion became epidemic, and all the 
Powers entered upon a wild scramble for 
land in all parts of the world, wherever it 
was not already strongly held, or in the 
hands of competing powers. The rapid 
development of home industries, usually 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



801 



fostered by excessive protective tariffs, in 
each state, was the chief moving factor in 
this scramble, as new marliets became 
necessary as au outlet for the overproduc- 
tion at home; and the scheme involved 
the marking out and establishing a con- 
trol over great portions of the globe, which 
were either annexed in some form to the 
particular state, or were brought within 
its exclusive " sphere of influence." This 
implied that within that " sphere of in- 
fluence " only the nation establishing its 
supremacy should be consulted in internal 
affairs; that only the goods, machinery, 
etc., manufactured by its factories and 
merchants should be sold; and that in all 
internal developments its bankers should 
first be applied to for necessary funds. 
Much of the territory seized, or brought 
under the controlling influence of many 
of these states, was uncivilized and, for 
the time at least, incapable of being made 
a productive asset of the aggressive na- 
tion. Thus, France included within her 
sphere of influence in Africa a great part 
of the Desert of Sahara ; but claims have 
been made as extensive and comprehensive 
as possible in the hope that at some time 
they would become rich markets for home 
produce, or in some other way prove of 
value. The whole procedure has been 
aptly described by a leading English 
statesman as " pegging out claims for the 
future." 

This great change of national policy 
marks a new epoch in the world's history. 
The " Powers " of the flrst eighty years 
of the nineteenth century have ceased to 
be the dominant influence in world's 
politics, as such. Europe is no longer 
the world. England, France, Germany, 
Russia are all more practically interested 
in affairs outside of Europe than they are 
in those within the old limits. By a 
strange succession of events, too, the 
United States has become active in the 
same direction, for good or for ill, and, 
inoculated by the expansion bacillus, has 
stretched its land-grabbing arms around 
the world, with the result that instead of 
the " Powers " of the nineteenth century, 
— ^England, France, Germany, Russia, 



Austria, and* Italy, — the twentieth century 
counts only the " World Powers," — 
England, Russia, Germany, France, and 
the United States. 

As the nations of Europe began to 
study the map of the world to see what 
territory was available for conquest or 
pre-emption, hungry eyes were fixed upon 
China. That the country was infinitely 
rich in mineral resources, and that the 
wants of her three or four hundred million 
I)eople offered unlimited possibilities as a 
market for European goods, had long been 
recognized. Richthofen, one of the 
world's most learned geologists, had de- 
clared that the region around Tsechau was 
the richest mineral land in the world. 
This district, known as the Shanse, is 
about two hundred and thirty miles long 
by thirty wide, and is able, as this expert 
estimates, to furnish coal and iron for 
the world's manufactures, at the rate of 
consumption for the year 1900, for two 
thousand years. Mr. Brooks Adams, a 
learned and ingenious authority on poli- 
tical movements, especially in their con- 
nection with economic needs, has found 
the immediate cause of the outbreak of 
the European powers upon China in 1897 
in the formation of the first Steel Trust 
in the United States, which took place on 
March 17 of that year. Realizing the 
natural results of this movement the 
great manufacturing nations of Europe 
were convinced that they must look else- 
where for cheap coal and iron. Un- 
happily for China the easy victory which 
Japan had gained over that country in 
1894 made evident the political weakness 
of that great and rich nation ; while by 
their action in robbing Japan of the 
fruits of her victory, nominally in the 
interests of China but truly to serve their 
own, Germany, France, and Russia had 
apparently established a prior claim to 
the consideration of the Chinese Govern- 
ment and people. How sincere the pre- 
tensions of at least one of the intermed- 
dling nations were the secret treaties 
which Russia immediately exacted from 
China afterwards made clear. Jealousy 
of each other, however, kept each from 



802 



FEOM COLONY TO WOELD POWEE. 



overt acts for a time; but in 1897 the 
vultures could no longer be kept from 
their prey. Happily for them during the 
summer of that year one French and two 
German missionaries were killed by the 
Chinese, and quite justly as the investi- 
gations afterward made proved. Separa- 
tion was at once demanded of the govern- 
ment by these powers, not, however, in 
the way of punishment of the offending 
natives, or money payment, but in the way 
of railroad and mining concessions. 
Eussia pressed down from tlie north, 
seized Port Arthur, and endeavored to 
establish her control over practically all 
the territory to the north of Peking; Ger- 
many forced from the Go\-ernment a 
ninety-nine year lease of the important 
strategic point and port of Kiao-Chau, 
with several miles of adjacent territory, 
and extended her " sphere of influence " 
over the rich Shantung province which 
extends to the borders of the mineral zone 
in the Shanse province; and later Eng- 
land demanded and received the lease of 
Wei-hai-Wei, with contiguous lands, on 
the same terms that had been granted Ger- 
many in the lease of Kiao-Chau. Then 
what Lord Salisbury called the "Battle 
for Concessions " began. Within a year 
each of the nations named had established 
a well defined " Sphere of Influence," and 
together they had practically forced the 
decrepit Chinese government to grant 
over thirty separate and valuable conces- 
sions involving mining claims and the 
rights-of-way for the building of railroads 
wherever their individual interests would 
be advanced. Well docs Professor Eeinsch, 
in his " World Politics," say : '• Never be- 
fore, perhaps, has so much material value 
been attached to ministers of the Gospel 
in foreign lands; and the manner in 
which, after their death, they are used to 
spread civilization is somewhat foreign to 
our older ideas of the functions of the 
bearers of Spiritual blessings." And 
again, in speaking of the exorbitant de- 
mands of the French Government in con- 
sequence of the murder of the French 
priest, the same writer says : " The man- 
ner in which religious, industrial, and 



political considerations are combined in 
this case produces a somewhat incon- 
gruous result. . . . Small wonder that 
the Empress dowager in a recent (1898) 
decree enjoined all officials of the Empire 
to give missionaries and churches special 
protection. The murder of a European 
missionary is one of the most expensive 
indulgences the Chinaman can nowadays 
permit himself." 

Of course the attention of the great 
European nations, with the exception of 
Eussia, was not directed toward China 
alone during this period. That was sim- 
ply the richest fruit and seemed ripe for 
picking. New spheres of influence were 
established in Africa and the islands of 
the seas, until in 1900 there seemed to be 
no land on the globe subject to foreign 
aggression that had not in some form 
been pre-empted. We have considered the 
movements in China more in detail simply 
because they had a direct bearing upon 
the course the LTnited States was led to 
pursue. 

The real causes of the Spanish war have 
never yet been clearly set forth, and per- 
haps will not be for a generation. Osten- 
sibly they were chiefly humanitarian, and 
the Eesolutions of the Congress, and the 
declarations of the Executive branch of 
the Government, were directed toward a 
confirmation of this theory. The first of 
the Eesolutions adopted by Congress, 
April 19, 1908, which were the virtual 
declaration of war, declared " that the 
people of the Island of Cuba are, and of 
right ought to be; free and independent ; " 
and the last of these Eesolutions stated 
" that the United States hereby disclaims 
any disposition or intention to exercise 
sovereignty, jurisdiction, or control over 
said island, except for the pacification 
thereof, and asserts its determination, 
when that is accomplished, to leave the 
government and control of the island to 
its people." This was understood by the 
people of the United States and by for- 
eign governments to disavow all purposes 
of aggression, — our sole aim being to es- 
tablish order in Cuba instead of the 
anarchy that had so long prevailed in the 



THE UNITED STATES A WOELD POWER — 1909. 



803 



island, and to remove the distress of its 
people; and it was understood that when 
these beneficent purposes were achieved, 
our work was done, and the contest would 
end. Moreover President McKinley had 
declared during- the summer that " Forci- 
ble annexation, according tO' our American 
code of morals, would be criminal aggres- 
sion," — a sentiment that received enthu- 
siastic endorsement throughout the land. 
On another occasion, at about the same 
time, he said: "Human riglits and Con- 
stitutional privileges must not be forgotten. 
in the race for wealth and commercial 
supremacy. The government of the peo- 
ple must he hy the people, and not hy a 
few of the people. It must rest upon the 
free consent of the governed and all of 
the governed. Power, it must he remem- 
hered, which is secured hy onpression or 
usurpation or hy any form of injustice is 
soon dethroned. We have no right in law 
or morals to usurp that which helongs to 
another, whether it is property or poiver." 
But while the popular mind was stirred 
by conflicting purposes, a mingling of a 
beneficent impulse excited by the reports 
of the sufferings Spanish rule in Cuba 
was causing and a spirit of revenge 
aroused by the loss of the Maine, igno- 
rantly ascribed to Spanish treachery, it is 
only too evident that the motive forces 
that were directing the representatives of 
the people at Washington were political 
and commercial. — not at bottom human- 
itarian or beneficent, but purely material. 
Mr. McKinlej' and his party had 
triumphed at the polls in 1896 after a 
hard-fought battle upon the financial ques- 
tion alone, — no other was seriously dis- 
cussed. But after being elected and as- 
suming office the Administration ignored 
the issue on which it was raised to power, 
and no efforts were made to enact any 
measures looking toward the establish- 
ment of the currency on a sound basis. 
On the contrary, one of the President's 
early acts was the appointment of a com- 
mission to sound the great money powers 
of Europe on the subject of bi-metallism, 
— a move looking toward the return to the 
party fold of the rebellious silver-party 



men. But the very first measure to re- 
ceive legislative and executive attention, 
a measure on which the people may truly 
be said to have expressed no opinion by 
their votes so thoroughly was it kept out 
of sight by the money question, was the 
revision of the tariff, the Dingley Bill re- 
ceiving immediate and favorable con- 
sideration, adding largely increased pro- 
tection to the already over-protected in- 
dustries of the country. This seemed to 
many Republicans, even, much like a 
breach of trust ; and as the months passed 
it became evident that a spirit of rebellion 
was abroad in the party, and the Con- 
gressional election of the Fall of 1898 was 
looked forward to with not a little alarm. 
It did not, therefore, take remarkable 
legislative acumen to see t'le political 
value of a war with Spain, which would 
distract the attention of the people from 
home issues, and hold them united in sup- 
port of the party conducting the war. 
General Grosvenor, an administration 




wiLLi.-VM Mckinley. 

leader and close friend of the President, 
asked in the House on March 31, nearly 
a month before war was determined upon, 
" Do you think that this great party in 
power to-day is going to be unfaithful to 
a trust which, as the gentleman from 



804 



FEOM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



Texas intimates, -will, if properly dis- 
charged, bring glory to ihe administra- 
tionf Will the administration now in 
power run away from the most brilliant 
opportunity that any administration since 
the days of Abraham Lincoln has had to 
establish itself and its party in the praise 
and honor and glory of a mighty people ? " 
And a week later he declared in the same 
place: " This war will be fought under 
the banner of the Republican administra- 
tion of this Government, or it will never 
be fought at all." On April 16, similar 
sentiments were expressed in the Senate, 
— Senator Hale, of Maine, proclaiming 
that " if war must come, its conduct will 
not be in the hands of the Democratic 
party; it will not be by the Democratic 
party that the flag of the LTiiited States 
■will be borne; that great soldier and 
statesman, the President of the United 
States, will conduct the war and bring it 
to a successful end ; " while that distin- 
guished statesman. Senator Piatt of New 
York, found the great compensation for 
the war in the fact that " it would pre- 
vent the Democratic party from going 
into the next Presidential campaign with 
' Free Cuba ' and ' Free Silver ' em- 
blazoned on its banner, and prevent the 
possibility of Populistic success in 1900." 
While such sentiments indicate clearly 
that political considerations chiefly an- 
imated a large proportion of the mem- 
bers of Congress, there is hardly a hint to 
be found in the debates of the influence 
of commercialism; nor is there manifested 
any ulterior purpose to seize new territory 
as a result of the war. It is generally 
stated, and as generally believed, that 
the course which events took, at length in- 
volving the subsequent acquisition of the 
Philippines, did not enter the mind of the 
Administration or any of its supporters. 
Professor Reinsch, in his " World Poli- 
tics," notes the " remarkable coincidence, 
to say the least, that the United States 
should have entered upon war, the out- 
come of which placed it unexpectedly in 
the centre of Asiatic affairs, just at the 
time when the resources of the celestial 
empire were first beginning to be really 



opened to foreign enterprise and when 
Eurt)ix'an nations were beginning to make 
territorial encroachments upon various 
portions of China." And in another place 
he says : " At the beginning of the war 
there was perhaps not a soul in the whole 
Republic who so much as thought of the 
possibility of his nation becoming a sov- 
ereign power in the Orient." Professor 
Coolidge, in his " United States a World 
Power," declares this last statement of 
Professor Reinsch to be a " bit em- 
phatic ; " but he considers it " safe to say 
that when orders were sent to Commodore 
Dewey to proceed to Manila, President 
McKinley and his cabinet had no thought 
of getting possession of the three thou- 
sand odd islands which have since come 
into American hands." Yet the order sent 
to Dewey under date of February 25, two 
months before the opening of hostilities, 
was in these words : " In event of declara- 
tion of war with Spain, your duty will be 
to see that the Spanish squadron does not 
leave the Asiatic Coast, and then offen- 
sive operations in Philippine islands." 

It is certainly difficult to see how the 
last phrase of this order can be made to 
comport with the ijosition of the two 
writers quoted, or with the statements gen- 
erally made in this regard. But light on 
vexed questions frequently comes from un- 
expected sources. One of the most illu- 
minating books recently published on 
many questions in American politics is 
the "Autobiography " of Senator George 
F. Hoar. No one will question Senator 
Hoar's political orthodoxy; among the 
staunch Republicans in Congress during 
the last thirty years he has been " the 
noblest Roman of them all." On two or 
three occasions he has differed seriously 
with his party in its policies, and has 
strenuously endeavored to turn it from the 
course it was pursuing, — notably, and for 
similar reasons, on the whole question of 
Chinese Exclusion, and the acciuisition of 
the Philippines; but when a vote has been 
taken his name has always appeared in 
the party column. For nearly a year be- 
fore tlie Cuban affairs came to a crisis the 
i]uestion of the annexation of Hawaii had 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



805 



been before Congress. When that body 
assembled in December, 1897, the advo- 
cates of annexation were sure the measure 
would pass without serious opposition; 
but strongly opposing forces soon mani- 
fested themselves ; and though the measure 
was more or less constantly debated all 
through the winter it steadily lost support 
and was dropped until the war was well 
on. Senator Hoar goes quite extensively 
into his connection with this subject, re- 
citing first the previous attempts to annex 
the islands and the positive position he 
had taken and advocated in favor of such 
treaties. As will be remembered the 
treaty negotiated by President Harrison 
was withdrawn from the Senate by Pres- 
ident Cleveland and not resubmitted. 
Another treaty was negotiated soon 
after President McKinley assumed office. 
" Meantime, however," says Senator Hoar, 
" the controversy with Spain had assumed 
formidable proportions, and ihe craze joy 
an extension of our empire had her/un ils 
course. Many Bepublican leaders were 
advocating ihe acquisition of the Ha- 
waiian Islands, not for the reasons I have 
just stated, hut on the avowed ground that 
it was necessary we should own them as a 
point of vantage for acquiring dominion 
in the Far East." (This was early in 
1898). "Under these circumstances the 
question of duty came to me : Will you 
adhere to the purpose long formed, and 
vote for the acquisition of Hawaii solely 
on its own merit ? Or will you vote against 
it for fear the had and mischievous reasons 
that are given for it in so many quarters 
will have a pernicious tendency only to 
be counteracted by the defeat of the 
treaty itself ? " He says that he hesitated 
long. One day President McKinley sent 
for him to come to the White House, " as 
was not his infrequent habit." " He said 
he wanted to consult me upon the ques- 
tion whether it would be wise for him to 
have a personal interview with Senator 
Morrill, of Vermont. He had been told 
that Mr. Morrill was opposed to the 
Treaty. The President said : ' I do not 
quite like to try to influence the action 
of an old gentleman like Mr. Morrill, so 



excellent, and of such exi^erience. But it 
is very important to us to have his vote.' 
I said, ' I ought to say, Mr. President, in 
all candor, that I feel very doubtful 
whether I can support it myself.' I told 
the President that I favored then, as I al- 
ways had, the acquisition of Hawaii. But 
I did not like the spirit with which it was 




GEORGE F. HOAR. 

being advocated hoth in the Senate and 
out of it. I instanced several very distin- 
guished gentlemen indeed, one a man of 
very high authority in the Senate in mat- 
ters relating to foreign affairs, who were 
urging publicly and privately the Ha- 
waiian treaty, on the grounds that we 
must have Hawaii in order to help us get 
our share of China. President McKinley 
disclaimed any such purpose. He ex- 
pressed his earnest and emphatic dissent 
from the opinions imputed to several lead- 
ing Republicans, whom he named. I left 
the President, after the conversation 
above related, without giving him any as- 
surance as to my action. But I deter- 
mined, on full reflection, to support the 
acquisition of Hawaii in accordance with 
my long settled purpose, and at the same 
time to make a clear and emphatic state- 
ment of my unalterable opposition to ac- 



806 



I'KUM CULOXV TO WUiiLD POWER. 



quiring dependencies in the East, if we 
did not expect, when the projier time 
came, to admit them to the Union as 
States. Afterward, July 5, 1898, (more 
than a month before the capture of Ma- 
nila), I made a speech in the Senate on 
the joint resolution for the acquisition of 
Hawaii, in which I said that I had enter- 
tained j^rave doubts in regard to that 
measure; that I had approached the sub- 
ject with greater hesitation and anxiety 
than I had ever felt in regard to any other 
matter during my whole public life. I 
went on to say: 'The troulile I have 
found with the Hawaiian business is this: 
not in the character of the ixipulation of 
_the Sandwich Islands, not in their dis- 
tance from our shores, not in the doubt 




Photo. CopyrighteO bi/ J. E. Pitrdi/, Bosion. 
WILLIAM P. FBYE. 

that we have an honest right to deal with 
the existing government there in such a 
matter. I have found my trouble in the 
nature and character of the argument by 
which, in the heginning and ever since, a 
great many friends of annexation have 
sought to support it . . . If this be the 



first step in the acquisition of dominion, 
over harbarous archipelagos in distant 
seas; if we are to enter into competition 
with the great powers of Europe in the 
plundering of China, in the division of 
Africa ; if we are to quit our own to stand 
on foreign lands; if our commerce is here- 
after to be forced upon unwilling peoples 
at the cannon's mouth; if we are ourselves 
to be governed in part by peoples to whom 
the Declaration of Independence is a 
stranger; or, worse still, if we are to gov- 
ern subjects and vassal states, trampling 
as we do it on our own great charter which 
recognizes alike the liberty and the dig- 
nity of individual manhood, then let us 
resist this thing in the beginning, and let 
us resist it to the death. I do not agree 
with those gentlemen who think we should, 
wrest the Philippine Islands from Spain, 
and take charge of them ourselves. I do 
not think we should acquire Cuba, as the 
result of the existing war, to be annexed 
to the United States.'" In the light of 
these statements, coupled with the order 
sent to Commodore Dewey, it would seem 
impossible to deny that there were many 
and influential men in Congress and out 
of it who had the acquisition of the Phil- 
ippines in mind even before the outbreak 
of the war with Spain; and that the real 
causes of that war were political and com- 
mercial, and not simpl.v humanitarian. 

Hostilities between Spain and the 
United States were terminated by the 
Protocol signed August 12. By article 
I., SiJaiii agreed to relinquish all claim of 
sovereignty over and title to Cuba. By 
the second article. Spain ceded to the 
United States Porto Rico and all other is- 
lands then under her sovereignty in the 
West Indies, and also an island in the 
Ladrones. By the third article it was 
agreed that the United States should oc- 
cupy and hold the city, bay, and harbor 
of Manila, pending the conclusion of a 
treaty of peace, tvhich "shall determine 
the control, disposition, and government 
of the Philippines." The next two articles 
provided for an appointment of commis- 
sioners for the purpose of carr.ying out 
the details of the evacuation of Cuba, 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



807 



Porto Rico, etc., and for the appointment 
of five commissioners on each side to meet 
at Paris not later than October 1st to 
negotiate a treaty of peace; while the 
sixth and last article provided that upon 
the signing of the protocol, hostilities be- 
tween the two countries should imme- 
diately be suspended. The Peace Commis- 
sioners met at Paris October 1. The 
United States delegation was composed of 
William R. Day, who resigned the office 
of Secretary of State to head the Com- 
mission ; Cushman K. Davis, Chairman of 
the Senate Committee on Foreign Rela- 
tions; William P. Frye, president pro-tem 
of the Senate; Senator George Gray of 
Delaware, and Whitelaw Reid, editor of 
the New Tork Tribune. Professor John 
Bassett Moore, Assistant Secretary of 
State, acted as Secretary of the Commis- 
sion. At the first meeting of the Joint 
Commissioners, the Spanish commission- 
ers demanded a restoration of the status 
quo of August 12 in the Philippines, Ma- 
nila having been attacked and captured 
the day after the signing of the Protocol. 
This subject the American commissioners 
refused to discuss, claiming that it had 
been considered in the negotiations that 
resulted in the Protocol, and so was not 
properly within their powers. Waiving 
the point for the time, the Spanish repre- 
sentatives reserved the right to bring it 
up later. The entire month of October 
was consumed in a discussion as to the 
cession of Cuba, the troublesome subject 
being the arrangement of the Cuban debt. 
The Philippine question was taken up 
October 31, and occupied the time of most 
of the meetings during the entire month 
of November. The President's mind was 
not made up on this question when our 
commissioners left for Paris, so that it 
was practically an open one. The general 
instructions which the President gave the 
Commissioners under date of September 
16, referred to the subject in this manner: 
" Without any original thought of com- 
plete or even partial acquisition, the pres- 
ence and success of our arms at Manila 
imposes upon us obligations which we 
cannot disregard. The march of events 



rules and overrules human action. Avow- 
ing unreservedly the purpose which has 
animated all our effort, and still solicitous 
to adhere to it, we cannot be unmindful 
that, without any desire or design on our 
part, the war has brought us new respon- 
sibilities, which we must meet and dis- 




CUSHMAN K. DAVIS. 

charge as becomes a great nati(;n on whose 
growth and career from the beginning the 
Ruler of Nations has plainly written the 
high command and pledge of civilization. 
Incidental to our tenure in the Philip- 
pines is the commercial opportunity to 
which American statesmanship cannot he 
indifferent. It is just to use every legit- 
imate means for the enlargement of 
American trade; but we seek no advan- 
tages in the Orient which are not common 
to all. . . . The commercial oppor- 
tunity which is naturally and inevitably 
associated with this new opening depends 
less on large territorial possession than 
upon an adequate commercial basis and 
upon broad and equal privilejres. 
The United States cannot accept less than 



808 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



tlie cession in full rig-ht and sovereignty 
of the island of Luzon." During the dis- 
cussion of the question sharp differences 
of opinion arose among the Commission- 
ers, and their several views were submitted 
to the President by cable on October 25, 
with a request for explicit instructions. 
At the time of their appointment as com- 
missioners. Senators Frye and Davis and 
Whitelaw Reid were known to be earnest 
in their purpose to acquire territory in 
the far East, while Secretary Day was 
thought, and Senator Gray known, to be 
utterly opposed to the policy of expansion. 
The first three commissioners favored the 
acquisition of the entire Philippine Ar- 




WHITELAW REID. 

chipelago ; Secretary Day expressed no op- 
position to the retention of Luzon, but he 
objected to a peremptory demand for the 
whole Philippine group, thereby, as he 
said, " leaving us open to the imputation 
of following agreement (in Protocol) to 
negotiate, with demand for whole subject 
matter of discussion for ourselves." Sen- 
ator Gray cabled his objections at length. 
Among other things he said: "The 



undersigned cannot agree that it is wise 
to take Philippine islands in whole or in 
part. To do so would be to reverse ac- 
cepted continental policy of the country, 
declared and acted upon through our his- 
tory. Propinquity governs the case of 
Cuba and Porto Eieo. Policy proposed 
introduces us into European politics and 
the 'entangling alliances' against which 
Washington and all American statesmen 
have protested. It will make necessary a 
navy equal to the largest of powers; a 
greatly increased military establishment ; 
immense sums for fortifications and har- 
bors; multiply occasions for dangerous 
complications with foreign nations, and 
increase burdens of taxation. Will re- 
ceive in comixnisation no outlet for Amer- 
ican labor in labor market already over- 
crowded and cheap ; no area for homes for 
American citizens; climate and social con- 
ditions demoralizing to character of 
American youth; new and disturbing 
questions introduced into our politics; 
church questions menacing. On whole, 
instead of indemnity, injury. . . . 
(There is) no place for colonial admin- 
istration or government of subject people 
in American system. So much from 
standpoint of interest ; but even conceding 
all benetits claimed for annexation, we 
thereby abandon the infinitely greater 
benefit to accrue from acting the part of 
a great, powerful, and Christian nation; 
we exclidiige the moral grandeur and 
strength to he gained hy heepiiig our word 
to nations of the world, and hy exhibiting 
a magnanimity and moderation in the 
hour of victory that becomes the advanced 
civilization we claim, for doubtful mate- 
rial advantages and shameful stepping 
down from high moral position boastfully 
assumed. H'e should set example in these 
respects, not follow in the selfish and vul- 
gar greed for territory which Europe has 
inherited from mediaeval times. Our 
declaration of war upon Spain was accom- 
panied by a solemn and deliberate defini- 
tion of our purpose. Now that we have 
achieved all and more than our object, 
let us simply keep our word. Third article 
of Protocol leaves everything concerning 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



809 



control of the Pbiliiipine islands to nego- 
tiation between the parties. It is absurd 
now to say that we will not negotiate hut 
will appropriate the whole suhject matter 
of negotiation. At the very least let us 
adhere to the President's instru'ctions, and 
if conditions require the keeping of Luzon 
forego the material advantages claimed in 
annexing other islands. Above all let us 
not make a mockery of the injunction con- 
tained in those instructions, where, after 
stating that we took up arms only in obe- 
dience to the dictates of humanity and in 
the fulfillment of high public and moral 
obligations, and that we had no design of 
aggrandizement and no ambition of con- 
quest, the President, among other things, 
eloquently says : ' It is my earnest wish 
that the United States in making peace 
should follow the same high rule of eon- 
duct which guided it in facing war. It 
should be as scrupulous and magnanimous 
in the concluding settlement as it was 
just and humane in its original action.' 
This and more, of which I earnestly ask 
a reperusal, binds my conscience and gov- 
erns my action." 

Between the date of his first instruc- 
tions to the Peace Commissioners and the 
report of their differences by cable. Pres- 
ident McKiuley had made a western tour, 
at all points discussing war questions, and 
feeling the popular pulse. The people 
were everywhere intoxicated by the great 
victories of the war, and under the in- 
fluence of that " pest of glory,'' as Frank- 
lin called it, — " the thirst for glory which 
is an epidemic that robs a people of their 
judgment, seduces their vanity, cheats 
them, of their interests, and corrupts their 
consciences." At all places he was en- 
thusiastically received, and every refer- 
ence to the disposal of the Philippines 
elicited a popular demand for the reten- 
tion of the whole group. Unfortunately 
no opportunity was afforded him to test 
the sober sense of more thoughtful- 
minded citizens. It is not strange, there- 
fore, that the day after the receipt of the 
cable messages from the Commissioners, 
the Secretary of State replied as follows: 
" The information which has come to the 



President since your departure convinces 
him that the acceptance of the cession of 
Luzon alone, leaving the rest of the is- 
lands subject to Spanish rule, or to be the 
subject of future contention, cannot be 
justified on political, commercial, or 
humanitarian grounds. The cession must 
be of the whole archipelago or none. The 
latter is wholly inadmissible, and the 
former must therefore be required." Nat- 




GEORGE <;KAV 



urally, when the American Commission- 
ers, acting upon these instructions, de- 
manded the cession of the whole Philip- 
pine group, the Spaniards were greatly 
surprised, and claimed the demand was a 
direct violation of the Protocol. After 
further consultation with the home gov- 
ernment, though the President insisted 
that the claim by right of conquest be not 
yielded, as "the destruction of the Span- 
ish fleet on May 1 was the conquest of 
Manila, the capital of the Philippines," 
an ultimatum was issued to the Spanish 
Commissioners, November 21, demanding 
the cession of the entire group, but offer- 
ing to pay twenty million dollars into the 
Spanish treasury for the same. A reply 



810 



FROM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEE. 



was demanded by the 28th; and as Spain 
was helpless and realized that this last de- 
mand was intended as a final one, the Gov- 
ernment yielded on the date named and 
nothing remained to complete the pro- 
ceedings of the Joint Commissioners but 
the draughting of the articles of the 
treaty and the affixing of the signatures 
of the Commissioners, which was done on 
December 10, 1898,— and the United 
States became a World Power. 

It is true that there were many, very 
many Americans who had regarded their 
country as a World Power for many years. 
From the day when, as Emerson has it, 
" the embattled farmers " stood at Con- 
cord bridge 
" And fired the shot heard round tlie 




WILLIAM E. DAY. 

down to President Cleveland's bold atti- 
tude on the Venezuelan situation, hardly 
a year had passed without manifest evi- 
dences of the world-wide influence of the 
United States. In its suppression of the 
Barbary Corsairs; in its successful mis- 
sion to Japan, as a result of which that 
country was ox)ened to the world; in the 



important additions to, and revisions of, 
International Law which it has secured in 
its constant insistence upon the principle 
of arbitration of diflieulties with Eu- 
ropean states; in its general continental 
polic.y, — the influence of the United States 
as a World Power has been constant and 
effective. But beyond and above all these, 
its influence as a moral power had been 
the greatest among all the nations of the 
earth, and had to be reckoned with by 
every continental government. Ever 
since the proclamation of the Declaration 
of Independence there had been raised be- 
fore the vision of the oppressed of all the 
earth an ideal government of the people 
by themselves; a government whose foun- 
dation principle was the equality of all 
men before the law, and which guaran- 
teed to every man who came under its 
beneficent influence the greatest amount 
of personal liberty. Within fifty years 
after the Declaration of Independence by 
the United States, eveiy one of Spain's 
colonial possessions on the Western Con- 
tinent had declared their independence, 
and adopted constitutions almost identical 
with that of the United States; and the 
chief motive force in all the revolutions 
of Europe during the nineteenth century, 
which resulted in the overthrow of abso- 
lutism and the establishment of Constitu- 
tional government, was the spirit of the 
Declaration of Independence of 1776. So 
that, though the United States as a nation 
had not directly and by material force in- 
terfered in the concerns of European gov- 
ernments, yet this moral force was one 
more dreaded by Emj^erors and Kings 
than were the armies and navies of their 
neighbor royal sovereigns, and was the 
leaven that was silently working every- 
where to undermine their power, to en- 
large the freedom of the people, and ex- 
tend their powers as factors in national 
governments. But when the treaty of 
peace with Spain came before the Senate 
for approval on January 4, 1899, where it 
was fiercely debated for a month, the char- 
acter of the speeches made, and the tone 
of the press throughout the country as it 
discussed debates, made it only too evi- 



THE UNITED STATES A WOELD POWER — 1909. 



811 



dent that the events and movements of 
the preceding year had worked a marvel- 
ous, and, as it seemed to many, a most 
lamentable change in the sentiment of the 
majority of the people of the United 
States. A distinguished foreign Ambas- 
sador at Washington is said to have re- 
marked in 1901 that, though he had been 
in this country but a few years, he had 
seen two different countries, — the United 
States before the war with Spain, and the 
United States since the war with Spain. 
Though the change in sentiment had been 
more gradual than this Ambassador's 
picturesque statement would indicate, still 
it was the cleavage that was establislied 
by that war that made it distinct and evi- 
dent to every thoughtful citizen. The 
great charters of Liberty to which the 
faith of the people had been pledged for 
more than one hundred years lost their 
force and seemed to the later legislators 
stumbling blocks in the path of progress. 
The reverence of the older statesmen for 
their principles could hardly be better 
stated than they were by Senator Hoar in 
a speech on the Chinese Exclusion Act, 
in 1880. "I believe," he said, "that the 
immortal truths of the Declaration of In- 
dependence came from the same source 
with the Golden Bide and the Sermon on 
the Mount. IIV can trust Him who pro- 
mtdgated these laws to Tceep the country 
safe that obeys them. The laws of the 
universe have their own sanction. They 
will ntjt fail. The power that causes the 
compass to point to the North, that dis- 
misses the star on its pathway through 
the skies, promising that in a thousand 
years it shall return again to its home 
and keeps His word, will vindicate His 
own moral law. As surely as the path on 
which our fathers entered one hundred 
years ago led to safety, to strength, to 
glory, so surely will the path on which 
we now propose to enter bring us to shame, 
to weakness, and to peril." And in com- 
menting upon the changed conditions he 
said later: "Certainly the Chinese Ex- 
clusion Bill and the Chinese Treaty, the 
Spanish Treaty and the war against the 
Philippine fieople, could not have lived an 



hour before the indignation of the Amer- 
ican ijeople at any time from the begin- 
ning down to the time when, in 1876, they 
celebrated the centennial of their Inde- 
pendence." But " a nevv' King had arisen 
who knew not Joseph." To this new ele- 
ment in legislation and in popular thought 
the Farewell Address of Washington, the 
Declaration of Independence, even the 
principles so earnestly advocated by Lin- 
coln, whose voice, warning his country- 
men that they should take care " lest the 
government of the people, by the people, 
and for the people should perish from the 
earth," was hardly yet silent, — all these 
great statements of the founders of free 
government were but as " sounding brass 
and tinkling cymbals." During the debate 
on the Spanish Treaty these " teachings 
of the Fathers," as they have usually been 
reverently called, were variously referred 
to as " glittering generalities," and 
" those nursery rhymes that were sung 
around the cradle of the Republic." They 
were good enough for tlieir day; but we 
had outgrown all that. A leading writer 
in favor of expansion has even stated un- 
equivocally that Washington's true atti- 
tude has been so far misunderstood that, 
if he had been alive, he would in our day 
have been the leader in all movements 
aimed at the acquisition of foreign terri- 
tory and dependent colonies in far distant 
lands. Even the old songs of the poets in 
praise of liberty have been placed on the 
shelf, and the grand old anthem " My 
Country, 'tis of thee. Sweet land of lih- 
erty," is rarely sung even in our churches. 
In view of all these facts, the statement 
of the foreign Ambassador quoted above 
that he had known two distinct countries 
during his brief sojourn in Washington 
seems hardly exaggerated. 

During the debate on the Spanish treaty 
three quite clearly marked shades of 
opinion were manifested. One of these 
was voiced in the Resolution introduced 
by Senator Vest, two weeks before the 
treaty was submitted to the Senate, but 
when the senators had a full knowledge 
of the final terms the President had dic- 
tated to our Commissioners at Paris. 



812 



FROM COLONY TO WORLD POWER. 



That resolution, ■whieli set the discussion 
of the whole question in motion, was in 
these words : " That under the Constitu- 
tion of the United States no power is 
g'iven to the Federal Government to ac- 
quire territory to be held and governed 
l»rmanently as colonies." About the prin- 
ciples of this resolution the opponents of 
the treaty gathered their forces and raised 
their standard. The position of one wing 
of the expansionists was embodied in the 
resolution of Senator Piatt, of Connecti- 
cut, who said : " I propose to maintain 
that the United States is a nation; that 
as a nation it possesses every soiwreign 
power not reserved in its constitution to 
the States or the people; that the right to 
acquire territory was not reserved, and is 
therefore an inherent sovereign right." 
An interesting point establisiied in this 
resolution was the entirely new view of the 
Constitution enunciated by the learned 
Senator. He finds that the " Nation pos- 
sesses every sovereign power not reserved 
in its Constitution to the states or the 
people ; " whereas that immortal document 
distinctly declares that the Naiion has no 
powers hut such as are delegated to it li>/ 
the states. Article X., of the Amendments 
adopted in 1791, reads: "The powers not 
delegated to the United States by the Con- 
stitution, nor prohibited by it to the 
states, are reserved to the states respec- 
tively, or to the people." But, as a dis- 
tinguished Democratic congressman once 
remarked, when told that some measure 
he wanted to introduce was unconstitu- 
tional, " What is a little thing like the 
Constitution among friends?" The third 
position set up regarding the conditions 
involved in the approval of the treaty was 
the " don't worry " one, — let things take 
their course. This was expressed by the 
junior senator from Massachusetts, Henry 
Cabot Lodge, in these words : " Suppose 
we ratify the treaty. The islands pass 
from the possession of Spain into our pos- 
session without committing us to any 
policy. I believe we can be trusted as a 
people to deal honestly and .iustly with the 
islands and their inhabitants thus given 
to our care. What our precise policy shall I 



be I do not know, because I for one am 
not sufficiently informed as to the condi- 
tions there to be able to say what it will 
be best to do; nor, I may add, do I think 
anyone is." This sentiment received 
wide endorsement, and had much to do 
with the fijial approval of the treaty, a 
majority of the Senators agreeing that, 
as they had eventually worked cut of more 
or less disagreeable positions in the past 
with a greater or less degree of honor, so 
they undoubtedly would work out of this 
dilemma. The general feeling was that 
the baby had been left upon the doorstep, 
and in some way they must make provi- 
sion for its sustenance. Nevertheless 
there was a hearty response to the state- 
ment Senator Spooner made during the 
debate : " The Philippine proposition is 
one of the fruits of the war. To me it 
is one of the bitter fruits of the war. I 
wish with all my heart we were honorably 
quit of it." 

Perhaps no other question has been so 
seriously and fiercely debated since the 
civil war as was the Spanish Treaty, and 
the result was in doubt up to the last 
moment. When the treaty was received 
by the Senate it had been agreed that the 
final vote should be taken ou February 6. 
An unlooked-for event came to the aid o£ 
its supporters at the last moment. On the 
evening of February 4 a quarrel broke out 
between what was styled the Insurgent 
army of Filipinos and the American 
troops, which resulted in a pitched battle 
and the loss of American lives. Many at 
once took the position that an insurrec- 
tion having become a fact, no other course 
was oiwn to us but to approve the treaty, 
and postpone any action as to the stand- 
ing or rights of the jseople of the islands 
until the insurrection was put down. Yet 
even then the Administration had not the 
majority of votes required. But at the 
last moment Mr. Bryan, who was still rec- 
ognized by the Democrats as their party 
leader, appeared on the scene and urged 
his followers to vote for the treaty; with 
the result that it was approved February 6, 
by a vote of 57 for and 27 against. Of 
those voting in favor of the treaty 40 were 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



813 



Republicans, 10 Democrats, 3 Populists, 
2 Silverites, and 2 Independents. Of 
those who voted against it, 22 were Demo- 
crats, 3 Republicans, and 2 Populists. 

As a result of Dewey's victory at Ma- 
nila and the general progress of the Span- 
ish war, it was made more easy for the 
advocates of the annexation of Hawaii to 
press their interests. The treaty which 
President McKinley had submitted to the 
Senate in June, 1897, constantly lost 
friends as the debate upon it was dragged 
along through the following winter. By 
March, 1898, the Administration saw that 
there was no hope of securing a majority 
in favor of the treaty, and dropped it, de- 
termining to resort to a Joint Resolution 
of both houses to accomplish their pur- 
pose. The new measure passed the House 
June 15, and the Senate July 6, and was 
signed by the President the following day. 

It is a recognized opinion among 
twentieth century publicists that quan- 
tity rather than quality counts in the 
determination of " World Powers." As a 
result of the treaty with Spain the United 
States acquired, for twenty million dol- 
lars and other considerations, 3,141 islands 
in the Philippine Archipelago and about 
8,000,000 subject people. Of the islands, 
however, only 1,668 are listed by name, 
and only 342 are inhabited. The total 
area of the archipelago is 11.5,000 square 
miles, of which Luzon constitutes 40,000, 
and Mindanao 36,290, while the area of 
2,800 islands is less than a square mile 
each. The islands are mostly momitain- 
ous or very hilly, and of volcanic origin. 
The entire population, according to the 
census of 1903, was 7,635,426, of which 
number 6,987,686 were classed as civilized, 
about 650,000 as wild. Of the civilized 
inhabitants practically all are adlierents 
of the Catholic Church ; while of the wild 
tribes about one-half are Mohammedan 
Moros. The most important of the other 
acquisitions from Spain is the island of 
Porto Rico, the fourth in size of the West 
Indian islands, with an area of about 
thirty-six hundred square miles. Accord- 
ing to the last census taken its population 
was 953,243, of which number 589,426 



were classed as white, 304,352 as Mestizos, 
59,390 as blacks. It must be borne in 
mind, however, that the term white as 
used here is a very uncertain quantity and 
a somewhat variable color. The island of 
Guam, one of the Ladrones, also acquired 
from Spain, is of importance only as a 
coaling station, being about thirty miles 
long and six bi'oad, with a population of 
about nine thousand. The territorial pos- 
sessions, not annexed to the home-land, 
which serve to establish the position of 
the United States as a " World Power," in 
the latest sense, may be summed up as 
follows: Alaska, The Philijipine Archi- 
pelago, Hawaii, Porto Rico, Guam, the 
small island of Tutuila in the Samoan 
group, and the strip of territory across 
the Isthmus of Panama. The acquisition 
of this territory has not been made, how- 
ever, without the assumption of great 
financial burdens, and vast responsibili- 
ties. Lord Salisbury expressed the opin- 
ion, after the American occupation of the 
Philippines, that the appearance of the 
United States as a factor in the Eastern 
question would greatly help the interests 
of Great Britain, but was " not in the 
interests of peace." As was illustrated in 
our war with Spain, in the event of a war 
with a European or Asiatic power, our de- 
pendencies would be the weak point, which 
would first be attacked by the enemy. So 
long as the policy is continued, therefore, 
of holding widely separated lands, there 
will be a demand for a constantly increas- 
ing navy and a large standing army. The 
increased expenditures of the government 
which can be traced directly to the Span- 
ish war amount to more than 1,250 
million dollars; while incidental expenses 
as truly traceable to the same source 
would vastly increase this amount. Al- 
ready the annual military and naval ap- 
propriations of the United States are 
painfully close to those of the great mil- 
itary states of Europe ; while if our an- 
nual pension disbursements V7ere classed 
as military expenditures, as they are in 
Europe and should be here, the present 
total expenditures of the United States 
each year for military and naval purposes 



814 



FEOM COLONY TO WOKLD POWEK. 



would exceed that of any of the great mil- 
itary powers of the world by at least forty 
per cent. The curse of militarism in 
Europe, from which the American people 
have always gloried in being free, has been 
well expressed by the adage that in those 
countries " every laboring man carries a 
soldier on his back." Under existing ten- 
dencies it would be well for every labor- 
ing man in the United States to consider 
well how long it will be before he must 
take up a similar burden. The crown of 
glory is the most costly ornament a nation 
can wear. 

We have referred to the nineteenth cen- 
tury period as the Youth of this great 
nation, — the United States. The colonial, 
may be regarded as its childliood days. 
With unfailing admiration we have tried 
to depict the glory of that youth, — as of 
a young man gradually becoming con- 
scious of his powers, and ever and anon 
testing them in new fields of endeavor. 
Ever actuated by high and noble purposes, 
though sometimes erring, the youthful 
nation advanced step by step to honor, 
power, and influence; until on the thresh- 
old of its mature life it faced " the part- 
ing of the ways." The one path was broad, 
easy to traverse, as it had been well worn 
by the older nations of the world, an<l 
promised generous, if not always har- 
monious, companionship. The other way 
the young nation must largely mark out 
for itself through the coming years as it 
had through the past — " isolated," per- 
haps, yet glorious and of mighty benefi- 
cence in its isolation. Over the entrance 
to the one way hung a banner ou which 
was inscribed as a maxim 

" The good old rule, the simple plan, 
That they should take who have the 

power. 
And they sliould keep who can." 

Over the other entrance were simply the 
homely truths taught by the Fathers and 
their later followers, which warned 
against the temptation to make " en- 
tangling alliances " abroad, and whose 
spirit breathed only freedom, good will 
to all men who willed good, a sturdy self- 



respect, and the same consideration for 
the rights of others that was expected 
from them in return. For good or for ill, 
intoxicated by victory in an unexpected 
struggle, the nation turned its eyes toward 
the alluring heights of glory, and was 
bound fast by its sijell. Almost in a day 
a revulsion toward old policies and pre- 
cepts and enthusiasm for the new trans- 
formed its people, and thought and en- 
deavor were turned to new and strange 
channels. The travelers over the old and 
beaten road said, " He has become as one 
of us," and were reasonably jubilant. Hap- 
pily, though hardly a decade has passed 
since the enthusiasm for bigness rather 
than for goodness took possession of the 
popular mind, there are already abun- 
dant evidences that a constantly increasing 
number of the people and of their leaders 
are looking back with a higher regard for, 
and desire to return to, the old ways. In 
the course of a serious expression of his 
regret that he had on two or three oc- 
casions been obliged to radically dissent 
from positions his party had taken, Sen- 
ator Hoar in his Reminiscences consoles 
himself with the recollection that his 
political associates and the majority of 
the people later came to take the same 
views. While the reaction regarding the 
subjugation of the Philippines had not 
proceeded far enough before his death to 
enable him to claim that endorsement for 
his views on that subject; still he was able 
to write : " I have been told by many 
Senators who voted for the Treaty that 
they regretted that vote more than any 
other act of their lives. Enough Senators 
have said this to me in person, not only 
to have defeated the Treaty, but if they 
had so voted, to have defeated it by a 
majority. A very eminent Eepublican 
Senator told me that more than twenty 
Senators who voted for the Treaty had 
given the same assurance to him. But 
they are very unwilling to make the dec- 
laration public." Everyone who has fol- 
lowed the debates in Congress knows full 
well that a question relating to the gov- 
ernment of the Philippines rarely comes 
before either branch of that body with- 



THE UNITED STATES A WORLD POWER — 1909. 



815 



out eliciting- from some speakers an ex- 
pression of impatience or disgust, — as in 
the case of Senator Hale, of Maine, who, 
under such circumstances, recently petu- 
lantly exclaimed in the Senate, "would 
that we were quit of the whole business ! " 
It is, perhaps, unfortunate that the claim 
of the United States to the position of a 
" World Power " in the popular sense 
hinges so absolutely upon its occupation 
of, and course in, The Philippines. As 
it is, more and more of the people see 
neither glory nor honor in its application. 
We have referred above to the silent, in- 
tangible, but uone the less effective power 
of this nation all through its youth as 
the standard bearer of the cause of Free- 
dom and an enlightened civilization, and 
of the influence throughout Europe of 
the gospel it proclaimed. That this is not 
a mere fancy, a letter from " an emi- 
nent Hindoo Scholar " in the Japan 
Times, June 17, 1902, bears abundant tes- 
timony. Referring to Senator Hoar's 
powerful statement of the principles 
underlying our government, that writer 
said : " The speech of Mr. Hoar, though 
an address to his own countrymen, is a 
message of hope to the whole world, which 
sank in despondency at the sight of Re- 
publican America behaving like a cruel, 
tyrannical, and rapacious Empire in the 
Philippines, and particularly to fhe heart - 
hrokeii people of Asia, who are heginning 
to lose all confidence in the humanity of 
the white races. Or is it that they have 
lost it already? Hence all papers in Asia 
should reprint this speech, translate it, 
and distribute it broadcast. Let it be 
brought to the Asiatic people so that they 
may work and worship their champion and 
his forefathei-s. Thanks to the awaken- 
ing in America, thanks to the forces that 
are at work to chase out the degenerating, 
demoralizing passion for territorial ag- 



grandizement from the noble American 
mind and save it for itself and for the 
world at large from the Cancer of Im- 
perialism." 

Here is an expressed recognition of 
America's World Power by even an 
Oriental, such as every lover of his 
country may contemplate with pride and 
holy satisfaction, — a power that never 
strikes to humiliate or oppress, but whose 
every action looks toward the uplifting 
and enlightenment of every sort and con- 
dition of men, of whatever race, creed, 
or color. Now, as in Solomon's time, 
"Righteousness exalteth a nation; but 
sin is a reproach to any people." When it 
shall come about, and there are many in- 
dications that the time is not far distant, 
that this great Republic shall free itself 
from the temptations and snares of Im- 
perialism and shall again walk in the old 
paths, practicing, and not preaching only, 
good faith and the highest and most 
honorable treatment of all nations and all 
peoples; then, blessed with its immense 
resources, energy, and intelligence, the 
manhood of the Nation shall present the 
unique spectacle of a country so truly a 
" WORLD POWER " that its very moral 
force in world movements will place it in 
a position which no enemy, however 
powerful materially, may successfully 
assail. Then, as with one voice, fearlessly 
and unblushingly looking every fellow- 
man in the face, may the whole i>eople 
join with renewed reverence and devo- 
tion in the grand anthem : 

My country 'tis of thee. 
Sweet land of liberty. 
Of thee I sing: 
Land where my fathers died. 

Land of the Pilgrim's pride. 
From every mountain side. 
Let freedom ring. 



INDEX. 



Achievements of nineteenth eentury greater than those 
of all preceding centuries, 32. 

Adams, Brooks, theory of, as to outbreak of European 
Nations in China, 769. 
— , Henry, History of the United States, quoted. 36. 
— , John, earnest advocate of Independence, 66 ; 
urges selection of Washingt^m as Cr-mmaEider-in- 
Chief of Continental Army, S9 ; appointed first min- 
ister to England. 96; interview with George HI.. 
97; results of his mission. 100; elected first vice- 
president of the United States, 116; death of. on 
Independence day. 1S26, 192; sk'etch of his life and 
distinguished services, 192. 193. 
— . John Quiney, farewell address of, as President, 
to Lafayette. 190; defender of the Right of Peti- 
tion, 206-215; presents fifteen petitions to Congress 
praying for the abulition of slavery In the District 
of Columbia, 207; bittci opposition of Southern rep- 
resentatives, 208; details of fierce debate of eleven 
days. 208-214; triumph of Adams, 214; contest over 
the organization of tlie House. 215; his wonderful 
proplu'cy of the Proclamation of Emancipation, and 
its effects, 306 ; announces principles of the Monroe 
Doctrine, 512 ; opposes alliance of any sort with 
Great Britain, 512. 513; spicy retort to Canning's 
protest against settlements on the Columbia river, 
518. 
— , Samuel, pays $2,000 for suit of clothes, 46. 

Agassiz, Louis, lectures at the Lowell Institute, 740. 

Agriculture, the chief source of wealth of the Colonies, 
62. 

Alaska. 7S1. 

Alexander I., of Russia, commanding position of, at 
close of the Napoleonic wars. 502; his meeting with 
Mme. de Krudener, 503 : her influence over his 
thought and action, 503. 504 ; great review of Rus- 
sian army, and Tc Deinn service. 503 ; opinion of 
Sainte-Beuve, 504 ; Emperor's declared purpose in 
farming the Holy Alliance, 504, 505; his influence 
with his allies, 505. 

Alexander the Great, effect of conquests of, 33. 

Alexandrinus, the Codex. 407. 

AlexieflF. Ru*!sian viceroy, 617-619. 

Allies, the Holy, the Emperors of Russia and Austria 
and King of Prussia, 505 ; original purposes of, 
506; degeneracy of. 507; ultimate plan to crush the 
Spirit of Democracy, SOS. 

Alvey, R. H., 522. 

Altgeid, Governor, pardons Chicago anarchists, 456. 

Amber, and its properties, 636. 637. 

America, the Yacht, victorious race of, 250-258; opin- 
ions of Englishmen regarding the boat, 252 ; scenes 
at Cowes before the start, 252 ; details of the race, 
253-257 ; Queen Victoria and Prince Albert visit the 
yacht, 258; description of the vessel, 258; summary 
of all races for the America's Cup, 258. 

American and French Republics, close relations of, 
6S1. 682. 

American and Spanish governments, communications 
between, prior to the Spanish war, 4G9. 470. 

American Bible Revision Committee. The, and its 
work. 441; their revision published In 1901, 441. 



American people. The; their pride in the nation's 

history, 468. 
— Philosophical Society, founding of The, 643. 

Americus Club, The, 377. 

Ames, Fisher, view of conditions existing in 1800, 47; 
remarkable speech on the Jay treaty, 55S. 

Amicis, Edmondo de, quoted. 562. 565. 

Ampere, Andre, establishes principles of electro- 
dynamics, 600. 601. 

Anarchy, princiiiles and development of. 445-456 ; 
causes that led up to the revolutionary movements 
of the last century, 445 : the " rights of man " 
versus the " divine rights " of Kings and institu- 
tions, 445; position of dominant powers in Church 
and State, 447: influence of the French Revolution 
on social movements. 447 ; of the transcendental 
movement, 447 ; St. Simon. Fourier. Proudhon. — 
their principles and schools. 448 ; differing super- 
structures built upon their teachings. 44S ; sketch 
of Proudhon's life and writings, 448 ; influence of 
his great disciples, Biikunin and Kropotkin. 448. 
449; the celebrated trial of Anarchists at Lyons in 
1883. 449 ; development of destructive anarchism 
in Russia, 450; murder of Alexander 11. and its re- 
sults, 450 ; Anarchist leaders driven to the United 
States, 450 ; labor organizations in America not 
Anarchistic, 451 ; the great strike at the McCor- 
mick Harvester Works, Chicago, in 1885-1886, 451. 
452 ; wild actions of Anarchist leaders and pr'ess. 
452, 453 ; the Haymarket meeting and riot. May 4. 
1886. 453; arrest and trial of eight Anarchist lead- 
ers, 454, 455; attitude of trial judge. J. E. Gary. 
455; execution of four of the leaders, November 11. 
1886, 455; public opinion and position of Governor 
Altgeld, 456; revulsion of popular sentiment. 456. 

Angell, James B.. president of L'niversity of Michigan. 
726. 

Anglo-Japanese Alliance, The, 614. 

Annexation of Hawaii. The. 525-556; early legends re- 
garding the islands, 525 : unknown until close of 
the eighteenth century, 526. 527 ; arrival of Captain 
Cook and his dealings with the natives. 526. 527: 
names them Sandwich Islands, in honor of his 
patron, the Earl of Sandwich, 527: location and de- 
scription of the islands, 527 ; the great volcanoes. 
528; description of Kilauea. 528; daring action of 
Princess Kapiolani, 529. 530; history of islands di- 
vides itself into thi''ee periods. 530 ; early migra- 
tions of the Polynesians. 530; the Sawainris. 
531 : description of the social and religious life of 
the people, 531-534; Kamehameha I., 535, 536: 
overthrow of the native religion, 536. 537; arrival 
of missionaries, 537; introduction of learning with 
the new religion, 537-539 ; creation of a written 
language and alphabet, 540: constant friction with 
visiting naval commanders, 540-546; expulsion of 
Catholics. 541; the Great Revival. 542. 543; recog- 
nition of the island government by Great Britain. 
France, and the United States. 543; establishment 
of constitutional government, 543-545 ; astounding 
mortality among the natives, 544, 545; rise of a 
for'eign party In politics, 545-547; Queen Liliunka- 
lani's statement of the situation. 545. 546; acces- 
sion of King Kalakaua. 54S ; he makes reciprocity 



INDEX. 



817 



troaty wltb the rilited States. 549: cession of Pearl 
barbor, 549 ; accession of Liiiuokaiani, 550 ; quar- 
reis between the Que'en and the foreign party, 551, 
552 ; peculiar course of the American minister, .T. L. 
Stevens, 552 ; Committ'ee of Public Safety formed, 
552 : troops landed from the Boston to aid in over- 
throwinft the government of the Qui-en, 552 : Com- 
mitt'ee of Safety gains control of the government. 
55.3 : embassy to Washington to secure annexation, 
553; protest of tlie Queen, 553; action of the Har- 
rison administration. 554; President Cleveland with- 
draws the treaty from tlie Senafe, 554 ; his 
remarljable message. 554, 555 : he institutes thor- 
ough investigation of conditions in Hawaii, 555 ; 
President JIcKinley submits new treaty to Con- 
gress. 555 ; fails to receive support. 555 ; islands 
annexed to the United States by Joint Resolution of 
both houses of Congress, 555 : ceremonies attendant 
upon the transfer of the islands, 555, 556 ; policy of 
leading Republicans as to annexation, 773. 

Antonines. The, age of, 32, 

Appropriations, generous, of Congress for the Navy, 
495. 

"Arabian Nights, The," quoted, G39, 676. 

Arbitration between nations, inception of the principle, 
558: prominent subject before the Hague Confer- 
ences, 572-582 ; the Permanent International Court 
of Arbitration, 574; proposed Permanent Court of 
Arbitral ,Jnstic'e, 579-582. 

Arc lights, electric, described, 668-670, 

Architecture, colonial, 56. 

Armour. J. Ogden ; founds Institute of Bloodless Sur- 
gery. 754. 
— . P. D. ; founds th'e Armour Mission, and the Ar- 
mour In.stitnte. 753. 754. 

Armstrong and Orling system of wireless telegraphy 
675. 

Army, the, transportation of, from Florida to Cuba, 

490 ; astonishing lack of preparation for service, 490, 

491 ; movements and actions about Santiago, 491 ; 
El Caney and San Juan hill. 491 ; embarkation for 
Montauk Point, 494 : General Miles invades Porto 
Rico, 494. 

Arnold, Matthew, appreciation of the Bible. 442, 443. 

Aryans, Persian and Greek. 33. 

Asia. Ptolemy's description of. 594. 

Asiatic despotisms overthrown by Alexander. 33. 

Assa.ssination of President Lincoln. 344-355 ; review of 
events that bad crowned his career with glory. 344. 
345 ; incidents of last day of the President's life. 
345. 34G; the party to witness the *'.\mcrican 
Cousin " at Ford's theatre, .346; details of the 
events that followed. .347-349: consternation and 
grief of the people. 349 ; the funeral obsequies. 350, 
351; capture of the assa.s.sln. 352; trial and sen- 
tences of the conspirators. 354, 355, 

Astor, John Jacob, and th'e Astor library, 757, 758, 
— , Lenox, and Tilden foundation. The, 760, 761. 

Atlanta. Ga., captured and burned by General Sher- 
man, 327. 

Atlnnla, The. 479. 

Atlantic cable, laying of the. 661-664. 

Authorized, or King James. Version of the Bible, re- 
sult of many previous revisions, 401 ; history of its 
preparation and reception, 431 ; long rivalled by the 
Geneva Bible, 434. 

Autonomy granted to Cuba by Spain. 470. 

Awakening, The Great, in the Religious World. 276- 
288; influence of the great panic on the movement. 
277 ; vast audiences assemble all oVer the country. 
277. 27S; the John Street and Jayne's Hall daily 
prayer meetings. 279 ; group of noted revival preach- 
ers. 280 : requests for pra.vers. 2S1 ; work of Moody 
and Sankey. 284 ; character of immense m'eetings 
conducted by them. 2S6. 

B. 

Bakunin. Michael, disciple of Proudhon, 448; leading 
exponent of destructive anarchism, 448 ; terrible ex- 
periences and sufferings, 448, 449, 

Baltimore, Md.. in 1800, 40; rise of the later city 
from ashes, 585. 



Baltimore, The Second Council of, decree regarding 
the authorized text of Scriptures for the Catholic 
Church. 436. 437, 
Bancroft, George, quoted, 694. 

Baptist Young People's Union. The, organization of. 
389: general scope of its work, 390: all Baptist 
Young people called out of the Endeavor societies, 
390; organ, and watchword, of the society, 390. 
Barnard College. 729. 
— , Henry, and his educational work, 724, 
— , Professor E, E,, use of selenium cells by, to 
detect comets, 671. 
Bartholdi statue, history of the, 682-684. 
Barthoidt. Richard, 574. 
Battery, The, New York city, in 1800, 37, 
Battleship fleet, remarkable cruise of, around the 

world, 496-499. 
Beach. Charles F., courses on American law at French 

universities, 684, 685. 
Beaufort. M. W. II. de. 567. 

Bede. the Venerable, makes translations of the Script- 
ures, 412. 
Bell. Alexander Graham, and his telephone, 665-667, 

— , The Liberty. 66. 
Benjamin, Park, quoted, 639, 644. 
Berkeley. Sir William, opinion on early education In 

Virginia, 70S. 
Berzelius, J. J., discovers selenium. 671. 
Bible, curious and rare editions of the, 436, 437. 
— on which Washington took oath as President, de- 
scription and history of, 121. 
— . Revision of the. 401-444. See Revision of the 
Bible. 
Biddle, Captain Nicholas, 474, 475. 
Bildt. Baron de, Swedish delegate to the Hague Con- 
ference, 570. 
Birth of the Xew Navy. 479. 
Bishops' Bible, The. history of, 430. 
Blaine, James G.. 516. 549. 
Blair, James, founds William and Mary College, 709- 

711. 
Blizzard. The Great. 457-406; wonderful material de- 
velopment of New York city, 457 ; origin and course 
of storm that paralyzed all movement In the city, 
458 : ofljcial report of the Weather Bureau regard- 
ing it, 458 ; unparalleled severity of snow fall and 
gale for two da.vs, 459-482 ; thrilling experiences of 
people exposed to storm's fury, 460-462 ; all traffic 
of every kind suspended, 462 ; experience of ex- 
Senator Roscoe Conkling, 463 ; scenes after the ces- 
sation of storm, — loss of life and property, 464 ; 
messages of sympathy from Dakota, 465 : limited 
area covered by the storm, 466. 
Blockade of Cuban ports established. 483; effective 

blockade of Santiago harbor, 482. 483. 
Bolton. Mrs. Sarah K.. quoted. 732. 
Boh Homme Iticliard, The. battle with the Serapis, 72. 
Boone, Professor R. G.. quoted. 698. 
Booth. J. Wilkes, shoots President Lincoln in Ford's 
theatre, 347 ; flight, and shooting of the assassin by 
Boston Corbett, 352, 
Boston Latin School. The, 696. 
— . Mass.. reception of news of the declaration of 
independence, GS : population and general character 
of the town in 1800, 39; becomes a city in 1822, 
39: effects of the great September gale in, 176; 
rise of the city from ashes. 585. 
— News Letter, The, first paper published in the 

Colonies, 62. 
— . The, pioneer vessel of New Navy, 479. 
Bottome. Mrs. Margaret, organizes the Society of 

■' King's Daughters," 385. 
Bowdoin, Governor, and Shays' rebellion, 104. 
Bowling Green, destruction of statue of George HI. 

in. 68. 
" Boxer " outbreak in China. The. 616. 
Boyle. Robert, and the Royal Society, 640. 
Bradford .\cademy. The. 721. 
Brethren of the Common Lot, The, 693. 
Brewer. David J.. 522. 523. 

Brookli/ti, The. 480; flagship of Admiral Schley. 486; 
on blockade and in battle off Santiago, 487, 489, 
492-494. 



u 



818 



INDEX. 



Brooks, Reverend Phillips. 696. 

Brotherhood of St. Andrew. The. 390 ; Its early or- 
ganization, principles, mottoes, etc., 390; the "St. 
Andrew's Crn.ss." 390. 

Rr.van. William J., urges support of the Spanish 
treat.T. 780. 

Br.vce, James, quoted, 557 ; his friendship for the 
United States, 689 ; a might.v Influence for peace, 
689; his Anterican Coynmuuwfnith, 689, 690; ambas- 
sador to the I'liitert States, 689. 

Br.vn Mawr College. 720. 

Buchanan. Franklin, commander of the Mcrrimac in 
her fight with the Munitor, 298, 302. 

Bug Bihie. The. 4:i7. 

Buoys, Electric, automatically lighted by use of selen- 
ium, 671. 

Burke. Edmund : his appreciation of the Bible. 443. 

Burnham. D. n. : his plans for beautifying San Fran- 
cisco. 6.',4. 

Burr, Aaron; duel with Hamilton, 144; sketch of his 
career, 145: origin of his hatred for Hamilton. 146; 
his shooting of Hamilton regarded as wilful mur- 
der, 150. 

Butler, Nicholas Murray, interviews with the German 
Emperor, 685 ; president of Columbia University. 
717, 

c. 

Cable, submarine, description of. 661. 

Caedmnn. sings paraphrases of the Scriptures, 411. 

California, discovery of po'iil at Sutter's Mill. 242- 
249 ; early explorers of. 626 ; the University of, 
753. 

Calvin. John, and popular education, 694. 

Cambridge, Mass.. name clianced from Newtowne. 700. 

Canal, The Nicaragua, ^vr Panama Canal. 
— , Panama. See Panama Canal. 

Canals, noted, of the world, description and cost of 
the, 610. 

Candles, early use of, 59. 

Canning. George. 508. 512. 513, 518. 

Capeflgue, M., historian of the Restoration, quoted. 
505. 

Capital, founding and establishment of the first na- 
tional. 129-135: previous migrations of the national 
government, 129; compromise which led to perma- 
nent establishment on the Potomac. 130; corner- 
stone of the oapitol laid. September 18. 1793. by 
Washington. 132; archives of the government re- 
moved from Philadelphia to Wa.shington. In summer 
of 1800, 133; grand plan on which new city was 
laid out. 135. 

Capitol, the national, comer-stoie laid at Washing- 
ton. 132. 

Cardinal, consecration of the first. In the United 
States. 365-370; the conclave of cardinals, 365; 
John McCloskey, Arch-bishop of New York, hon- 
ored, 366; details of the ceremony of consecration. 
366-370 ; papal documents conferring the honor, 
369; description of St. Patrick's Cathedral. New 
York city. 370. 

Carlyle. Thomas; his reverence for the Bible, 443. 

Carnegie, Andrew ; his numerous gifts. 763, 764 ; ad- 
dress at the Pittsburg Institute, — professed igno- 
rance of his wealth, 763; general conditions upon 
which his gifts are m.Tde. 764 ; the teachers' pen- 
sion fund, 765 ; the Temple of Peace at The Hague. 
765. 
— Institute. Pittsburg. Pa., founder's day at the, 
678. 

Caroline Affair, The. 205. 

Cars, electric, 672, 673. 

Corter, J. F., the " Father of Normal Schools," 724, 
725. 

Cathay, origin of the name, 594. 

Catholic churches, the Bible used In, 432. 

Cavallo, Tiberius: " History of Electricity." quoted, 
647. 

Cavlte. Manila bay. battle off, 484-486. 

Central Pacific railroad, opening of the. 750. 751. 

Cervera, Admiral Pascual, and his fleet. 486; enter 
Santiago harbor, 487 ; description of his vessels. 



487, 488 ; his dash for liberty, and the destruction 
of his fleet. 492-494. 
Challoner, The. revision of the Douay Bible, 436. 
Charles I.; his contest with Parliament. 34. 
Charleston, S. C, population and status of, In 1800, 

42. 
Chatham, Earl of; his estimate of the Continental 

Congress. 70. 
Chautauqua. The. 730. 
Cheney, John Vance. 755. 
Chicago, rise of the city from ashes, 585. 
— , the University of. 726. 764; approximate totr.l 
of gifts from J. I>. Rockefeller. 764. 
Childhood of the Nation, The. 782. 
China and pewter, use of, during colonial days, 57. 
China, results of the war with Japan, 615; Integrity 
of the nation secured by Secretary Ilay. 620 ; im- 
mense mineral wealth of the country, 769 ; out- 
break of European Nations In, 769. 

Chinatown. San Francisco. 629. 

Chinese South Pointing Car, The, 638. 

Choate, Joseph H., delegate to Hague Conference, 
674 ; places window in St. Saviour's Church, 
London. In memory of John Harvard. 703. 

Church Life in the Colonies, 59; in New England ^dd 
Virginia compared, 60. 

Clenfuegos. Cuba, blockade of. 483. 487. 

Citizens* Industrial Association of America, The, 399. 

Civil War. <-oiiditIon of the Navy after the. 479. 

Clark, Captain C. E., commander of the Oregon, 482. 
See Oregon, The. 
- — . Reverend F. E. ; organizes the flrst society of 
Christian Endeavor, .386; character of the man and 
his work. 386 : resigns pastorate to become presi- 
dent of the United Society ot Christian Endeavor, 
387 ; establishes the Society paper, the " Golden 
Rule." 388; message on the twenty-eighth birthday 
of the Society. 388. 

Clay, Henry. 514. 599. 

Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, The. 599; Its abrogation, 603. 

Clergy, character and influence of the Colonial, 60. 

Clermont. The, Fulton's first steamboat, 153. 

Cleveland, Grover; message to Congress on the Cuban 
situation. 468; bold position regarding the Venezuela 
boundary dispute. 519. 520 ; message to Congress 
regarding the same, 520 ; his " Presidential Prob- 
lems " quoted. 520; message to Congress withdraw- 
ing the treaty for the annexation of Hawaii. 514, 
515 ; address at the unveiling of the Bartholdl 
statue. 683. 

Cochrane. C. H. ; his " Modem Industrial Progress " 
quoted. 671. 

Codex, meaning and description of, 406 ; Codes 
Sinai ticus, Vaticanus, Alexandrinns, Ejihracmi, de- 
scribed. 407. 408. 

Coffee Houses, noted ones about 1800. 38. 

Collins. Sir Richard. 523. 

Collinson. Peter, association with Franklin. 642, 643. 

Colombia, relations with United States regarding the 
Isthmus. S(e Panama Canal. 

Colonial Days. In, 31-64. 

Colonies, lack of common Interests In the, 44 ; 
chaotic conditions in, following the Revolutionary 
War. 45. 

Columbia College and University, 416. 417. 

Comets, use of selenium cells in detecting, 671. 

Commission of Washington as Commander-in-Chief of 
the Continental Army, 89. 

Committee of Seventy, The, investigates the Tweed 
Ring. 380-382. 

Compass, the mariner's, first knowledge of, in Europe, 
595. 

Concas, Captain, describes plan of action for Cervera'a 
fleet. 492. 

Concert of the Powers, The. 768. 

Conclave of Cardinals. The. 365. 

Congress, the Continental. 66. 

Congressional Resolutions establishing war with Spain, 
473. 

Conkling, Roscoe. experience in the Great Blizzard. 
463. 

Connecticut, The, flagship of battleship fleet. 499. 



INDEX. 



819 



Connolly. Richard B., 376-380. 

Constitution, formation and adoption of the Federal, 
lOS; proceedings and events that led up to the cun- 
vention at Philadelphia, 109; character of the load- 
ing delegates to the convention. 110 ; submission 
of the Constitution to tbe States, and its final 
adoption. 114. 
— , The, United States frigate, captures British frig- 
ate Guerriere 157 : " Old Ironsides," ir>7 ; de- 
scription of the battle. 158-162; effect of victory on 
the American people, 163. 

Continental Congress, opinions of its members as to 
a standing army and navy. 474. 

Cook, Captain James, 526, 527. 

Coolidge, Professor A. C. ; his critical estimate of 
pride of the American people, 468 ; quoted, 772, 

Cooper, Peter, and the Cooper Union. 756. 757. 

Corbett. Sergeant Boston, shoots murderer of Lincoln, 
352. 

Cornell University, 726. 761. 

Cortez ; his efforts to discover the secret strait across 
the Isthmus. 596. 597. 

Cotton. Reverend John, 696. 

Cotton, first production of, in the United States, 44. 
— Gin. The. invention of, 44, 122; conditions pre- 
vailing previous to Whitney's Invention, 125 ; de- 
scription of the machine. 126; Its effect upon cotton 
production, 128. 

Coubertin. Baron de, Interest of. In educational re- 
ciprocity. 684. 

Coudert. Frederic R.. 522. 

Council of Trent, The; decree regarding the Vulgate 
text of the Bible. 433. 
— . The Vatican. 1870. 436. 
— . The Second, of Baltimore. 436. 

CoverdalG. Myles ; his translation of the Bible, 424, 
425. 

Creator, The, revelation of the purposes of. 34. 

Crerar. John, record of his princely gifts, 755 ; founds 
the Crerar library in Chicago, 755. 

Crisis, Terrible, in the business and financial world, 
267-275 ; the Great Panic, 267 ; causes of the 
disaster. 268. 269; rapid succession of bank failures, 
268. 269: amusing incidents. 270; consternation and 
despair of the people, 271, 272; fortunes swept 
away like ashes, 273. 

Crocker, Charles, 750. 

Crozier. Captain W., delegate to The Hague Con- 
ference, 567. 

Cuba, relations of the United States with. 468; hor- 
rible devastation and suffering in, 469. 470 ; au- 
tonomy granted by Spain. 470; United States de- 
clares war in behalf of, 473 ; blockade of Cuban 
ports, 483; details of the war in, 486-494; inde- 
pendence secured by the signing of the Peace 
Protocol. August 12. 1908, 494. 

Cuban Junta, The. 469. 

"Cup of All Nations." The, 250, 256. 

Curious and rare editions of the Bible, 436, 437. 

Currency, the Continental. 45. 

Currents, transmission of electric. 667-669; direct and 
alternating. 667; polyphase, 667. 

Cursives, description of, 406. 



D. 

Dakota sends messages of sympathy to New York 
city. 465. 

Dame Schools. The. 699. 

Dana. Charles A., " there Is no book like the Bible." 
444. 

Daniells, J, D., inyentor of the constant current bat- 
tery. 654. 

Danville, Va., temporary capital of the Confederacy, 
341. 

Dark Day, the wonderful, 79. 

Dartmouth College, and the " Dartmouth College 
Case." 718. 719. 

Davis. Cushman K., 775. 
— , General George B.. 574. 

— , Jefferson, flight from Richmond and capture of, 
341. 242. 



Davy. Sir Humphrey, discovers the arc light, 649, 
650. 

Day. William R.. 775. 

" De Jure Belli ac Pacia/* 564, 

Debate between Webster and Hayne, the great, 197- 
205 ; events that led up to it, 198 ; Webster's 
oration the masterpiece of modern eloquence. 205. 

Declaration of Independence. The; committee appointed 
to draft it. 66; Fiftieth Anniversary of its pro- 
mulgation, 191-196. 

Deep-Water Commission of Galveston. The, 590. 

Democracy, criticisms of. about ISOO, 47 ; cause of, 
injured by colonial and state jealousies, 46. 

Demologos. The, Fulton's, the first steam vessel of 
the American navy, 477. 

Dennie, Joseph, and his Portfolio, 03. 

Dewey, Admiral George; text of order sent htm to 
prepare for emergencies, 473; mobilizes fleet in 
Asiatic waters, 483 ; details of the battle of Manila 
bay, 483-485 ; effect of his victory upon the Amer- 
ican people. 485. 

Dewey Arch, The. 501. 

Despotisms, Asiatic, overthrown by Alexander, 33. 

Dexter, Professor: History of Education in the United 
States, quoted, 706. 

Dickens. Charles ; his reverence for the Bible and the 
Christian religion. 433. 

Dinners. Colonial, 58, 

Distaff. The, 31. 

Doe. C. F., great gift of, to the University of Cali- 
fornia. 753. 

Dole, Sanford B., 555. 

Dollar, value of. in 1780, 46. 

Dolores Mi-ssion. The, 627. 

Dolphin. The. 479. 

Douay, or Rheims-Douay, Bible, The, 435. 

Douglas, Stephen A. ; bis great debate with Lincoln, 
289-295. 

Drake. Sir Francis. 626. 

Drama of the development of the race, 33. 

Drunkenness, prevalence of, in the eighteenth century, 
61. 

Duel, The, between Burr and Hamilton, 144-150. 

Dummer Academy, The, 720. 

Dunster, Henry ; first president of Harvard College, 
703. 

Durant. Henry F. ; founds Wellesley College, 728. 732, 

Dwight, Timothy, president of Yale College, 712. 

Dynagraph car, the Dudley, 673. 

Dynamo- Electric machine, the first, 652, 667. 

E. 

Earle. Alice Morse, on Colonial customs. 52. 

Earthquake at San Francisco, loss of life from, 629. 

Eaton, Nathaniel, 703. 

Edison, Thomas A., improves the microphone, 666 ; 
experiments and achfevements In incandescent light- 
ing. 668, 669. 

Education, in the Colonies and States. 691-730; pop- 
ular education the handmaid of an enlightened re- 
ligion, 691 ; effects of intellectual awakening of 
fifteenth century. 691 ; all learning confined to 
narrow circles, 692 ; a measure of liberty essential 
to desire for learning. 602; the Reformation, not 
the Renaissance, the renovating influence. 692; 
Luther's appeal to the German magistrates. 692 ; 
his contention that schools should be supported by 
municipality, or State, 692 ; rapid rise of common 
schools all over Germany, 693 ; first statute requir- 
ing general education. 693; influence of the German 
and Dutch systems of education on the Pilgrim 
Fathers, 693 ; claim that common school system 
came from Calvin and Geneva disproved. 693-695; 
opinions of John Fiske, Bancroft, and Edward 
Everett, 694 ; first public school established In 
North America, 695 ; efforts of the Dutch West 
India Company to advance cause of education, 695; 
the first schoolmaster in New Amsterdam, and first 
Latin school, 695; salaries and duties of early 
Colonial teachers, 696 ; influence of Emmanuel Col- 
lege, Cambridge, upon early New England educa- 



820 



INDEX. 



tion. G9fi : John Cotton and the Boston Latin school, 
696; opinion of Phillips Brooks upon value of the 
foundation, 606. 697 ; early New England schools 
not " free" schools. 696; Indian children alone 
'* taug:ht gratis," 697: decree of the Massachusetts 
General Court, of 1G42; and the law of 1647, called 
the " Great Charter of free education in the Com- 
monwealth," 697; conditions in other New England 
Colonies, 697 ; character of the early teaching, and 
test-bonks. 698 ; public schools for boys alone down 
to near the end of eighteenth century, 698 : the 
Dame Schools, 699; down to Revolutionary period, 
whole range of teaching in elementary schools was 
confined to reading, writing, and religion, 699 ; 
arithmetic and mathematics rarely referred to prior 
to 1750, 699; character of the early schoolhouses, 
699 ; number of university graduates in Massa- 
chusetts and Connecticut in 16:iS. — one to every 
two hundred and fifty of the population, 699 ; first 
appropriation of public money " for a school or 
college." 700; early history of Harvard College. 
701-706; timely gift of John Harvard. 701: sketch 
of his life. 701. 702: history of William and Mary 
College. 707-711 ; Elihu Yale and Yale College. 711. 
712; Tennent's "Log College," 712. 71.1; histr>ry 
of Princeton College, 712-715; founding of King's 
College. 715. 716; history of Columbia College, 
716, 717; Williams College, founding of, 718; re- 
monstrance of Harvard authorities against the es- 
tablishment of a second college in the State, 718; 
early history of Dartmouth College, 718, 719; the 
"Dartmouth College Case." 719; summary of 
" universities, colleges, and technical schools " In 
the United States. 719; decline of elementary and 
secondary schools during the eighteenth century. 
719, 720 ; rise of academies, 720 ; academies and 
seminaries devoted to women, 721 ; rise of system 
of co-education. 721 ; summary of academies, co- 
educational, in 1850, 721 ; the Massachusetts State 
Board of Education and Horace Mann, 722-724; 
establishment of High Schords. 724; rise of Normal 
schools, 724, 725 ; establishment of Teachers' col- 
leges. 724, 725 : the state universities, 726 ; de- 
velopment of post-graduate work, 726, 727; rise of 
women's colleges, 727, 728 ; the Chautauqua schools, 
730. 

Education, reciprocity in, 6S4-6S6. 

El Caney. tlie fight at. 491. 

Electricity. The story of, 636-677; early knowledge 
and uses of Amber, 6.36, 637 ; the lodestone, mag- 
netite, or Hercules stone, 637-639; the Saraothra- 
c!an rings. 637, 638; opinions of Thales and 
Socrates. 637: the Chinese South-pointing Car, 638; 
the wonder of the early Church Fathers at mag- 
netism. 638; St. Augustine's account, 638, 639; 
the Arabian Kiohts story of the lodestone, 639 ; 
advance in knowledge of electricity dependent upon 
experiments, 639; birth of experimental philosophy 
639; Doctor William Gilbert, and his wonder£ul 
experiments. 640; summary of his achievements, 
640; work of Robert Boyle and Otto von Guericke, 
640; foundation of the Royal Society of England, 
640; von Guericke hints at the electric light, and 
the relation of the electric spark to lightning, 641 ; 
Doctor Wall's experiments, 641 ; investigations and 
deductions of Doctor Watson. 641; he affirms the 
existence of an electrical ether. 641; incredulity of 
the public, and the *' practical man," 642; Franklin 
first becomes acquainted with electrical phenomena, 
642 ; the Library Company of Pliiladelphia, 642 ; 
Influence of Peter CoHinson, 642 ;" formation of the 
American Philosophical Society, 643; honors heaped 
npnn Franklin by the R.iyal So<.-iety, 643; details 
of his experiments to determine the identity of the 
electrical fluid and lightning. 643-645; his curious 
letter to Collinson. the "electrified bumper," 643; 
his discovery of the uses of lightning rods, 645 ; 
attitude of the Church toward his experiments. 
645, 646 ; invention of the Leyden jar, 646 ; 
Muschenbroeck's account of his experiment. 646 ; 
Cavallo's account of achievements to close of eigh- 
teenth century. 647; Galvani and "Animal Elec- 



tricity," or Galvanism. 647, 648; Volta and his 
deductions from Galvani's experiments, 648 ; the 
Voltaic battery, or pile, 648, 649 ; Humphrey Davy 
and the electric light, 649, 650 ; Count Rumford 
and the Royal Institution, 649; development of the 
idea of the unity of the forces of nature. — hence 
the belief in the identity of magnetism and 
electricity, 650; epoch making discoveries of Oersted 
and Ampere, 651 : important discoveries of Fara- 
day, 651. 652 ; the first dynamo-electric machine. 
652; Sturgeon discovers the electro-magnet. 652; 
remarkable development of the electro-magnet by 
Joseph Henry, 654 ; the galvanoscope and galvanom- 
eter, 654 ; Henry's " intensity magnet," 6.14 ; the 
Daniell's battery, 654 ; early experiments in teleg- 
raphy, 655 ; Morse and the electric telegraph, 655- 
659; early submarine cables, 660; description of an 
ocean cable. 600, 661 ; Cyrus W. Field and the 
Atlantic cables, 601-664 ; summary of the Bureau 
of Statistics of ocean telegraphs. 664 ; invention of 
the telephone, 664-667 ; marvelous achievements of 
Alexander Graham Bell, 605-667 ; the principle of 
the telephone described. 665 ; Hughes' invention of 
the microphone. 660 ; Edison's improvements. 660 ; 
statistics as to the use of the telephone. 666; 
electric lighting, heating, and power. 667-671 : the 
dynamo and motor. 667 ; transmission of power, 
667; incandescent and arc lighting, 668. 669; per- 
sistent efforts of Edison to perfect carbons, 669 ; 
the arc light, and its uses, 670, 671 ; discovery and 
uses of selenium, 671 ; many applications of elec- 
tricity, 671-673; Dr. Holmes' "broomstick train." 
672; adaptation to transportation, 672. 673; the 
Dudley Dynagraph car, 673 ; discovery of ether. 
673; Hertz and the Hertzian waves. 673; wireless 
telegraphy and its principles. 673-675 ; remarkable 
experience of the steamship Republic, practical uses 
of wireless telegraphy demonstrated, 675, 676; de- 
mand of civil and political Itodies that wireless 
apparatus be installed on all vessels, 676 ; what 
next — Telepathy? 677. 

Electro-dynamics, principles of, established, 651. 

Electro-magnet, first discovered by Sturgeon, 652. 

Eliot, Charles W., president of Harvard University. 
706. 

Elmira College, first women's college. 728. 

Emancipation, The Pmelamation of, 305-314; Presi- 
dent Lincoln's views as to the occasion for, 305, 
306; views of his cabinet officers, 307; early state- 
ment of principle and effect of such an act by 
John Quincy Adams, 307 ; the preliminary proc- 
lamation, 308; scope of the final proclamation, 310; 
its reception at the North and South. 311. 312; 
disposition of the original draft of the proclama- 
tion, 313 ; the precursor of the Fifteenth Amend- 
ment to the Constitution, 313. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo; his appreciation of the Bible, 
442. 443. 

Emma Willard Female Seminary. The. 721. 

Emmanuel College, Cambridge, England, 696, 700. 702. 

Employers and employees, history of their relations, 
392-396. 
— • of labor, organizations of, 399, 400. 

Endeavor, Young People's Society of Christian, 386- 
388. 

English language, gradual formation of new. 414. 

Ephraemi. The Codex, described, 407. 

Epochs in historical development, six great. 33. 

Epworth League. The; withdrawal from the Christian 
Endeavor Union. 389 ; meeting of representative 
Methodists at Cleveland, O., in 1S91, 389; call 
upon all Methodist Societies to come out and be 
separate, '* To your tents, O, Israel," 389 ; im- 
mediate success of the movement, mtmbership in 
1909, and motto of the society. 389. 

Era of Princely Gifts, An. 731-766; gifts of John 
Harvard and John D. Rockefeller crmpared. 731 ; 
different conditions under which wealth was ac- 
cumulated at the middle and close of the nineteenth 
century. 732; enormous total of public benefactions 
of the last five years. 732 ; inciting causes of great 



INDEX. 



821 



gifts, 732; sketch of the life of Stephen Girard, 
732; the establishment of Girard College, 735, 736; 
John Lowell. Jr.. and the founding of the Lowell 
Institute, 737-742 ; text of clauses of his will 
creating the trust. 739; noted lecturers, 740, 741; 
founding of the Lawrence Scientific School, 740; man- 
agement of the trust fund, 741 ; remarkable career 
of George Peabody. 742-745; his royal gifts. 742, 
743 ; the Peabody Education Fund, 743, 744 ; found- 
ing of the Smithsonian Institution. 745; peculiar 
character of the gift, and its uses. 745, 740; great 
gifts traceable to the example and influence of 
George Peabody. 746; The John F. Slater Fund, 
746; the Daniel C. Hand gifts to aid poor blacks 
in the South, 747; the munificence of Anna T. 
Jeanes. 747. 748 ; founding of the Johns Hopkins 
University, and Johns Hopkins Hospital, 748, 749 ; 
novel university established by his trustees. 749; 
the Leland Stanford Junior University, 749-753; 
the munificence of Leland Stanford. 749-751 ; groat 
gift to the University of California, 753 ; its Greek 
theatre. 753 ; Armour Institute, and the Armour 
Mission. 754 ; the " Lolita Armour Institute of 
Bloodless Surgery," 754; liberal benefactions of 
D. K. Pearsons, 754; establishment of the New- 
berry library, Chicago. 754, 755 ; the John Crerar 
library, and its founder, 75G ; munificent gift to 
endow Washington University, St. Louis, 756 ; 
Cooper Union and its benevolent founder, 756 ; 
Robert Lenox and the Lenox library, 758, 759 ; the 
generous bequest of Samuel J. Tilden, 759 ; the 
Astor. Lenox, and Tild^-n fiMindutions. 760; notable 
gifts of millions by Mrs. Mary Macrae Stuart, 760; 
benefactions of J. Pierpont Morgan, 760; his rich 
gifts to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 761 ; 
Immense gifts of Mrs. Russell Sage, 762 ; com- 
parison of gifts of Carnegie and Rockefeller with 
those of other princely givers. 762 ; the essence of 
a " gift." — " the gift without the giver is bare." 
762 ; Carnegie's own statement as to what his 
gifts cost him, 763 ; J. D. Rockefeller and the 
University of Chicago. 763; conditions upon whi4'h 
the Rockefeller gifts are dependent, 764 ; the en- 
dowment of the General Education Board. — the 
greatest single gift ever made, 764 ; Andrew 
Carnegie's enormous bent-factions, 765 ; summary of 
his principal gifts. 765 ; the lesson of such lavish 
generosity, 766; opinion of Daniel C. Gilman, as to 
the influence of George Peabody on later benefactors. 
766 ; the position and influence of Robert C. 
Winthrop. 766. 
Erasmus, the Greek Testament of, 418. 
Ericsson. John, influence of. In the construction of the 

new navy. 478. 
Estournelles. Baron d', 575. 

Ether, discovery of. 234-241 ; claimants for priority 
of discovery, 236; opinions of Doctors Holmes and 
Warren, 236 ; account of first surgical operation 
upon an etherized patient. 237 ; monument erected 
to commemorate the discovery, 240 ; general effects 
upon patients, humorous anecdotes, etc.. 237-241. 
European Press, The, on the Monroe Doctrine, 511. 

512. 
Evans, Robley D., commands the Iowa at Santiago. 
492-494 ; in command of the battleship fleet, 496. 
497. 
Everett, Edward, quoted, 604. 703 ; first American to 
take the degree of Doctor of Philosophy from a 
German tiniversity, 726; inaugurates the Lowell 
Institute lectures. 740, 741. 
Evolution, discovery of the law of. 32. 
Execution of the Chicago anarchists, 455. 
Expense, comparative, of the naval establishments of 

the great powers. 496. 
Experimental Philosophy, birth of. 639. 
Explorers of California, the early, 626. 

r. 

Factory System. The, and the Industrial Age, 395. 
Family life in the colonies, 56. 



Faraday. Michael, makes first dynamo-electrical ma- 
chine, 652. 
Farewell to the Army, Washington's, 88. 
Fatherhood of God, Christ's revelation of the. 34. 
Fathers of the early church, writings of, as sources of 

our Bible. 406. 
Federal Constitution, formation and adoption of the. 

108. 
Federation of Labor. The. 399. 
Ferry houses of San Francisco. The, 632. 
Fever, scourges of yellow, 35. 

Field, Cyrus W., and the Atlantic cable. 661-664. 
Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The; result 

of the Proclamation of Emancipation. 313. 
Fiftieth Anniversary of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence, 191-196 : popular enthusiasm checked by the 
deaths on that day of ex-Prcsidents Adams and 
Jefferson. 191 ; sketches of their lives. 192. 
First American Naval Victory. The, 72-78. 
Fish. Hamilton. Secretary of State. 516. 
Fiske. John; his theory of evolution. 32; quoted. 33. 

594. 595. 694. 
Flag, first, of the United Colonies. 476; John Paul 

Jones first floats it in European waters, 477. 
Flying Squadron, The. 486. 
Ford's theatre. Washington ; assassination of President 

Lincoln in. 347-349. 
Forks, introduction of table, 58. 
Fourier, and his teachings, 447. 
France recognizes the independence of the American 

Colonies, 70. 
Franco- American Alliance. The. 682. 
Franking privilege, origin of the, 50. 
Franklin. Benjamin ; his influence at the French court. 
70 ; pleads for harmony at the Constitutional Con- 
vention, 112 ; first becomes acquainted with elec- 
trical phenomena, in 1746, 642 ; his experiments, 
based on Watson*s " Observations," 642 ; honors 
heaped upon him by the Royal Society of England. 
643 ; detailed account of his experiments to de- 
termine identity of lightning and the electric fluid, 
643-645 ; the renowned kite experiment. 644 ; dis- 
covery of the uses of lightning rods, 645 ; attitude 
of clergy toward his experiments, 645. 
French and American Republics, The, close relations 
of. 681. 682. 
— • Panama Canal Co., The. See Panama Canal. 
— Revolution. Influence of, on the social movements 
of the last century, 447. 
Fry. Sir Edward, address of, at the second Hague 

Conference, 577. 
Frye. William P.. 775. 
Fuller. Melville W.. 523. 

Fulton, Robert; story of his early life. 151; first ex- 
periments with steamboats, 152 ; builds the CJer- 
mont, 153; first successful trip to Albany, 154; 
builds first steam vessel for the American navy, 
the Drmologos, 477. 
Funding Act of the first National Congress. The, 46. 
Funston. General Fred. 630. 

G. 

Gale, the ever-memorable, in New England, 173-180; 
known as the great September gale. 173; peculiar 
atmospheric conditions preceding it. 174; women 
and children saved from second story windows in 
boats. 175; destructive force of the gale at Boston, 
176; general destruction of crops, 178; origin and 
course of the hurricane. 179; pecuniary loss, 180; 
records of previous terrific gales. 180. 

Galvani. and "Animal magnetism." or Galvanism. 
647. 64S. 

Galveston. Texas, destruction of, 585-593 ; wonderful 
courage shown by survivors of great disasters. 585 ; 
rise of Chicago. Boston, Baltimore. San Francisco, 
from ashes. 585 ; different conditions that obtained 
in Galveston. 585. 586; early history of the city, 
586: description of it. and of its commerce. 587; 
origin and development of the hurricane. 587; ter- 



822 



INDEX. 



riblo destruction of life and property as storm in- 
creased. 588 : detailed description of its ravages, 
5S8-590 : wind covered every point of compass dur- 
ing twelve hours, and attained a velocity of over 
one hundred and twenty miles, 589 ; more than six 
thousand dead, 589 ; funeral pyres made from the 
wreckage, — thousands cremated, 589 ; financial con- 
ditions that faced the city after the storm. 590; 
the Deep-water Commission, 590 ; the new city 
charter and its original features, — the Galveston 
Plan, 590, 591 ; the great sea wall, 591 ; elevatiun 
of grade of the entire city, 592; results secured, 
592 ; the resurrected city, and its prospects, 592 ; 
success of the new form of government, 592. 593. 

Gary, Judge J. E,. 445. 

Gatun Dam, The, 610. 

General Court of Massachusetts, The. 700, 703. 

Geneva Bible. The, history of, 428 ; the Bible the 
Pilgrim Fathers brought to America, 428. 

Genghis Khan, effects of the conquests of, 594. 

Germantown Academy, The. 720. 

Gettysburg, the battle of. 315-324; General Lee's 
purpose to transfer the seat of war to the Northern 
States. 315 ; description of General Meade's army. 
315; details of the great battle. 316-320; descrip- 
tion given by Whitelaw Reid, 320; notable acts of 
bravery, 322; terrible losses of individual brigades 
and regiments. 322. 323 ; President Lincoln tele- 
graphs result of the battle to the country on morn- 
ing of July 4, 323 ; the soldiers' monument at Get- 
tysburg. 323. 

Gibbs, Major-General, succeeds Pakenham in command 
at New Orleans, 170; is mortally wounded, 170. 

Gilbert, Dr. William, earliest experimenter in elec- 
tricity. 640. 

Gilinsky. Captain ; Russian delegate to The Hague 
Conference, 569. 

Gilman, Daniel C, 522; quoted, 766. 

Gllmore, P. S., originator and director of the great 
Peace Jubilees. 356-304. 

Girard, Stephen : sketch of his life. 732 ; founds 
Glrard College, 734-736. 

Gladden. Rev. Washington, quoted. 400. 768. 

Gloucester, The ; formerly J. P. Morgan's yacht Cor- 
sair, 488 ; in blockade and fight off Santiago, 487, 
492. 493. 

Goethe; his testimony to the worth of the Bible. 442- 
444; wonderful prophecy as to canals. 597. 59S. 

Gold, discovery of. at Sutter's Mill. Cal.. 242-249; 
previous production of precious metal. 243; Captain 
Sutter's account of the discovery. 246; tremendous 
rush of adventurers to California, 248 ; results of 
the discovery. 249. 

Golden Gate, The. 629. 630. 
park, San Francisco, 631. 

Gompers, Samuel, 305. 

Graduate Clubs. Report of the Federation of, 727. 

Grant, General U. S.. meets General Lee, and re- 
ceives his surrender, 339. 340 : as President, re- 
asserts the Monroe Doctrine. 516. 

Granville. Lord, 518. 

Gray, George; protests against the seizure of the 
Philippines. 775. 
— , Stephen, discovers principles of electrical con- 
duction, 641. 

Great Bible, The, of Cromwell. 425; ordered set up, 
to be read in every church of the British Kingdom, 
425. 

— Blizzard. The, 457-466. 

— Eastern. The. 663. 

Greek Theatre, The, of the TTniverslty of California, 

753. 
Green, J. R. : his account of influence of English 

Bible upon the people, 427. 
Gregg. W. R., quoted, 32. 
Gregory. Professor C. R., 401, 409. 
Gridley. Captain, commander of the Olympia, 484. 
Grnsvenor. General C. 11., 772. 

Grotlus. Hugo, tribute of Andrew D. White to. 564. 
Guam, island of, 781. 



Guericke, Otto von, experiments of, in electricity, ( 
Guerricre, The, captured by the Constitution, 157. 



H. 

Hadley. A. T., president of Yale University, quoted, 
711. 

Hague, The. See The Hague. 

Hall, A. Oakey, member of the Tweed Ring. 376-380. 
— , W. I. ; his *' Two Hague Conferences '* quoted, 
577. 

Hale, Rev. Edward Everett ; publishes *' Ten Times 
One is Ton," 384; apostle of the " Lend-a-hand " 
gospel, 384; establishes the " Lend-a-hand " Jour- 
nal. 385. 
— . Senator Eugene, on the Spanish war. 772. 

Hamilton. Alexander: his criticism of Democracy. 47; 
duel with Aaron Burr. 147 ; profound grief over the 
result of the meeting. 148; distinguished honors 
paid him, 149. 

Hamitic races, supremacy of, 33. 

Hammurabi. King of Babylon, 31. 

Hampton Roads, battle between Monitor and Mcrrimac 
in. 296-304. 478; battleship fleet sails from. 496; 
return of fleet to, 498, 499. 

Hantl. Daniel C. ; munificent gifts of, 747. 

Harper. William B., late president of the University 
of Chicago. 730. 

Harvard College and University, history of. 700-706. 

Harvard, John ; his bequest to establish a college, 
701 ; sketch of his life, 701-703 ; his probable con- 
nection with Shakespeare. 701 ; General Court or- 
ders new college named after him. 703; memorials 
erected. 703 ; earliest of America's princely givers. 
731. 

Havana. Cuba ; visit of the Maine to, 471, 472 ; 
bl«H-kade of. 483. 

Hawaiian Islands, The. See Annexation of Hawaii. 
— — , position of leading Republicans as to the an- 
nexation of, 773. 

Hay, John, Secretary of State ; note to the Powers 
suggesting Second Hague Conference, 574 ; secures 
the neutrality and integrity of China, 620. 

Hay-Herran treaty. The. 604. 

Hay-Pauncefote treaty. The, 603. 

Ha.ves. President R. B.. states position of the United 
States as to a French Panama canal. 600. 601. 

Haymarket riot. The. Chicago, 1886, 453. 

Hayne, Robert 1'., In debate with Daniel Webster, 
197-205. 

Hearst, Phoebe, and the University of California. 753. 

Henry. Joseph; sketch of his life, 652. 653; invents 
galvanoscope and galvanometer, 653; his "intensity 
magnet." 654. 

Hercules stone. The. 637. 

Hertz, Heinrich, discovers the existence of etherlc 
waves. 673. 

Hertzian waves. The, 673. 

Hill, David J., delegate to The Hague Conference, 
574. 

Hoar. George F. ; his autoblc^raphy. 772 ; his posi- 
tion regarding the annexation of Hawaii. 773; in- 
terviews with President McKinley. 773 ; speech In 
the Senate on the question. 774 ; notable speech on 
the " principles of the fathers." 779. 

Hobson. Lieut. R. P. ; takes the Merrimac into San- 
tiago harbor, 488. 489. 

Holland, or The Netherlands; description of the coun- 
try. 562. 563 : remarkable ascendency of, in six- 
teenth and seventeenth centuries. 564. 

Holls. F. W. ; historian of the First Hague Conference. 
566. 

Holmes. Dr. O. W. ; his "broom-stick train." 672; 
quoted. 703. 

Holy Alliance, The, 504 ; text of the compact be- 
tween the Emperors, 505. 506; McMaster's opinion 
as to the sincerity of the allies, 506; secret arti- 
cles added to the treaty at Verona In 1822. 507; 
purpose to restore the revolting Spanish colonies to 
the mother country, 507. 



INDEX. 



823 



Hopkin:?, Johns, founds university and hospital, 748. 

— . Mark. 750. 
Horse, The. in the colonies, 51. 
Hotels, Famous early, 54. 
Houston, Dr. E. J., quoted. 660, 664, 66S. 
Howe. Elias, Jr., invents the sewing-machine. 226- 

230; story of his life and trials, 227; wonderful 

success achieved. 230. 
Hudson. Henry. 695. 

Hughes, Professor, invents the microphone. 666. 
Hull. Captain Isaac; commands the Cunsiitution In 

fight with the Guerriere, 156; details of the battle, 

15S-162; his notable reception in American ports, 

165. 
Humbnldt, Alexander von ; explores Central America, 

598. 
Huntington, C. P., 750. 
Hyde. James H., establishes American lectureship at 

The Sorbonne. 684. 



" In His Name," watchword of *• Lend-a-hand " 
Clubs. 385. 

Inauguration of Washington as first President at New 
York, 119; description of the attendant ceremonies 
and rejoicings. 120. 

Incandescent lights, electric, described, 668-670. 

Independence; committee appointed to draft Declara- 
tion of, 66; rejoicings upon adoption of the Declara- 
tion of. 67 ; Washington causes it to be read to the 
army, 68 ; reception of the Declaration in France 
and England. 70. 

— Hall. Philadelphia. 71. 

— of the United States acknowledged by foreign 
powers, 71. 

— . fiftieth anniversary of Declaration of, 191-196. 

Industrial age. and the Factory Ssystem, 395. 

Inns, character of colonial, 53. 

Intemperance, prevalence of. among colonial clergy, 60. 

International Cmirtesies, — " Little things that make 
for pi'Hre." 67S-690 ; Founder's day at the Carne- 
gie Institute, 678; notable address of W. T. Stead. 
678 ; " The world for peace. — only * yellow jour- 
nals * for war." 679 ; influence of Peace Societies 
and Conferences. 6S0 : little things that make for 
peace. 680 ; effect of death of George Peabody upon 
the settlement of the Alabama claims. 681 ; senti- 
ment of the London Telegraph, 681 ; close relations 
of the French and American republics, 681, 682 ; 
the Bartholdi statue and its significance. 682. 683 ; 
detailed description of the statue, 683 ; imposing 
exercises at its imveiling. 683, 684 ; reciprocity 
among scholars, 684, 687; work of rAUiance Fran- 
gaise. 684 : Harvard professors lecture at the Sor- 
bonne. 684 ; work of Charles F. Beach at French 
law schools. 684 ; proposition of German Emperor 
to establish an exchange of lecturers between uni- 
versities. 685 ; his interview with President Butler, 
of Columbia, and Us results. 685, 686 ; the Theo- 
dore Roosevelt professorship at Berlin. 685 ; similar 
movements between other nations. 686; opinion of 
Baron Iventaro. 686. 687 ; Cecil John Rhodes and 
his scholarships, 688. 689 ; influence of James Bryce 
and bis American Commoniccalth, 689; reciprocal 
service of Hannis Taylor. 690 ; mighty influence of 
intimate acquaintance between the peoples of the 
world. 690. 
Interparliamentary Union , The, 574, 619. 
Isthmian canal. See Panama Canal. 
Itinerary of cruise of battleships around the world, 
500. 



Jackson, Andrew, defeats British troops at Pensacola. 
167: decisive victory at New Orleans. 167-172; de- 
scription of his personality at that time, 172. 
— , Dr. Charles T., claims to have discovered ether. 
236, 241. 



Japan; naval expedition to. 259-266; purpose of the 
expedition and description of the vessels, 262 ; ex- 
periences with Japanese officials, 262. 263 ; execu- 
tion of treaty between Japan and the United States, 
265; interesting interchange of courtesies, 264; in- 
terest of Japan in Manchuria and Korea. 613, 614 ; 
manufactures, exports, and imports of, 615; results 
of her war with China, 615; alliance with England. 
616; calls upon Russia for understanding as to posi- 
tion in Manchuria, 617 ; declares war against Rus- 
sia, February 10, 1904. 618; sends envoys to meet 
those of Russia at Portsmouth conference, 620 ; final 
compromises result in treaty, 622 ; national gains as 
result of the war. 624. 
Japanese navy, presentation of loving cup to, by offi- 
cers and men of the battleship fleet. 497. 
Jay, John, ambassador to England, 557. 

— treaty, The. 558. 
Jealousy between the colonies, 44. 
Jeanes. Anna T. ; notable gifts of. 747. 748. 
Jefferson, Thomas ; writes the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, 66 ; death of, on Independence Day, 1826, 
194 ; sketch of his life and distinguished services, 
192 ; his appreciation of the Bible. 443. 
Jerome, Saint, makes revision of the Bible, 410. 
Jesus, and the Apostles, — only Scriptures known to, 
402 ; his connection with the synagogue worship, 
402. 
Johns Hopkins University, The; history of, 726. 74S. 
Jones. Jdhn Paul, sketch of his life, 72 ; hoists first 
American naval flag, 73 ; famous battle with the 
Scrapis, 73; his account of the action. 76; interest 
in fiirmation of the early navy, 475 ; floats first 
American flag in European waters, 476. 
Jordan, David Starr, 753. 
Journalism, The Pulitzer School of. 761. 



Kaahuraanu, Queen, 536, 540. 

Kalakaiia, King, 548-550. 

Kamehameha I., 535. 

Kapiulani, Princess, defies the goddess Of volcanic 
fires, 529, 530. 

Keane, Major-General, 170. 

Kent. James: " Commentaries on American Law." 716. 

Kentaro, Baron Kaneko; on the future of Japan, 624; 
urges educational reciprocity between Japan and the 
United States. 686. 687. 

Key W^est, general rendezvous for navil vessels. 488- 
490. 

Kiao-Chau. lease of. extorted from China by Germany, 
770. 

Kilanea ; description of the volcano, 528. 

King James, or authorized, version of the Bible, his- 
tory of. 432. 

King's College, history of. 715. 716, 
— Daughters, The ; organized by Mrs. Bottome, 
385; based on Dr. Halo's Ten-Times-One Clubs, 
385; men admitted and name changed. 386; state- 
ment of principles of the society, and of its work, 
3S6. 

Kingly office proposed for Washington. 91. 

Kirkup : " History of Socialism," quoted, 448. 

Kissing Bridge, The. 55. 

Knights of Labor, The. 398. 

Knox, John, 694. 

Komura, Baron : envoy from Japan to Portsmouth Con- 
ference. 621-623. 

Korea, de.scription of. 613. 617. 

Kropotkin. Prince Peter ; disciple of Proudhon. 449 ; 
experiences in prisons, and as a leader in destructive 
anarchism. 449; trial at Lyons, 1883. 450. 

Krudener, Mme. de ; account of her early life. 502- 
503 ; her conversion and religious devotion. 503 ; 
her influence over Alexander L, 503 ; grand review 
of Russi.qn array and Te Deum on Plains of Vertua, 
504 : her part in drawini: up the Holy Alliance. 
505 ; separated from the Emperor. 503 ; death 
among poor colonists in Crimea, 503. 



824 



INDEX. 



Labor Organizations, development of. 391-400; histori- 
cal attitude of emi>Io.vers and employed. ^92: origiTi 
and rapid spread of slaver.v, 392; the gradual merg- 
ing of slavery into serfdom, and of serfdom into 
legal freedom. 393 ; influence of Wyclit and his 
Bible tracts. .303; effect of the great Reformation. 
394; rise of modem labor organizations. .394; John 
Mitchell's statement of the case of organized labor. 
. — the basic principles of all unions, 39G. 397 ; the 
Knights of Labor. 398 ; politics a disintegrating 
force. 398 ; the Federation of Labor, 399 ; its basic 
principles. 399 ; organizations of employers. 399, 
400 : the Citizens' Industrial Association of Amer- 
ica. 399 ; its official principles. 399 ; hostility to 
unions, and all rights of labor, 400; the outlook. 
400 ; labor organizations of America not anarchistic, 
451. 
Lafayette. Marquis de; his visit to America as the 
guest of the nation. lSl-190; sketch of his life, 
and of his services to America. 182: his first meet- 
ing with Washington, 183; their intimate relation- 
ship, 184; his experiences during the French 
Revolution. 184; arrival in New York. August 15. 
1S24. accompanied by his son George Washington 
Lafayette. 184; tremendous enthusiasm throughout 
the States, 185; participates in laying conier-stone 
of Bunker Hill monnment. 187 ; tumultuous recep- 
tions from Boston to Charleston. S. C. 187; visits 
the tomb of Washington. 189; tou'-hing farewell 
address of President Adams, in behalf of the Ameri- 
can people. 190, 
Lambert. Major General. 171. 

Larned. J. N. ; " Seventy Centuries." quoted, 33. 
Law of Nations. Roman concept of the. 34. 
Law School of the University of Paris. 6.84. 685. 
Lawrence. Abbott, founds the Lawrence Scientific 

School, 741, 
Lee, Fitzhugh, consul-general at Havana, 470. 471, 

, General Robert E., surrenders to General Grant, 

339, 340. 
— . R. H.. resolutions of. as to independence. 66. 
Leicester Academy. Tlie ; first co-educational school in 

New England. 721. 
Leiand Stanford Junior University, founding of. 751- 

753. 
Lcnd-a-hand Clubs, organization and principles of, 384, 

385. 
Lenox, Robert, and the I*nox Library, 758, 759. 
Lesseps, Ferdinand de, and the Panama canal, 600 ; 
his visit to America, 600; formally presents the 
Bartholdi statue to the United States, 683, 
Leverett, John, president of Harvard College. 704. 
Leyden jar. invention of the. 646. 
Lianconrt. Due de ; his opinions of life In America 

about 1800. 35. 
Liberty Bell. The. 66. 

Library Company of Philadelphia. The. 642, 
Libraries in tlie United States. Early. 64. 
Light. diiTerent forms of artificial. 668; incandescent 
and arc lights described. 668-670; searchlights, etc., 
671. 
Liliuokalani, Queen, 545, 

Lincoln, Abraham: his debate with Douglas, 289-295; 
his personal appearance and manner, 291 : elected 
President, 295 ; is.sues the Proclamation of Emanci- 
pation. 305-314; visits Richmond the day after its 
capture. 340 ; his assassination. 344-355 ; solemn 
funeral obsequies. 350, 351. 
Literature in the United States; i^Mas of, at close of 

the eighteenth century, 62. 
Little Things that Make for Peace. — International 

Courtesies. 678-690. 
Livingston, Chancellor; Interested student of u.ses of 
steam, 152; greatly aids Fulton, 152; with Fultoa 
opens service on the Ohio river, 156. 
Lodestone, The, Magnetite, or Hercules stone, 637, 

638. 
Log College. The, of William Tennent, 712. 



London Telegraph, Tlie, quoted, 681. 

Long. Jolin D.. Secretary of the Navy. 481. 

Lorcnz. Doctor, introduces bloodless surgery, 754. 

Low. Setb. didegate to the Hague Conference. 567 ; 
president of Columbia University, 717, 

Lowell, Abbott Lawrence, president of Harvard Uni- 
versity, 706; trustee of the Lowell Institute. 741. 
— . Charles. 738. 
— . Francis Cabot, 738, 
— , James Russell, 738; quoted, 762, 
— , Judge John, 737, 

— , John, Jr., founder of The Lowell Institute, 737- 
742, 

Lovelace, Francis ; establishes the first mail service in 
America, 48 ; his letter to Governor Winthrop, 48. 

Luther, Martin ; translates New Testament into Ger- 
man, 418; the pioneer advocate of popular educa- 
tion, 602, 693. 

Luzon. Island of. 781. 

Lyon. Mary; founder of Mt. Holyoke College, 727. 

Lyons, France, remarkable trial of anarchists at, 1883, 
449. 

M. 

Macanlay. 'a. B. ; his appreciation of the Bible, 442, 
443. 

Maclay. E. S.. historian of the United States Navy, 
quoted, 476, 493. 

Magnetism, the identity of, with electricity estab- 
lished. 651. 

Magnetite. G'.i', 63S. 

Mahan. Captain A. T., 567. 

Mail, the first ever dispatched In America. 48. 

Maine, The; visit of the battleship to Havana harbor, 
471 ; her complete destruction, Fetirnary IS, 1898, 
471. 472: '■ Remember the Maine/' 472; first bat- 
tleship of the " Xew Navy.'* 479. 

Man. the brotherhood of. revealed. 34 ; emancipation 
of. 35. 

Manchuria, description of, 613, 614. 

Manliattan island, the purchase of. 695. 

Manila bay. the battle of. 483-485. 

Mann, Horace, his life and work. 722-724. 

Manuscripts as sources of our Bil)le. 406. 

Marconi, William, develops the wireless telegraph, 
673-677; his early experiments, 673; first message 
across the ocean, 674. 

Marine Corps, The, estaldishment of, 476. 

Mariner's compass, first knowledge of, in Europe, 595. 

Maritime Canal Company, The, 602. 

Marshall, James W., discovers gold at Sutter's Mill, 

Cal.. 247. 
— . John, decision in tlie " Dartmouth College Case." 
719. 

Martens, Frederic de. 523. 

Massachusetts, population and taxable valuation of, in 
ISiiO. 37. 

Mathew. Father, the Apostle of Temperance, 222-224. 

Maury. Lieut. M. F., describes the bed of the Atlan- 
tic ocean, 662. 

Mayflower, The; the President's yacht, 500; meeting 
of the President and Japanese and Russian envoys 
on board of. 021. 
Mazarin Bible, The; first book printed from movable 

types. 417. 
McCloskey. John, consecrated first cardinal in the 

United States. 365-370. 
McCormick harvester works, great strikes at, 451, 

452. 
McCosh, James ; experiences as a young pastor, 61 ; 

president of Princeton College. 714. 715. 
McKinley, President William, inaugural address of, 
468; submits treaty for annexation of Hawaii. 555; 
appoints committee to investigate canal proposition, 
602 : statement of principles underlying the war 
Wi*"h Spain. 771 ; general instructions to the Peace 
Commissioners at Paris, 775 ; his Western tour, and 
Its results, 777: demands cession of entire Philip- 
pine archipelago, 777. 
McMahon, Rev. Bernard, revises the Douay Bible, 
43& 



INDEX. 



825 



MtMaster, Professor J. B., quoted, 506, 508. 

Meade, General G. G., victorious at Gettysburg, 305- 
314. 

M<*ilford rum and the slave trade, 40. 

Medical science, condition of, about 1800, 62. 

Merchant vessels added to navy for Spanish war, 481. 

Mcn-imac, the Confederate ram, in battle with the 
Monitor, 29G-304. 
— , the collier, sunk in Santiago channel, 488, 489. 

.Metternich, Prince, 506. 

.Mexico, French occupation of, 515; General Sheridan 
with fifty thousand veteran troops sent to Mexican 
fmntier, 515; effect on the French government, 515. 

Michigan, the University of, 725, 726. 

Microphone, invention of the, 666. 

Miles. General N. A., commands the army in war 
with Spain, 490 ; leads expedition into Porto Rico, 
494 ; at surrender of General Toral, 494. 

Militarism, the curse of. 782. 

Milton, John ; testimony as to value of the Bible, 442. 

Mindanao, island of, 781. 

Mitchell. John, states the case of organized labor, 
395. 396. 

Mohammedan Moros. 781. 

Monitor, The, in battle with the Merrimac, 296-304; 
history of the Mirrimac. 290 ; her depredations in 
Hampton Roads, 300 ; arrival and appearance of 
the Monitor, 300, 301 ; details of the memorable 
battle, 300, 301 : condition of both vessels after 
the fight, 302 ; influence of the battle upon naval 
construction, 478 ; later battleships only highly de- 
veloped monitors. 478, 479. 

Monroe Doctrine, The, 502-524 ; the Holy Alliance. 
504-508 ; purpose to restore her revolted colonies 
to Spain, 508 ; Russian settlement on the Cali- 
fornia coast, 507 ; awakening of American states- 
men to the situation, 507, 508; Canning's proposal 
to interfere with the plans of the allies, 508 ; 
Jefferson's opinion of Canning's proposal, 508 ; 
strenuous opposition of John Quincy Adams, 509 ; 
he proposes to establish an American doctrine, and 
adhere to it, 509. 510; principles of the doctrine 
as enunciated in President Monroe's message, 1S23. 
509-511 ; European opinion of the proclamation. 
510-512 ; duplicity of Canning established, 513 ; 
prevailing opinions in the United States, 513 ; 
position of Henry Clay, while Secretary of State, 
514 ; opinion of Polk as representative, and as 
President, 514, 515 ; application of the doctrine to 
the French occupation of Mexico, 515 ; President 
Grant's position, 516 : the doctrine in party plat- 
forms, 516, 517 ; President Cleveland's bold state- 
ment of it, in regard to the Venezuelan contro- 
versy, 519. 520; attitude of the British government. 
523 ; present established position of the principle, 
524. 

Montauk Point, removal of the army from Cuba to, 
494. 

Montojo. Admiral. 483-485. 

Moody. Dwight L., great revival movement under, 
284-288. 

Moore, John Bassett. 775. 

Moore. Thomas, visits America in 1804. 62. 

Morals, state of. at close of Colonial period, 61. 

Moravian Academies, The. 720. 

Morgan. J. Pierpont. notable gifts of, 760. 761. 

Morley, John, on the Geneva arbitration, 559. 

Morrill Act, The, 725. 

Morse. S. F. B. ; sketch of his life, 655-660; de- 
tailed statement of his development of the tele- 
graph. 657-659 ; distinguished honors conferred 
upon him, 659, 660; advises as to feasibility of an 
rw^ean telegraph, 660. 

Morton, Dr. W. T. C, claims to have discovered 
ether. 236. 241. 

Motley. J. L.. quoted. 562. 693. 

Motor, the electric, 667. 

Mt. Holyoke Seminary and College, The. 721. 727. 

MouraviefF, Count, Russian Ambassador, 560. 561, 
562. 569. 



Mozart Hall, absorbed by Tammany Hall, 373. 
Mueller, Frederick. 754, 
Mukden, battle of, 620. 
Murderer's Bible. The, 436. 



N. 

Napoleon HI. in occupation of Mexico. 515 ; his in- 
terest in canal schemes. 600. 
National Labor Union, The. 397. 

— Peace Jubilee at Boston. 356-364. 

— Road, construction of the, 51. 
Nations, Roman concept of the law of, 34. 

— , Settlement of the New, 34. 
Naval Court of Inquiry, report of, on the destruction 
of the Maine, 472. 

— Victory, the first American. 72. 

Navy, The New, 467-501 ; conditions In the United 
States preceding the war with Spain. 467. 468; 
pride of the people in the naval history, 468; 
opinion of Professor Coolidge. 468 ; message of 
President Cleveland to Congress on the situation in 
Cuba, 468 : inaugural address of President McKinley, 
468; platform of the Republican party. 1896. 469; 
diplomatic relations of Spanish and American gov- 
ernments. 469, 470; General Weyler recalled from 
Cuba. 470; autonomy granted Cuba by Spain, 470; 
visit of Senator Proctor to the Island, and his 
report on conditions there, 470. 471 ; visit of the 
Mai7ic to Havana, 471 ; her complete destruction, 
February 15, 1898. 471. 472; rrpnrt of the Naval 
Board of Inquiry. 472 ; results of the investiga- 
tions by Spanish authorities, 472; "Remember the 
Maine" the war cry. 472; Congressional resolu- 
tions, the virtual declaration of war. 473; text 
of order sent to Commodore Dewey. 473 ; history 
of the Spanish war a record of the valorous 
achievements of the Navy, 473; no place in Re- 
publican governments for large standing army or 
navy, 474 : opinion of members of the Continental 
Congress. 474 ; origin of the navy of the United 
Colonies, 474 ; early efforts to build a navy. 474 ; 
the largest vessels of the first navy compared with 
those of the new navy, 475 ; total salt-water navy 
during the Revolutionary War. 475 ; careers of 
John Paul Jones and Captain Biddle. 475 ; first 
flag of the United Colonies. 476 ; creation of a 
separate Navy Department. 1798. — Benjamin Stod- 
dert the first Secretary. 476; story of the Navy's 
development, 476. 477 ; critical opinions as to its 
effectiveness, 477 ; Fulton's Dcmologos, 477 ; con- 
struction of steam war vessels, 477 ; the adoption 
of the screw propeller. 478; influence of John Erics- 
son. 478; effects of the battle between the Monitor 
and Mfrrimar, 478 ; later battleships only highly 
developed monitors. 478, 479; the Navy after the 
Civil War, 479; birth of the New Navy. 479; the 
Dolphin, Atlanta, and Boston the first vessels. 479; 
the Maine the first armored ship of the " White 
Squadron." 479; the New York the Constitution 
of the New Navy, 480 ; the story of the Oregon. 
the *' Queen of the New Navy." 480; condition and 
strength of the navy when war with Spain began, 
481 ; remarkably efficient work of Secretary Long. 
481 ; successful concentration of the scattered 
fieets. 481, 482; detailed account of the Oregon's 
race against time and the enemy. 482; Admiral 
Sampson blockades the Cuban coast, 483 ; Dewey's 
movements in Asiatic waters, 483 ; details of the 
battle in Manila bay. 483-485 ; effect of his victory 
upon the American people, 485 ; Admiral Cervera 
and his fleet, 486; general account of the blockade 
of Cuba and search for Cervera, 486 ; Schley's 
remarkable maneuvers. 487 ; the blockade of San- 
tiago, 487, 488; Hobson's daring adventure with 
the Merrimac, 488, 489 ; departure of troops from 
Florida to Cuba, 490 ; story of the assault on San- 
tiago. 491. 492; Cervera's orders to leave the 
harbor, 492 ; account of the total destruction of his 



826 



INDEX. 



fleet, 492. 493 ; the wonderful " loop " of the 
Brooklyn, 493 ; grand race between the Oregon and 
the Colon, 493; news of the victory received in the 
United States and celebrated July 4. 494 ; the 
famous " round robin " of the army officers, ad- 
dressed to the Secretary of War, 494 ; removal of 
army to Montauk Point, 494 : General Miles' in- 
vasion of Porto Rico, 495 ; signing of Peace protocol, 
August 12, 190S, 494 ; popular and Congressional 
rei'ognition of the achievements of the sea forces, 
495 ; summary of the development of the Navy from 
1893 to 1909, 495; the proposed 26000 ton battle- 
ships, 495; the ever present "war scare" as an 
Incentive to further enlargement of the Navy, 490 ; 
comparison of the expenditures of the World 
Powers for their navies, 496; the great battleship 
cruise around the world, 496-500 ; reception of the 
ships in the various countries visited. 496, 497 ; 
Admiral Sperry succeeds Admiral Evans in com- 
maud, 498; itinerary of the cruise with distances 
between ports visited, 500 ; departure of the fleet 
from Gibraltar for home, 500 : reception by the 
President in Hampt<m Roads, 500, 501 ; the pride 
of the American people in the success of the cruise, 
and the conduct of the officers and men of the 
battleships. 501 ; the hope and prayer of the people 
for the future. 501. 

Navy Department. The. creation of. 476. 

Nelidow. M., president of Second Hague Conference. 

Netherlands. The. See Holland. 

Netherlanders. The. grand hospitality of. 568. 

New England; financial condition of, in ISOO, 39; 
its rum and the slave trade, 40; wonderful dark 
day in, 79. 

's '• First Fruits," quoted, 704. 

. Forms of Religious Activity, 383-390 : Edward 

Everett Hale and the " Ten-times-one " clubs, 3S4 ; 
mottoes and principles of the clubs, 384 ; Mrs. 
Bottome and the King's Daughters, 385, 3S6 ; 
principles of the organization, 386 ; inception of 
the Young People's Society for Christian Endeavor, 
386; account of Rev. F. E. Clark and his great 
work. 386-388; enormous expansion of the society. 
388 ; the Epworth League. 389 : the Baptist Young 
People's I'nion. 3S9 ; the Brotherhood of St. An- 
drew. 390 ; general influence of the entire move- 
ment. 390. 

. Granada, treaty of 1S4G with the United States. 

599. 

— Navy, The. See Navy, The New, 

— Orleans, the battle of, 166-172; events that 
led up to the action, 167; detailed account of the 
battle, 170-172: effect of the victory, 172. 

— York, The Cruiser, description and trial test of. 
480 ; flagship of Admiral Sampson, 4S6 ; in tlie 
blockade and battle off Santiago, 492. 493. 

city, population and character of, in 1800, 

37: the expenses of its government at that period. 
37; character of its government when Twr>ed 
entered politics, 371 ; Its new charter, 378 ; shock- 
ing increase of indebtedness under Tweed's rule, 
377-380; the great blizzard in. 457-466. 

— . — State, population and taxable valuation of. In 
1800. 37. 

Times, exposes the Tweed ring. 380. 

Newberry. Walter L.. 754. 

Newman. Cardinal J. H. ; his estimate of the Chal- 

loner and Troy revisions of the Douay Bible. 436. 
Newspapers, character of the Colonial. 62. 
Nicaragua Canal route. Sec Panama Canal. 
Nineteenth Century, achievements of, greater than 

those of all preceding centuries. 32 ; conditions in 

the United States at the opening of the. 35. 
Nob nill. San Francisco. 629. 631. 
Normal Schools, history of the. 724. 723. 
Norman Invaders ruthlessly destroy everything Saxon. 

413, 414. 
North Carolina, population of and conditions in, about 

1800, 42. 



0. 

Odyssey, The, 31. 

Oersted, J. C, discovers the identity of magrtietism 
and electricity, 600, 601. 

Ohio river, first steamboat on the. 156. 

Old Latin Version of the Bible, The, 409. 

0/(7 Ironsides, 157. 

Old Testament the library of the Jews, The. 402. 

Olympiay The, flagship of Admiral Dewey, 484. 

Opinions, remarkable, regarding the Bible, 442-444. 

Oregon, The, '* Queen of the New Nuvy," 4S0 ; con- 
struction of. 478. 480; detailed account of her race 
against time and the enemy from San Francisco to 
Key West. 482 ; in the battle off Santiago. 492 : 
thrilling run to overtake the Colon, 493; effect of 
her trip around the Horn on the canal question, 
602. 

Oriental opinion of the influence of the United States, 
783. 

Origin of the Navy of the United Colonies. 474. 

Orling and Armstrong develop a novel system of 
wireless telegraphy. 675, 



Pakenham, Sir Edward. British commander at New 
Orleans, 170. 

Palfrey. Rev. J. G.. 740. 

Palimp.sests. description of, 407. 

Palmer, Alice Freeman ; successful work at Wellesley 
College. 728 ; Dean of Women's College at the 
University of Chicago. 729. 

Pan-American Congress, the third. 574. 

Panama Canal, The. 594-611 ; Ptolemy *s description 
of Asia. 594 ; origin of the name Cathay, 594 ; 
effect of conquests of the Grand Khan, 504 , 
knowledge gained in Europe from Cathay of ocean 
east of China, 595 ; object of ail early ocean 
navigators, 595 ; the Mariner's Compass, 595 ; 
media'val trade routes. 59G; plans for an isthmian 
canal follow closely the discovery of America, 506; 
efforts of Cortez, and interest of Philip 11., 596, 
597 : description of the isthmus connecting North 
and South America, 596; Saavedra marks out the 
four routes, about 1528. that have ever since been 
accredited. 597 ; entry of the English upon the 
scene, 598; explorations of von Humboldt; he marks 
out nine possible courses for a canal. 598; interest 
of Goethe in Humboldt's reports. 598 ; his won- 
dt^rful prophecy of future canals, 597, 598; Henry 
Clay. Secretary of State in 1826. orders a survey 
of the Nicaragim route, 599 ; the treaty between 
the United States and New Granada. 1846, 599; 
the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, 599 ; opening of the 
Panama railroad, 599 ; interest of Napoleon III. in 
isthmian canal schemes, 600 ; the Colombian con- 
cession to Lieut. Wyse, and organization of the 
French company. 600, 601 ; de Lesseps. and his 
visit to America, 600: attitude of the United States 
toward foreign companies stated by President Hayes, 
6<i0, 601 : bankruptcy of the French company and 
horrible scan<lals, 601 ; receiver of the old com- 
pany forms new French company, 601 ; efforts to 
sell their rights to the United States. 602 ; the 
Maritime Canal Company and the Nicaragua route. 
602 : effect of the Oregon's famous run from the 
Pacific coast on the canal proposition. 602 : com- 
mission appointed by President McKinley to in- 
vestigate the whole subject anew. 602 ; conclusions 
of the commissioners in favor of the Nicaragua 
route, 602, 603 ; Panama company offers to sell 
for $40,000,000. 602; the Spooner Amendment. 
603 ; the Hay-Pauncefote treaty, abrogating the 
Clayton-Bulwer. 603 : the Hay-Herran treaty to 
secure a strip of land across the isthmus from 
Colombia. 604 ; rejected by the Colombian Senate. 
604 ; the position of President Roosevelt. 604 : the 
romnrkable " revolution " in Panama, 605 ; letter 
of President Roosevelt to the Editor of the Hericw 
of Reviews, 606; transfer of rights of the French 



INDEX. 



827 



company to the United States, 606. 607 ; eousitruf- 
tion commission appointed under the terms of the 
Spooner Amendment, 607 ; repeated changes in the 
commission and its plans, 607; international board 
of engineers appointed to determine the type of the 
canai, 607 ; the President rejects its conclusions 
and decides upon the lock type, 607 ; construction 
finally placed in the hands of a board of army 
engineers, 608; members of the board, their salaries, 
etc., 608; results actually achieved to 1909, 609; 
appropriation provided for by the Spooner Amend- 
ment and probable cost of the completed work. 600 ; 
description of the route of the canal, and profile 
map, 609; descriptions and cost of other noted 
oauals, 610 ; debate in Congress over the type of 
canal. 610; the Gatun dam. 610; public sentiment 
as to conditions on the canal and progress of the 
work, 611. 

Panic. The Great. 267. 

Papyrus, how prepared and used, 404. 

Paris. University of. Law Scboul. 6S4. 685. 
— , meeting of Commissioners at. to arrange terms 
of Peace between Great Britain and the United 
States, 71. 
— , meeting of Commissioners at, to arrange terms 
of Peace between the United States and Spain, 
775-778. 

Parker. Francis, and the Chicago Normal Scnool, 725. 

Parting of the Ways. The. 782. 

Patton, F. L.. president of Princeton University, 714. 

Peabody. George; influence of his life and death on the 
settlement of the Alabama claims, GSl ; sketch of 
his life, 742-745 ; summary of his princely gifts, 
742-744 ; distinguished honors paid him, 743-745. 

Peace Conferences at The Hague, The, 557-584 ; the 
Jay treaty between England and the United States, 
558 ; provided for the settlement of disputed ques- 
tions by commissions, 558 ; inception of the prin- 
ciple of arbitration, 558; the Treatj' of Washing- 
ton. 559; opinion of John Morley. 559; reciprocal 
action of the Congress of the United States and the 
House of Commons, 559. 560 ; tlie first message of 
the Czar of Russia, calling for conference, 560 ; 
text of the document, and the response of the 
Nations, 561 ; skepticism regarding the measure, 
562 ; The Hague fixed upon as a place of meeting 
for the delfirates. 562 ; description of the city ami 
country, 502-565 ; organization of the first con- 
ference, 566, 567 ; character and scope of the rep- 
resentation at it. 567 ; the representatives of tlie 
United States, 567 ; description of the place of 
meeting, 568; magnificent hospitality of the Nether- 
landers, 568; the attitude of Germany on the re- 
duction of armaments. 569 ; address of Colonel 
Gilinsky, outlining the proposals of the Czar, 
569 ; hostile address of Colonel von Schwarzhoff, 
of the German army. 570,; report of committee 
against reduction of armaments, 570 ; notable ad- 
dress of Baron de Bildt. of Sweden, 570; struggle 
over the subject of arbitration, 572: the Permanent 
International Court of Arbitration, 572 ; real 
achievements of the First Conference, 573; pressure 
of public opinion on the Second Conference, 573 ; 
influence of the Interparliamentary Union, 574 ; 
meeting of the Second Conference, 575, 576; dele- 
gates from the United States, 574 ; comparative 
representation at the two conferences, 574 ; laying 
of the corner stone of the Carnegie Temple of Peace. 
575; more independent attitude of the delegates to 
the Second Conference. 576 ; subjects proposed for 
consideration at the second meeting, 576; notable 
address of Sir Edward Fry. 577; treatment of the 
question of armaments. 578 : attempt to establish 
a Permanent Court of Arbitral Justice. 579-5S2 ; 
address of M. Asser, the noted jurist of the 
Netherlands. 579; earnest efforts of Mr. Choate. 
580, 581 ; opposition of the smaller states, 581 . 
582 ; everything provided except the judges, 582 ; 
the establishment of the International Prize Court, 
582 ; recommendation of delegates as to future con- 



ferences, 582 ; estimate of the value of The Hague 
meetings by Secretary of State Root, 583 ; closing 
address of the Second Conference, 584; Tennyson 
quoted on the " Federation of the World," 584. 
— Jubilee, The National, 356-364; conception and 
execution of the idea by P. S. Gilmore, 356; the 
opening exercises, 358 ; account of the separate 
performances. 358-362; triumphs of Parepa-Rosa, 
Adelaide Phillips, and others. 360; attendance of 
General Grant, 362 ; the World's Peace Jubilee. 

— Protocol, signing of the, concluding hostilities 
363. 

between Spain and the United States, 494. 

— Societies, influence of, 680. 

Pearl harbor, cession of, to the United States, 550, 
Pearsons, D. K., notable gifts to American Colleges, 

754. 
Pele. the Hawaiian goddesa of volcanic fires, 529. 
Pellegrini, Dr. Carlos, 6S6. 
Penelope and her suitors, 31. 
Penn Charter School, The, 721. 
Pensacola. Florida; Jackson's engagement with the 

British at. 167. 
Perfection, the ultimate goal of the race, 33. 
Pericles, The Age of, 32. 
Perry, M. C, commands naval expedition to Japan, 

259-266. 
Persian Aryans overthrown by the Greek Aryans, 33. 
Petition. Struggle for the right of. 206-215. 
Pewter and China, use of, in Colonial homes, 57. 
Phelan, ex-Mayor J. D. ; vision of a re-constructed 

San Francisco, 633. 
Phi Beta Kappa Society, the founding of the, 710. 
Philadelphia, population of and life in, about 1800, 

35: the National Capital until 1800. 35. 
Philip, J. W., commands the Texas at Santiago. 

493; describes the famous " loop '* of the Brooklyn, 

493. 
Philip II. of Spain : his interest in an isthmian canal, 

596. 597. 
Philippines, The, secret message to Commodore Dewey 

regarding. 481 ; battle in Manila b.iy, 481-4.S6 ; 

clause in the Peace Protocol as to the disposal of. 

774; area and population of the islands. 781. 
Phillips Academy, Andover. Mass.. The, 720. 

. Exeter, N. H.. The. 720. 

— , Stephen J., quoted. 625. 677. 
Philosophy, birth of experimental. 639. 
Pilgrim Fathers. Bible of the, 428 ; their departure 

from Delft. 564. 
Pine Knnts. early use of, for lighting purposes, 59. 
Pittsburg, Pa., settlements about, in 1800, 44. 
Plague, The Great London, 702. 

Piatt. T. C, opinion of. as to the Spanish Wiir. 772. 
Pole, North, Conquest of, 767-798. 
Political Revolutions, The Era of, 34. 
Polk, President J. K.. 514. 515. 
Poole. Dr. William F., 755. 
** Poor Richard's Almanac " quoted, 645, 
Port Arthur, 613. 616. 618. 770. 

Porter, General Horace, delegate to the Hague Con- 
ference. 574. 
Porto Rico, invasion of. by the army under General 

Miles, 495; its area and population. 781. 
Portsmouth, The Treaty of. See Treaty of Portsmouth. 
Post Office Department, early history of. 49. 
Postage, rates of, established in 1792. 49. 
Powers. The, of the nineteenth century, 768; concert 

of the. 768. 
President of the L^'nited States, the first elecrinn of a. 

115: influences brouglit to bear upon Washington 

to accept the office. 116: he is unanimously elected, 

116. 
" Presidential Problems." by Grover Cleveland, 

quoted. 520, 521. 
Presidio, The. at San Francisco. 630, 631. 
Press. The European, on the enunciation of the Mon- 
roe Doctrine, 511-513. 
Princely Gifts. An Era of. See Era of Princely Gifts. 



828 



INDEX. 



Princeton College and University, the history of, 712- 
715. 

" Printer's Bible," The. 436. 

Printing, the story of the invention of, 417. 

Proclamation of Emancipation, The, 305-314. 

Proctor. Senator Redfiehl ; hi; visit to Cuba and re- 
port on conditions existing there, 470. 471. 

Propeller, The. or Screw ; tirst application of, to naval 
vessels, 47S. 

Protocol. The Peace. 494. 

Proudhun and Anarchism ; sketch of his life, and 
statement of bis princii)li-s, 447. 44S. 

Ptolemy's descriptioa of Asia, 51*4. 

Pulitzer, Joseph, founds School of Journalism, 761. 



R. 

Radcliffe College, 729. 

Randolph, The. in the fight with the Yarmouth, 475. 

Reciprticity anmng Scholars, GS4. 

Reformation. The Great, free spirit of, 34 ; influence 
of, upon the status of laborers, 394. 

Reid. Whitelaw; his account of the battle of Gettys- 
burg, 320; commissioner to the Peace Conference at 
Paris, 775. 

Reinsch, Professor: World Politics, quoted. 770, 772. 

Religious Activity, New Forms of. See New I'^orms of 
Religious Activity. 

— World, gieiit awaliening in the. 276-278. 
" Remember tlie Maine/' the war cry. 472. 
Republic, The Steamship, rescued in rusponse to wire- 
less telcgrapli. 676. 

Repnl)lican Governments, no place in. for large stand- 
ing armies or navies, 474. 

— Party platform of 1S06. 469. 

Resolutions of Congress, creating war with Spain, 473. 

Results, essential, of Bible revision. 441, 442. 

Revised Bible of the American Committee, The, 441. 

Revisers of the Bible, wcu-k of. described. 441. 

Revision of the Bible, The, 401-444 ; our authorized 
version of the Scriptures result of many previous 
revisions, 401 ; Old Testament and Apocrypha only 
Scriptures known to Jesus and the Apostles, 402 ; 
Old Testament the "library" of the Jews, 402; 
the place of the Synagogue in Jewish worship and 
life, 402 ; Jesus and the Synagogue worsliip. 402 ; 
the chest for the Scripture rolls. 402 ; description 
of the rolls and bow they were made. 4o;t. 404 ; 
papyrus, how prepared and used, 404 ; character 
and history of the Septuaijint translation of Hebrew 
Scriptures, 404, 405; description of sacred writings 
possessed by early Christian churches. 405 ; the 
sources of our Bible. 405. 4(i6 ; Manuscripts, 
Versions, and Writings of Early Church Fathers, 
each class teclmically described. 406 : description 
of Uncials, Cursives, and the Codes, 406 ; history 
of the Codex Vaticnnus, Codex Sinaitictiit, Codex 
Alexandrinus, 407. 408; the Palitnpsests ami Codex 
Ephraemi, 40,S ; account of early versions. 41)9; the 
Old I-^atin Version, 409; extreme corruption of texts 
before fourth century, 410; Jerome's revision, 380- 
400, A, D.. 410; becomes accepted version of the 
Catholic Church, the Vulgate, 411; early Saxon 
paraphrases of the Scriptures. 411 ; the Story of 
Caedmon, 411: the Venerable Bede's translation. 
412; he passes away as he finishes translation of 
John's Gospel, 412; inlluence of Alfred the Great. 
413 ; ruthless destruction of everything Saxon by 
the Norman Invaders. 413. 414; gradual formation 
of new English lancujise. 414 ; John Wyclif and 
his translation of the Scriptures into English. 410: 
portrait of Wyclif. 416; reception and wonderful 
influence of Wyclifs Bible, 417; invention of print- 
ing: the Jfazarin Bible the first book printed 
frtiui movable types. 417 ; portrait of Giitenberg. 
417; Luther's translation of the New Testami-nt 
into German (1522K 418; the Greek Testament of 
Erasmus. 418 ; portrait of Erasmus. 41S ; history 
of Tj-ndale's translation. 419-421 : portrait of Tyn- 
dale. 420: his final revision of same (l.'J34). 422; 
character and supreme Influence of this translation. 



— the basis of all subsequent versions, 425 ; descrip- 
tiou of Coverdale*s {15;JG). Matthew's (1537). and 
Tavcrner's (1.539) Bibles, 424. 425; portrait of 
Myles Coverdale, 424; Cromwell's (Jreat Bible, 
" authorized to be read and frequented In every 
chur<'h in the kingdom," 425; the historian Green's 
remarkable description of effect of English transla- 
tion of the Bible on the people, 427 ; portrait of 
J. R. Green. 427; the Oeneia, or Brfirlits, Bible, 
its character and popularity, — the Bible the Pil- 
grim Fathers brought to America. 428 ; compara- 
tive page of translations of the tv.-enty-third Psalm, 
429: the Bishops' Bible of 156S, supersedes the 
Great Bilde in the English Ciiurch, 430 ; events 
that KhI to the making of tlie King James, or 
Authorized, Version, 431 ; character and portrait of 
King James, 431 ; the Geneva and King James 
Versions long-time competitors for popular favor, 
434; the Bible used in the Catholic churches, 432; 
decree of Council of Trent (1545) gives Jerome's 
Vulgate Ecumenical authority. 433 ; oldest extant 
copy of the Vulgate, the Codex Amiatinus, and its 
history, 433 ; first Catholic translation into English, 

— the Rheinis-Donay. or Douay, Bible. 435 ; the 
Challoner and McMahon, — or Troy, — revisions of 
the Douay. 436; opinions of Cardinals Newman and 
Wiseman as to former, 436; position of the Vatican 
Council of 1S70, 43fi; decree of Second Baltimnre 
Council, 1860. relating to texts to be used in the 
United States, 436, 437 ; descriptions of many 
curious and rare editions of the Bible, — the Mur- 
derers, the Wicked, the Printers', the Vinegar, the 
Unrighteous^ the Bug, and others, 437, 438; causes 
that led up to the revision of 1880, 439 ; work of 
the Revisers desi_'ril)ed, 440, 441 ; the American 
Committee and its work. 441 ; the revised version 
for the United States, published by the American 
Committee in 1901. 441 ; nothing essential lost In 
late revisions but text now secured unquestionably 
essentially same as that used in Early Church, 441, 
442 ; Shakespeare's use of the Bible, — 540 direct 
quotations or use of Bible figures, 442 ; remarkable 
testimonies of Milton. Emerson, Macaulay, Matthew 
Arnold, Goethe. JelTerson. Daniel Webster, Burke, 
Carlyle. Ruskin, Scott. Dickens, Thackeray, and 
many others, as to the supreme worth of the Bible, 
442-444; Charles A. I)ana. — " there is no book like 
the Bible," 444; quotation from WTiittier's Miriam, 
444. 

Revolution of 1688, The. and establishment of consti- 
tutional government. 35. 

Revolutionary movements of the last century, causes 
that led up to the, 445. 

— War, cost of the. 45. 
Revolutions. Era of Political, 34, 
Rheinis-Douay, or Douay. Bible, The, 435. 

Rhodes, Cecil John, sketch of the life of, 687; his 
great ambition in life. 087. 6SS : purpose in estab- 
lishing his scholarships, 688; working of the plan, 
688. 

Ricbnumd, Va.. Fall of, 334-343; for four years prin- 
cipal object of attack and siege, 335 ; effect of 
Sherman's march to the sea on the downfall of the 
city, 335; account of the final battles before the 
city, 335. 336; President Lincoln's attitude as to 
terms of peace. 338. 339; meeting between Grant 
and Lee. and terms of surrender, 339, 340 ; occupa- 
tion of the city by W'eitzel's brigade. 340; visit of 
President Lincoln to the Confederate capital, 340 ; 
incidents of the visit. 340, 341 ; circumstances at- 
tending the flight of President Davis from Rich- 
mond, 341 ; his capture and the close of the war, 
341, 342 ; ceremony attendant upon the re-occupa- 
tion of Fort Sumter, 342. 

Richthofen, estimate of, as to mineral wealth of 
China. 769. 

Ride-and-tie System, The, 51. 

Right of Petition, Struggle for the, 206-215. 

Rights of man versus the " divine rights " of Kings 
and Institutions, 445. 

Rise of modern labor organizations, 394-398, 



INDEX. 



829 



Roach, John, shipbuilder; Initial contract with, for 
New Navy, 479. 

Roads, superiority of the Roman, 32. 

Rockefeller, John D,, 731 ; summary of his notable 
gifts. 763, 764 ; the University of Chicago. 764 ; 
rules upon which his gifts are cuuditioued, 764 ; 
the General Board of Education, 764. 

Roelandsen, Adam, the first schoolmaster In America, 
695. 

Rome, effect of the conquests of, 34. 

Roosevelt, Theodore, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 
490; Lieut. Colonel of the "Rough Riders," 490; 
welcomes battleship fleet home, 500 ; proposes call 
for a second Peace Conference. 574 ; connection with 
the Panama canal. 603-607 ; famous letter to the 
editor of the Hcvicw of Revuics, 606 ; sends iden- 
tical notes to Japan and Russia urging a confer- 
ence looking toward peace. 620 ; receives envoys 
from Japan and Russia on the Mayflower, 621. 

Rosen, Barou, envoy of Russia to Portsmouth Confer- 
ence, 620, 622. 

Rough Riders, The. 490. 491. 

Round Robin of army officers to the Secretary of War, 
The, 494. 

Rum, New England, and the slave trade. 40. 

Rumford, Count, founds the British Royal Institution, 
649. 

Russell, Lord Chief Justice, 523. 

Russia, development of destructive anarchism In, 450; 
murder of Alexander II., and Its results. 450 ; 
schemes to control Manchuria and Korea, 612-614 ; 
builds the Siberian railway, 614 ; efforts to secure 
terminal on the Yellow Sea. 613, 614; character of 
her interests in Manchuria. 614 ; leases Port Ar- 
thur, 616; secret treaty with China, 616; drives 
Japan to war by her dilatory tactics, 617 ; loses 
every engagement, and her entire navy, in the war 
with Japan, 61S ; seeds envoys to meet those of 
Japan at Portsmouth. 620 ; cedes southern half of 
Saghalleo island to Japan, 622. 



s. 

Saavedra, Alvaro de, plans for an isthmian canal, 
597. 

Sage. Russell. 761. 
— , Mrs. Russell, princely gifts of, 762. 

Saghalien island, southern half of, ceded to Japan by 
Russia. 622. 

St. Augustine on the powers of the magnet, 638, 639. 

St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York city, 370. 

St. Saviour's Church. Southwark, London, 701, 702. 

Saint-Simon, and his teachings, 447. 

Sainte-Beuve, quoted. 504. 

Salisbury, Lord. 519-522. 

Sampson, Admiral W, T., blockades the Cuban coast. 
483. 

San Francisco, destruction of, 626-635; early discov- 
erers of California. 626: the Franciscan missions, 
626; the Mission Dolores. 626. 627; effects of the 
discovery of gold. 627 ; character of the early set- 
tlers, 627, 62S; the vigilance leagvies. 628; early 
baptisms of fire. 628, 629 ; general character of the 
buildings of the city, 629 ; description of the geog- 
raphy of the city. 629 : its peculiar cliarra, " Bohe- 
mian to the core," 628 ; the earthquake of April 
18. 1906, 629; city without water. 630: details of 
the terrible fire of two days, 630-632 ; area cov- 
ered, 631, 632 ; peculiar conditions that existed for 
a month following the fire. 632 ; glorious response 
of the nation to the city's need, 632; property loss 
and insurance, 633 ; fine work of Mayor Schmitz and 
his advisory board. 633 : summery of the situation 
by ex-Mayor Phelan, 633 ; character of the new 
buildings, 633. 634 ; the Burnhnm plans for beau- 
tifying the city. 634 ; area of burned district now 
rebuilt. 635 ; trial of Mayor Schmitz. 635 ; outlook 
for the future. 635. 

San Juan Hill, fight at, 491. 



Sandwich. Earl of. 527. 
— Islands. The. See Hawaiian Islands. 

Sankey. Ira D., associated with Mondy in revival 
work, 2S4-2SS. 

Santiago, Cuba, blockade of, by the American navy. 
4S2-493 ; investment of, by American troops, 490- 
494 ; surrender of the city, 404. 

Sawaioris, The, 531, 

Saxon paraphrases of the Scriptures, 411. 

Schley, Admiral W. S., engages in blockade of Cuban 
ports. 487 ; his remarkable retrograde movemt-nt 
fmni Santiago, 487; his cunduct in the tight with Cer- 
vera's squadron, 493; the historical "loop," 493. 

Schmicz, Mayor of San Francisco. 630, 633, 635. 

Scholarships, The Rhodes, 687, OSS. 

Schumburgk. Robert, 518. 

Schoolliouse, the primitive. 699. 

Schoolmasters. Colonial, salaries and duties of, 696; 
character of meu selected for such positions, 708. 

Science, meagre development of, at opening of the 
nineteenth century, 62. 

Scott, J. B., delegate to The Hague Conference, 574. 
— , Walter; his reverence for the Bible, — "there is 
but one book," 433. 

Screw. The, or Propeller; Its first application to naval 
vessels, 478. 

Scripture rolls of the Jews, description nf, 403, 404. 

Scriptures known to Jesus and the Apostles, 402. 

Sea wall, the great, at Galveston, 591. 

Searchlight on vessels, the, 670. 

Selection, change of natural, from physical to psychi- 
cal lines, 34. 

Selenium, discovery and uses of, 671. 

Semitic races, supremacy of, 33. 

Septuagint translation of the Jewish Scriptures, his- 
tory of the, 404, 405. 

.SVrapjs, The, destroyed by the Boji Homme Richard, 73. 

Serfdom, tlie merging of slavery into. 393. 

Seventy, The Committee of, to investigate the Tweed 
Ring. 379-3S2. 

'* — Centuries," by J. N. Lamed, quoted, 33. 

Sewall, Harold M., 555. 

Sewing machine, invention of the. 226-233: sketch of 
the life of Elias Howe, Jr.. 227; principles covered 
by his patents. 230; other inventors and their ma- 
chines. 230, 231 ; wonderful results of this Inven- 
tion, 232. 

Seymour, Sir Edward, 709. 
— . Horatio, Democratic candidate for the Presi- 
dency, 375. 

Shaffer. General W. R., in command of the army at 
Santiago. 490. 

Shakespeare, William ; his use of. and dependence on, 
the Bible, 442; his probable connection with John 
Harvard. 701. 

Shays' Rebellion in Massachusetts, 46; causes of, 101; 
peculiar conditions existing in New England, 102 ; 
Washington's letter regarding tlie situation, Ht3 ; 
efforts of Governor Bowdoin to allay the excite- 
ment, 104 ; the attack upon the Springfield armory. 
106; surrender of the insurgents, 107. 

Sheridan. General P. H.. 515. 

Sherman, General W. T. ; his great march through the 
South. 320-333 ; his personal statement as to the 
conception of the campaign, 326: Atlanta his first 
objective point, 326 : burning of the city. 327 : 
Lincoln's view of the situation, 328; details of the 
march, 328-332 ; interesting accounts of correspond- 
ents, 330, 331 ; Sherman's Christmas present to the 
President. 332 ; general results of the Invasion, 332. 

Shimonoseki, Treaty of. 615. 

Siberian railroad. The. 613. 614. 

Sigsbee. Captain Charles D., in command of tbe Maine 
at Havana, 471. 

Sinaiticus. The Codex, described, 407. 

Singer. I. M., an inventor of the sewing machine. 231. 

Slater, John F. ; his noble gift for Freedmen. 746. 

Slave Trade, New England's interest in the. 40. 

Slavery, origin and rapid spread of, 392. 

Slaves, nmnber of negro, In United States In 1800, 40. 



830 



INDEX. 



Skmne. Pruft'sscir W. M., quoted, 714. 
Smith College. 72S. 729. 
■ — . SopUia. founds Smith College, 729. 
SmithsoD, James, founds the Smithsonian Institution, 

745. 
Social life In the Colonies. 42. 
Socialism, influence of the French Revolution upon the 

rise of, 447; relation between it and Anarchism, 

447. 
Socrates on the power of the magnet. 63S. 
Sorbonne, The; establishment of American lectures at, 

GS4. 
Sources of our Bible. The. 405. 406. 
South-pointing car. The Chinese. 638. 
Spain, the war with. See Spanish war. 
Spanish and American governments, communications 

between, prior to the war. 469. 470. 

— Colonies in America, revolt of. between ISIO and 
1S20, 507; proposal of the Holy Alliance to reduce 
them to subjection, 507 ; attitude of the United 
States as expressed in President Monroe's message, 
509, 510. 

— fleet. The, under Cervera, description of. 4S7. 4SS. 

— War, The. 468-474. 481-494; positions of Presi- 
dents Cleveland and McKiuley as to Cuban affairs. 
468. 469 ; report of Senator Proctor on conditions 
In the island. 469, 470; diplomatic correspondence 
between the American and Spanish governments. 
470; destruction of the Maine. 471; the President's 
message to Congress on the situation, 473 : resultant 
resolutions of Congress, — a virtual declaration of 
war. 473 ; cessation of diplomatic relatipns, 473 ; 
mobilization of land and naval forces, 4S1 ; blockade 
of Cuban ports by Admiral Sampson, 4S3 ; orders to 
Commodore Dewey at Hong Kong. 483; destruction 
of the Spanish fleet in Manila bay, 484-486 ; Ad- 
miral Cervera nnis his fleet into Santiago harbor, 
487; close blockade of the harbor. 487-489; the 
sinking of the Mcrrimac in the harbor entrance. 
489 ; assembling of troops in Florida. 490 ; em- 
barkation of the Fifth Army Corps for Santiago. 
490 ; land attack upon the fortifications about the 
city. — El Caney. and San Juan hill, 491 ; the de- 
struction of Cervera's fleet, 492-404 ; surrender of 
Santiago. 494 ; the Invasion of Porto Rico, 494 ; 
signing of the Peace Protocol, August 12. 1898. 
494; the true causes of the war not clearly known, 
770; cost of the war. 781. 

Spears. John L. . historian of the Navy, quoted, 479. 

Sperry. Admiral. C. S.. assumes command of the bat- 
tleship fleet. 497 : his estimate of the value of the 
famous cruise, 49S ; brings the fleet back to Hamp- 
ton Roads. 498. 499 ; delegate to the Second Hague 
Conference. 574. 

Sppyer. James M.. endows a German professorship at 
Columbia University. 6S6. 

Spinning Wheel. The. 31. 

Spokane, Wash. ; its remarkable water power. 667, 668, 

Spooner. W. B., opinion regarding the settlement of 
the Philippine question. 780. 

— Amendment, The, 603. 

Sitringfield, 111., burial of President Lincoln at, 350. 

Springfield. Mass. ; its Court House seized, and Court 
broken up. by insurgents under Shays. 106; the 
T'nited States Armory attacked. 106; insurgents dis- 
persed, with three killed, by the State troops, 106. 

Staal. M. de, president of the first Hague Conference, 
567. 

Stage Coach, the early. 52. 

Stanford. Iceland: sketch of his life. 749-752; princi- 
pal promoter and builder of the Central Pacific 
railroad, 750; account of his son Ijeland. and the 
family devotion. 751. 752 ; the Palo Alto stock 
farm and ranch, 751 ; lays the foundation of the 
great university in memory of his son. 752. 

Stead. W. T.. 678. 

Steam, first successful application of. to navigation. 
151. 

— war vessels, first construction of, 477. 



Steers, Captain George, designs the victorious yacht 
America, 250, 252. 

Stevens, John, and son ; their experiments in steam 
navigation. 153; build the first boat to navigate the 
<icean by steam, 156. 

Stevenscin, Robert Louis, quoted. 467. 

Stoddert, Benjamin, first Secretary of the Navy, 476. 

Stuart. Mrs. Mary Macrae, great gifts of. 760. 

Sturgeon. William, discovers the electro-magnet, 652. 

Stuyvesant, Peter, 695, 

Submarine cable, description of the, 661. 

Summary of races for America's cup. 258, 

Sumter. Fort, ceremony attendant upon the re-occupa- 
tion of, 342. 

SutclilTe. Robert; his account of a journey through tlie 
states in 1804. 41. 

Sutter's Mill, discovery of gold at, 242-259. 

Suttner, Baroness von. on the Hague Conferences, 573. 

Swarthraore College declines proffered gift of Miss 
Jeanes, 747. 

Sweeney. Peter B.. member of the Tweed Ring. 376. 

Synagogue, the place of the, in Jewish life, 402. 



T. 

Tabard Inn, The. 701. 

Takahira, Baron, envoy from Japan to Portsmouth 

Conference. 621. 
Tammany Hall and the Tweed Ring, 371-3S2; charmed 

life of the society, 382. 
Tampa, Florida, embarkation of troops from, 490. 
Taylor, Hannis, Minister to Spain. 469; his ** History 

of the English Constitution," 690. 
— , Joseph W.. founds Bryn Mawr College, 729. 
Telegraph, invention and perfection of the Electric, 

655-659; the wireless system. 673-676. 

— Hill, San Francisco, 629. 631. 
Telephone, invention of the. 664-667. 

Temperance Reform Movement. The, 217-225; leading 
actf^irs in. 218: organization of the Washington Tem- 
perance Society. 219 ; the work of Father Mat hew 
in America, 222 ; opinions of distinguished men 
regarding the work. 224. 225. 

Temple of Peace. The Carnegie, at The Hague, 575. 

Tcnnent. William, and his Log College, 712. 

Tennyson, AIfre<l, quoted, 35. 584. 

Tenth Cavalry. The. negro regiment, valiant action of, 
at San Juan Hil!. 491. 

Testimonies, remarkable, concerning the Bible. 442- 
444. 

Teutonic nations, birth of the. 34 ; influence upon the 
development of the race. 34. 

Thackeray. W. M. ; his reverence for the Bible. 443. 

Thaiidcj/s, The. missionary brig to the Sandwich 
islands. 537. 

Thales and the magnet. 638. 

The Hague, description of. 562 ; its famous Art gal- 
lery, 565; the House in the Wood, 565; Peace Con- 
ferences at. 557-584. 

Theodore Roosevelt Professorship at the University of 
Berlin. The. 685. 

Thompson, H. Y., pioneer In educational reciprocity, 
6S6. 

Tililen. Samuel J.. Chairman of Committee of Seventy, 
380; founds New York city library. 760. 

Tischendorf, Professor Constantin. discovers the Codex 
Sinaiticus, 70. 

Toral, General, surrenders Spanish army at Santiago, 
494. 

Tori<'S, treatment of the. during the Revolutionary 
War. 69. 

Trade routes. The mediaeval. 596. 

— Unions in the United States. 395; John Mitchell's 
statement of the case of, 395, 396. 

Translations, comparative page of, of the twenty-third 

Psalm. 429. 
Transportation, electric. 672. 673. 
Treaty of Portsmouth. The. 612-625; description of 

Manchuria and Korea, 612, 613; the Siberian rail- 



INDEX. 



831 



road. 613; peculiar measures of Russia to secure 
terminus on the Yellow Sea, 61-4 ; establishment of 
Russian '* depots '* in Manchuria, 614 ; nature of 
Russia's interest in the control of that country. 
614; very different interests of Japan, 614, 615; 
rapid growth of Japanese population and commerce. 
614. 615; war between Japan and China and its 
results, 615; Russia secures virtual control of Man- 
churia for thirty years by secret treaty, 616; effect 
of the " Boxer " uprising on the general situation. 
616 ; Japan's last effort at peaceful negotiations 
with Russia, 616; severs diplomatic relations, 617; 
sudden attack of Japanese on Chemulpo harbor and 
Port Arthur. 618; brief review of the Russo-Japa- 
neso war and its results, 61S ; movements toward 
intervention, 619 ; such a course made natural by 
clauses of conventions adopted by the Hague Con- 
ference, 619 ; early efforts of Secretary Hay to 
secure the integrity of China, 620 ; conditions fol- 
lowing the battle of Muliden, and destruction of the 
Russian Baltic fleet, 620 ; identical notes sent to 
both combatants by President Roosevelt, 620 ; en- 
voys plenipotentiary appointed by the two Powers, 
621 ; their arrival in America and reception by the 
President on the Mayflower, 62 1 : Portsmouth, 
N. H., selected as a meeting place for the envoys, 
622 ; detailed account of the meetings of the en- 
voys, 622, 623; final agreement and execution of 
the Treaty, 623 ; reception of the treaty terms in 
Russia and Japan, 624; real significance and effect 
of the Treaty. 624. 

Trencher. The. use of, in Colonial days, 58. 

Trent. The Council of, decree of, as to Jerome's Vul- 
gate. 433. 

Trenton, N. J., grand reception of Washington at. lis. 

Troy, The, or McMahon. revision of the Douay Bible. 
436. 

Trueblood, B. F. ; his *' Federation of the World " 
quoted. 566. 

Trust, the stage coach, 53. 

Tutuila. 781. 

Twenty-third Psalm, page of comparative translations 
of. 429. 

Tweed Ring. The, 371-382: character of New York 
city government, 371 ; conditions that made or- 
ganization of the Ring possible, 372-375 ; Tweed's 
first entry Into politics, 372 ; election to the Na- 
tional Congress. 373 ; his rapid rise in Tammany 
Hall, 373; Mozart Hall and Fernando Wood. 373; 
the new Wigwam, and the Democratic National 
Convention of 1868, 374, 375; Horatio Seymour 
forced upon the Convention, 375 ; Tammany's state 
and city candidates all elected, 376 ; the city ring 
complete, — Tweed, ** Oakey *' Hall, Sweeney, and 
Connolly, 376 ; Tweed's new city charter. 378 ; the 
combination of Fisk. Gould, the Tammany ring, 
and the ring of the State legislature, 378 ; estimates 
of the stealings. 378. 379 ; shocking increase in the 
city's indebtedness. 379 ; Tweed declines proposal 
to erect monument to him, 380; exposures of the 
New York Times, 380. 381 ; the Committee of Sev- 
enty, and its work, 380-382 ; Tweed's arrest, con- 
viction, and sensational escape. 381 ; his capture 
and re-trial under a special law, 381 ; his death 
in Ludlow street jail, 381 ; summary of the mar- 
velous operations of the ring, 381. 382; fate of its 
other members. 382; Tammany's charmed life, 382. 

Tyndale. William, translates the Bible into English, 
419-421 ; character and supreme importance of his 
translation, 425 ; his martyrdom and last words, 
423. 

Tyndall. John : his Lowell Institute lectures. 740, 
741 ; establishes scholarships at American universi- 
ties, 741. 

u. 

Ulysses, the return of. 31. 

Uncials, the capital letter manuscripts, described. 406. 

Union, The Interparliamentary, 574. 

Unions, The Labor, 396-400. 



United States, wealth and population of the. about 
ISOO, 35, 44; conditions in, at the opening of the 
nineteenth century, 35; state of atTairs in, preced- 
ing the Spanish war, 467, 468. 

■ , Tlie. a World Power, 767-783; influence of 

catch phrases and sentiments, 767, 768; the so- 
called world Powers, 768 ; the ** Concert of the 
Powers," 768; the great change in political senti- 
ment toward the close of the nineteenth century. 
709; influence of tariffs and ovcr-proiluction, 769; 
Europe no longer the world, 7G9 ; outbreak of the 
land-grabbing fever, 760; conditions in China. 769; 
outbreak of the European nations in China due to 
formation of the Steel Trust in the Uniti'd States, 
769; tlie "battle for concessions," 770; n-al causes 
of the war between the United States and Spain, 
770 ; causes set forth by the resolutions of Congress, 
770; the declarations of President McKinley, 771; 
attitude of the dominant party in Congress, 771, 
772 ; cause of the war fmm the Congressional 
standpoint, political. 771 ; light thrown upon the 
subject by the late Senator George F. Hoar. 772 ; 
position of leading party men regarding the annexa- 
tion of Hawaii. 773 ; real causes of the war politi- 
cal and commercial, not humanitarian, 774 ; clause 
of the Peace Protocol as to the disposal of the 
Philippines. 774 ; delegates from the United States 
to arrange terms of peace at Paris, 775 ; general 
instructinns of the President as to the Philippines. 
775; differences between the Commissioners at Paris 
regarding the Philippine cession, 776; positive stand 
taken by Commissioner George Gray. 776. 777 ; 
President McKinley 's western tour and change of 
position, 777; demands cession of the whole archi- 
pelago. 777; payment of $20,000,000 for the .same. 
777; treaty signed December 10, 1898; the United 
States a World Power, 778; different views of the 
influence of the United States, 778, 779; lack of 
interest in the "principles of the Fathers," 779; 
the debate on the Spanish treaty, 779. 780 ; changed 
attitude of Senators regarding the question, 780; 
opinion of Senator Spooner. 780 ; outbreak between 
American and Philippine troops. 780 ; influence of 
W. J. Bryan, 780 : Joint Resolutions of Congress an- 
nexing Hawaii. 781 : the foreign possessions that 
constitute the United States a WnrlJ Power. 781 ; 
cost of the war with Spain. 781 ; the curse of 
militarism. 782 ; the glorious development of our 
nation, 782 ; the parting of the ways, 782 ; an 
Oriental opinion of America's course, 783; the 
brighter outlook, 783. 

Universe, The, not a machine but an organism, 32; 
an immense unit, 32 ; events of, not works of 
chance. 32. 

Unrighteous Bible, The, 437. 



Vancouver. Captain George, 534. 

Vanderbilts, benefactions of the, 76. 

Vane. Sir Henry, 700. 

Vassar College. 728. 

Vatican Council, The, decree of, regarding the Vulgate 
Bible. 436. 

Vaticanus. The Codex, described, 407. 

Venezuela, Boundary Dispute, The. 517-524; unsavory 
reputation of Great Britain in regard to the acqui- 
sition of territory, 517; her protest against Amer- 
ican settlements on the Columbia river, 517; spicy 
rejoinder of John Quincy Adams. 518; origin of the 
trouble over the Venezuela boundary line. 518 ; 
claims set up by Robert Schomburgk. 518 ; con- 
stantly aggressive movements by Great Britain in 
the face of Venezuelan protests, 518, 510 ; Vene- 
zuela's appeal to the United States, 519; all rep- 
resentations of both governments ignored by Great 
Britain, 519 : President Cleveland's message to 
Congress on the subject. 519, 520 ; prompt action 
by both houses, 520 ; appointment of a commission 



832 



INDEX. 



by the United States to determine the true 
boundary line, 522; Great Britain consents to arbi- 
trate, 52^ ; distinguished list of arbitrators and 
their decree, 523. 

VersitJHs as sources of our Bible, technical meaning 
of. 406, 

Vertus. Plains of. 503. 504. 

Vessels, the largest of the Revolutionary Navy com- 
pared with thosf of the New Navy, 475. 

Victoria. Queen, honors George Peabody. 743. 744. 

Vigilance leagues. The Early California, 627. 628. 

Vincent. Bishop J. H., and The Chautauqua, 730. 

Vinegar Bible. The, 436. 

Virginia, population of, and slaves, about ISOO ; 

early schools of, 708. 
— and Pennsylvania, early conditions In, compared, 
41. 42. 

Vladivostok, 613. 

Volta. and the Voltaic battery, 64S. 

Voltaire, (luotrd. 709. 

Vulgate. The; Jerome's revision of the old Latin Bible, 
411; decree <)f the Council of Trent regarding, 433; 
oldest extant copy of, and its history, 433. 



w. 

Wainwrlght, R. D., commander of the GloitCCStcr, 
492-494. 

War. cost of the Revolutionary, 45. 

Washington, George, the strenuous advocate of inde- 
pendence. GG ; nominated and elected Coramander-in- 
Chief of the Army, 89 ; assumes command at 
Cambridge. July 2, 1775 ; causes Declaration of 
Indepondence to be read to army, 68; conspiracy to 
proclaim him King. 91 ; farewell to the Army at 
Newburgh, and to the officers at Fraunces* tavern, 
New York city, 92 ; grand ovation to, on his 
journey to Mt. Vernon. 93 ; resigns his commission 
to Congress, at Annapolis. Md., 93; made president 
of the Convention to draft a Constitution. Ill; 
unanimously elected first President of the United 
States. 116; his journey from Mt. Vernon to New 
York to assume office, 120; his position on the 
question of locating the national capital, 131; hi3 
last illness and death. 136-143; burial at Mt. 
Vernon, 142 : estimates of his character and great- 
ness, 142. 143. 
— . the National Capital, in 1800. 40. See also un- 
der Capital. 
— • Temperance Society, The, 219. 
— . Treaty of. 559. 
— University. St. Louis, rehabilitation of the, 756. 

Waterman. Nixon, quoted. 690. 

Watson. Dr. William, affirms the existence of elec- 
trical ether, 641 ; his *' Experiments and Observa- 
tions.** and its influence on Franklin. 642. 

Wayside Inn. The, 53. 

Webster, Daniel, meets Hayne in great debate. 197- 
205 ; description of his manner and the immediate 
effect of his oratory, 201-205: his matchless fame 
as a statesman established. 205 : Secretary of State, 
and the "Caroline Affair." 205; his appreciation 
of the Bible. 443 : his great argument in the 
" Dartmouth College Case." 718. 719. 

Hayne debate. The, 197-205; events that led up 

to It. 198 ; Webster's great oration. 200. 201 ; 
tremendous excitement attendant upon the debate, 
2ft2. 

Wei-hai-wai. leased by China to England. 770. 

Weitzel, General, with his brigade first to enter 
Richmond. 340. 

Wellesley College. 723. 

Wells Collegre, 728. 



Wells. Dr. Horace, claims the discovery of ether. 

230. 241, 
Weyler. General, recalled from Cuba. 470. 
" What God Hath Wrought," the first message orer 

the Morse telegraph, 057. 
Wheeler, Benjamin Ide, on the charm of old San 

Francisco. 628. 
— , General Joseph, 491. 
White. Andrew D.. commissioner to determine the 

Venezuela boundary line. 522 ; delegate to the first 

Hague Conference, 5G4 ; notable tribute to Hugo 

Grotius. 564. 

— Squadron. The. 479. 480. 

Whitney, Eli. and his cotton gin. 44. 122; sketch of 
his early life. 123; base treatment of. by Southi^ru 
planters, 125-127 ; bitter struggle of the inventor 
to protect his rights. 127. 

Whittier, J. G., and the Bible; quotation from his 
Miriam, 444. 

Wicked Bible. The. 436. 

Wigwam. Tammany's New, 374. 

Wilhelmina, Queen, sketch of her life. 565; her mes- 
sage of welcome to the delegates to The Hague 
Conference. 507. 

William and Mary College, history of, 709-711. 

Williams College, founding of, 718. 

Wilson, Woodrow, president of Princeton University, 
715. 

Winthrop, John. 69G. 

— , Robert C. quoted, 745; his influence in directing 
the course of princely gifts. 760. 

Wireless telegraph, tlie. a result of the discovery of 
the etheric waves, 673 ; Marconi and his system. 
673-676 ; detailed account of his experiments, 673- 
675 ; the claims of other inventors, 674 : remarkable 
invention of Orling and Armstrong, 675; the rescue 
of the steamship Reiiublir. G7G. 

Wiseman. Cardinal; his estimate of the Challoner and 
Troy revisions of the Douay Bible. 436. 

Witherspoon. James, president of Princeton College, 
713. 

Witte, Sergius. envoy of Russia to the Portsmouth 
Conference, 620-623. 

Women. American, beauty and accomplishments of, 36. 

Wood, Colonel Leonard, organizes the " Rough Riders." 
490. 

Woodford, General S. L., Minister to Spain. 469, 

Worden, Lieut. J. L., commander of the Monitor, 
300-302. 

World Power, src. United States a World Power. The. 

— Powers, illustrations of, 7GS. 

Wyclif, John, influence of, upon the status of laborers, 
393 ; his translation of the Bible into the new 
English tongue, 416; wonderful influence of his 
translation. 417. 

Wyman. William, makes gifts to Johns Hopkins T'ni- 
versity. 748. 

Wyse, Lieut., secures concession for a canal from 
Colombia. 600. 

T. 

Yale College and University, history of. 711, 712. 

— . Elihu. sketch of the life of. 711. 712. 
Yaln river, the. 613. 614. 

Yarmouth, The. in fight with the RandolpJt, 475. 
Yellow fever, repeated scourges of. 35. 

— Journals, the evil influence of. 496. 679. 
Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor, 386- 

388; organization of the first society. 386; rapid 
spread of the idea, 387 : the third annual conven- 
tion of. 387: publication of the Christian Endeavor 
World. 388: twenty-eighth birthday message of 
President Clark. 388 ; seventy-one thousand societies, 
with over four million members. 388. 
Youth of the Nation, The. 782. 



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